NOTES ABOUT LEADERSHIP

Just like every secular organization, every Christian ministry needs leaders.

Of course, Jesus is ultimately the leader of every legitimate Christian ministry. Awareness of that fact ought to cause Christian leaders to become and remain humble.

Nevertheless, when it comes to the operations of the Church, human leaders are also needed. Usually, when God works in this world, he does so by using human beings as the instruments of his will. God is certainly capable of doing things without our help, and he sometimes chooses to do so, but I believe that God takes pleasure in delegating a certain amount of the work to us and watching as we learn to trust the Holy Spirit who dwells within us to give us the power to do things we could not do in our own strength. There's a good reason why the Church is described as "the Body of Christ". On a related note, St. Paul said, "It is not I, but Christ that lives in me." When we allow God to live and move within us, there is a sense in which everything we do is the result of a divine partnership in which we are in a subordinate position to God.

Whenever anyone declares that he is the leader of a particular ministry, without having been appointed or elected as such by human beings who are in positions of power within the Church, some folks are inclined to suspect that a measure of ego is involved on the part of the person making such a declaration. That may be true, but it may also be that it is simply an indication of godly self-confidence.

It takes a healthy amount of self-confidence to proclaim, in the absence of any current evidence, that one is called to both begin and lead a new ministry. Then again, it could be argued that such confidence is one of the key attributes which any leader worthy of the name ought to possess. It's easy to have confidence when one is endorsed by numerous people in positions of authority. To have self-confidence when no affirmation from other people is readily available generally means either that one is delusional or that one is in touch, on some level, with ultimate realities. To tell the difference between the two, we must "test the spirits" behind the ministry, not on the basis of subjective personal first impressions (which can often be misleading), but on the basis of solid and defensible scriptural principles. The world may decide whether or not a person is qualified for a position based on whether or not the person is "likeable", but that is not the way we ought to judge people or their ministries. Likeable people have been known to promote the worst kind of heresies. "Unlikeable" people have sometimes been judged unlikeable precisely because they obeyed God by telling people what they needed to hear rather than tickling their ears. Genuine spiritual discernment is not a popularity contest.

When it comes to new ministries, it should be intuitively obvious in the vast majority of cases that the person who first conceived of the idea for the ministry and who worked the hardest to get the project off the ground ought to be the person in a leadership position in the early stages of the ministry. For example, David Wilkerson was the obvious choice when it came to the international ministry known as Teen Challenge. If it had not been for David's hard work and for his willingness to listen to the voice of God and take huge risks, that groundbreaking ministry never would have begun. It was not ego which motivated David Wilkerson to take on the leadership role when beginning Teen Challenge. He was the obvious choice. He may very well have been the only choice at one time. Later, of course, others stepped in to take over as leaders of that ministry, and David went on to do new and different things for the Lord. That sort of thing should be expected in any organization or ministry worthy of preservation. In this world of transience, very few things last forever.

When Christian leaders begin to think of themselves as infallible and indispensable, then they disqualify themselves for the leadership positions they hold, even if they were previously qualified in the past. When scandals have occurred in the Christian church, it has often been because leaders lost sight of truths which would enable them to stay humble and maintain a proper perspective.

Who is the human leader of ArtisticChristians.com and its related ministries such as the North American Alliance of Artistic Christians? For the time being, I am, because this ministry is my vision. I am the one who has worked (and is working) to make it come to pass.

However, my power and my resources are both extremely limited. Apart from the ability to communicate my vision with others in an effort to persuade them to join me in these efforts, I have hardly any power or resources at all. In light of that truth, it's pretty easy for me to stay humble. Without the help of the people of God, I can do nothing.

That's why I seek qualified leaders who can and will join together with me in order to transform the vision in my mind and heart into a tangible reality which will benefit both the Church and the numerous people who currently remain largely unreached and untouched by the saving power of the gospel of Jesus Christ, often as a direct or indirect result of the moral decline in popular culture and Western civilization.

Many tasks will need to be performed in order to effect that transformation from vision to reality. While I possess numerous skills which are applicable to this project (such as my skills in web design and database management), I know my limitations all too well. When I consider the many tasks which will need to be performed, I feel a little bit overwhelmed. But I know that God is able to furnish me with the resources needed in order to bring good things to pass.

Needless to say, numerous material and financial resources will be needed. But ultimately the most valuable resources of all will be the human resources consisting of the men, women and young people who commit themselves to the goal of helping to insure the success of this endeavor.

Therefore, this space will be used in the very near future for the purpose of soliciting the involvement of any and all who believe my goals to be worthy goals. Additionally, this space will be used in order to publicize specific needs in relation to skill sets which will complement my own skills and abilities, and which will facilitate the successful completion of tasks I could not complete successfully on my own.

Jesus taught that if a person wished to lead, that person must be willing to serve. My hope and prayer is that I can faithfully serve the Body of Christ by means of the various ministries associated with ArtisticChristians.com.

... Mark W. Pettigrew
    Webmaster and Christian Renaissance Man