Leadership is Serving God, Not the Sheep

I am getting ready for our 2011 Vacation Bible School which will be held July 25th-July 29th. I am teaching the adult class this year on the concept of Leadership Vs. Management. It is a topic that not only for the church I serve, but for the entire body of Christ, needs to be discussed in great detail.

I have come across many authors with good information that I am looking forward to sharing. One of those authors was Fred Smith who wrote the book, "Learning to Lead: Bringing out the Best in Other People" from The Leadership Library Volume 5 (24-25) His section on "Leadership is serving God, Not the Sheep proved to be invaluable and it is out of that section that I share this:

Currently one of the most popular concepts is “servant leadership.” Properly understood, it’s a helpful concept, but it has been terribly abused.

The Christian leader is primarily a servant of God, not a servant of the sheep. Many shepherds act as if they’re servants of the sheep—a faulty concept. You are a servant of God, given to absolute obedience to what he says. To extend that to say you are the servant of each sheep is a fallacy.

Steve Brown, a pastor in Florida, said he nearly became neurotic when he used to think he worked for the church—because he had five hundred bosses. When your boss calls in the middle of the night to tell you something, you’re supposed to do it. But if everybody in the church is your boss and you’re their servant, you’ve got an absolutely intolerable position.

Yes, you lead by serving, but the major expression of your service is your leadership.

Take, for instance, Lee Iacocca, a great leader. He is the servant of the Chrysler Corporation, but he doesn’t ask the assembly line workers to decide where the company should go. He may solicit opinions, but Lee Iacocca doesn’t ask the man on the machine to do anything except run the machine and run it well—and have faith in the company. Iacocca’s servanthood is expressed by his leadership. If he were to quit leading, he would no longer be a trustworthy servant of Chrysler.

There are shepherds who constantly ask the sheep which way to go. If the pastor quits leading the sheep and starts following them, he is no longer a trustworthy shepherd.

In addition, a shepherd does not expect his compensation, blessing, or reward to come from the sheep. He expects it to come from the owner of the sheep. I don’t know of any sheep that ever gathered around to applaud the shepherd. All they do is cause him trouble.

Sheep are the work. They’re not the wage.

As leaders we have to say, “I’m going to get my ultimate strokes from God.”

If we don’t watch ourselves, we start manipulating things to get strokes from the sheep. If that happens, it’s like what Jesus said about giving alms in public. God will say, “You’ve got your reward.” You can lead with an eye on crowd approval, but if you lead primarily to be rewarded by the sheep, you’re not going to be rewarded by the owner of the sheep.

This position is difficult for some pastors to accept because of their personality make-up. Some pastors prefer serving people. There’s a certain ego satisfaction in doing menial things for other people. They justify it by saying, “I’m showing people I’m not above doing menial things,” which is a prideful statement, when you think about it.

Leaders who say, “Anything you need, let me know. I’ll cut your lawn. I’ll drive the kids to school” are not serving God, nor are they offering their best to their people. They are failing to understand the doctrine of gifts. There’s no point in a clumsy, all-thumbs person trying to be a carpenter. He might desire the servant role, but he isn’t serving. If my gift is leading (as evidenced by my having followers), then my serving is leading.


Smith, F. (1986). Vol. 5: Learning to lead : Bringing out the best in people. The Leadership library (24–25). Carol Stream, Ill.: CTi.