Who depends on leadership?

Everyone depends on leadership! Leadership is an art! Leadership can be learned! Just as the ability to write and read is a secular skill that needs to be learned, so is leadership.

Without the knowledge and skills of leadership, your ministry is going nowhere.

• Nations and communities depend on their leadership.

A nation without a leader is cursed! Truly, every nation rises and falls based on its leaders.

“For, behold, the Lord, the Lord of hosts, doth take away from Jerusalem and from Judah the stay and the staff, the whole stay of bread, and the whole stay of water. The mighty man, and the man of war, the judge, and the prophet, and the prudent, and the ancient. The captain of the fifty, and the honourable man, and the counsellor, and the cunning artificer, and the eloquent orator. And I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them. And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and everyone by his neighbour: the child shall behave himself proudly against the ancient, and the base against the honourable. When a man shall take hold of his brother of the house of his father, saying, ‘Thou hast clothing, be thou our ruler, and let this ruin be under thy hand’:  In that day shall he swear, saying, ‘I will not be an healer; for in my house is neither bread nor clothing: make me not a ruler of the people…

As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and to destroy the way of thy paths”. Isaiah 3:1-7,12

In the scriptures above, God talked about taking away all kinds of leaders from the community and leaving it leaderless.  The Almighty God knows this principle very well: No leader, no progress! No leader, no development! No leader, no blessing!  No leader, no deliverance! God knew that the community would fall into judgment if he removed leaders from their midst.  This is because everything rises and falls on leadership. 

The Almighty God was unleashing one of the most terrible punishments anyone, nation or group of people could ever have — to have no leaders! If you look closely at this Scripture, you will see that God was predicting the removal of every type of leader from the community.

• Every family depends on leadership.

A family becomes rich or poor depending on leadership. One of the most severe judgements that God gave to His people was the removal of all kinds of leaders. As you know, nature abhors a vacuum. And in place of real leaders, Jehovah predicted the rise of bogus leadership.
“And I will give children to be their princes, and babes shall rule over them” 

Instead of fathers taking up their role of leading, children would have to lead the way. These children and babies represent incapable and useless leaders. A baby cannot rule his bowels; how much more rule a nation?  

• The church depends on its leadership.  

A church without a true leader is truly pathetic! In the Church, the lack of true leadership gives rise to the proliferation of sin and evil-doers, as well as false church leaders. The lack of real leaders in a church causes many people to lose their souls, die and go to hell. 

How can this be? A real leader in the church will lead the congregation to win souls and do missionary work. Whenever the church’s leadership stops concerning itself with the lost and dying souls, false religions creep in and take over.

Almost every bad situation within the church can be attributed to the lack of a good leader. Church splits and scandals are often the result of a lack of strong leadership. The Scripture we read above tells us how God was going to judge the land by taking away its leaders. Churches rise and fall on leadership. With a good, strong leader, a church will grow into a mega church. With bad leadership, churches don’t go anywhere even if the pastor is very anointed.  

You sometimes see an anointed minister who has bad leadership qualities. His ministry usually falls into chaos because of bad leadership qualities.  

“Think about this: …the Lord doth take away… the mighty man, the man of war, the judge, the prophet, the prudent, the ancient, the captain of fifty, the honourable man, the eloquent orator…”

If you study this list closely, you will come to the frightening realisation that the community is left without anyone who can lead the people in any aspect.  

Pastors, politicians, senior citizens and wise people were taken away. This is what I call a headless society. May God have mercy on us! 

The writer is the founder of the Lighthouse Group of churches.
E-mail: theaol@ymail.com