By Paul Tripp
It’s easy to see people for what they can get you rather than seeing people for who they really are. Love for people isn’t everyone’s motivation in ministry, however, ministry itself is a calling rooted in loving people. It’s of utmost importance to continually remind yourself why you are in ministry in the first place: to love those Christ has called you to love.
If God has called you to leadership, He didn’t just called you to lead people. He called you to give yourself to people. In ministry, you must be willing to have your life complicated and potentially even muddied for the sake of loving others. You were not given a position of leadership to lord it over others and to use others to bring glory to yourself but to selflessly love those you lead.
Christ displayed this perfect, selfless love, when He gave up everything to come down to earth, take our sins upon His shoulders, and endure the punishment that we rightly deserve. Christ continues to show us this selfless love when He draws us to Himself, day after day, extending grace to us even when we sin and intentionally rebel against Him.
Christ displays perfect leadership: raising up those He serves above Himself, valuing the needs of others over His own needs. This is the kind of leadership that we should seek to replicate and reflect. Leadership is about the heart. It’s about willingness to make sacrifices of the heart. Leadership is fighting the temptation of control and self-glory.
Do you see people as people? Do you love them with that same degree of love? Are you committed to leading, not just to lead, but to give yourself to those you’ve been called to lead? Love like Jesus did.
Adapted from Training Pathway: Discipleship. Check out more training videos on Ministry Grid here.
