before them their instruction under every conceivable condition of life.
He modeled His message! Today we largely depend upon the institutional
model of Bible colleges, seminaries, and theological graduate schools to
train and prepare church leaders. Although these institutions certainly
have many good things to offer a Christian leader, Jesus largely trained,
discipled, and mentored His men “in the field.” He gave them practical
“on-the-job training.” His seminary was the “learning laboratory of life.” His
method of mentoring for ministry was the marketplace!
Principle:
“In training Christian leaders, Jesus used the
incarnational instructional model; He modeled His
message to those He was mentoring.”Gunter Krallman noted this about Jesus’ mentoring method of leadership
development:
An astute observer cannot help but recognize how immensely
life-related, concrete and dynamic Jesus’ leadership training
mode was – and that He consciously shunned any tendency to
formalize, structuralize or institutionalize it.^14The local church should always be the spiritual epicenter for leadership
development – not some academic theological institution. Bill Hybels,
senior pastor of the Willow Creek Community Church, says: “...the church
is the most leadership-intensive enterprise in society.” In every other segment
of society, the leader has an advantage over the follower – what some have
called “leadership leverage.” That simply means that in almost all other
organizations, the leader by virtue of his position and power has leverage
over the people under him. For example, in the military, the leader has a
higher position and can “pull rank” on the soldiers under him. They have
no choice but to obey and follow – or be court-martialed. In a business,
the boss has the leverage of salary, benefits, perks. He has the power
to “hire...“fire”...“promote”...and “demote.” But in the church of Jesus
Christ, that “leadership leverage” is not available. The followers are all
volunteers. They cannot be coerced, forced, intimidated, or leveraged into
following. The pastor must exercise leadership in its purest form. He must
seek to influence the people to follow without the leadership leverage that
the world uses: promotion...position...power...prestige...privilege...perks...
possessions. He must motivate them with love and persuade them through