Leadership from the Inside Out

Examining the Inner Life of a Healthy Church Leader

Kevin G. Harney

• Publisher: Zondervan
• Year: 2009
• eBook ISBN: 9780310571773
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Theology

You can serve God and his people for a lifetime and do it with passion and joy. You do not have to become another casualty in the growing number of leaders who have compromised their integrity, character, and ministry because they failed to lead an examined and accountable life. The road forward is clearly marked. Leaders must make a decision to humbly and consistently examine their inner lives and identify areas of needed change and growth. Also, wise leaders commit to listen to the voices of those who will love them enough to speak the truth and point out problems and potential pitfalls. Kevin Harney writes, "The vision of this book is to assist leaders as they discover the health, wisdom, and joy of living an examined life. It is also to give practical tools for self-examination." Sharing stories and wisdom from his years in ministry, Harney shows you how to maintain the most powerful tool in your leadership toolbox: YOU. Your heart, so you can love well. Your mind, so you can continue to learn and grow. Your ears, your eyes, your mouth … consider this your essential guide to conducting your own complete interior health exam, so you can spot and fix any problems, preserve the things that matter most, and grow as a source of vision, strength, and hope to others.

chapter 1
Love Strengthens Every Relationship
The Leader’s Heart

“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ … ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”

—Mark 12:30 – 31

Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.

—Matthew 9:35 – 36

You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.

—Jeremiah 29:13

Christmas 2004 was different from any other. Most years of my adult life I celebrated the birth of Jesus with my wife and three sons. Those were glorious times of family gatherings, exchanging gifts, candlelight services, and playing in freshly fallen Michigan snow.

But this year my attention was two thousand miles away. I got on a plane for a rush trip to Orange County. My dad was dying.

The doctors said operating on his heart could kill him. But not operating would be a death sentence. He decided to have surgery, and all of us kids gathered around his hospital bed with him and Mom. We prayed for his heart, for the doctors, for a great work of God in his life, for healing. By God’s grace, through faithful prayers, and by the hands of a skilled medical team, my dad made it through the surgery, and his heart became stronger than it had been for many years.

During the winter of 2004, I was confronted by a simple and profound reality. When the heart stops beating, life ends. I always knew this, but it struck me in a new way. As I stood looking at my father lying in a hospital bed, it felt personal.

What’s true of our hearts is also true of our spiritual lives and our calling as leaders. If our heart stops beating, we die. Sadly, leaders can mask the reality that their hearts are sick. Sometimes we can even fool ourselves into believing that our hearts are beating strong. It’s possible to preach, hold board meetings, lead an organization, and appear to be very much alive long after we have gone through spiritual cardiac arrest. We all have learned that we can go through the motions of leadership with an empty heart. Love is our heartbeat, and too often our heartbeat is weaker than we want to admit.

How is your heart? Is it strong and healthy? Is it weak and faltering? Has it stopped beating altogether?

A Passionate Heart

The question was malicious, fired at Jesus like a bullet. It was a test, not a conversation starter. “Which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” (Matt. 22:36). Jesus responded, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” (v. 37). Jesus emphasized that every other commandment comes after this one. Until we are seeking to fulfill this calling, we can’t do anything effectively.

A heart passionately in love with God is the starting point of a healthy life and ministry. This is why Jesus warns the church of Ephesus (and all of God’s people to this day), “Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love. Remember the height from which you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place” (Rev. 2:4 – 5).

When God is no longer our first love, our leadership lives are in danger. When other things, even good things, take supremacy in our hearts, we are in dangerous territory.

It is so easy for Christian leaders to allow other things to become our first love. Almost imperceptibly, the needle of our hearts can move from true north, and before we know it, we have fallen in love with a false idol. Often this surrogate first love seems noble, even Christ-honoring, but it is a heart-killing illusion.

Consider some of the enticements that cry for first place in our hearts:

• Building a successful and growing ministry.
• Being loved by the people we serve and keeping them happy.
• Making a name for ourselves.
• Making enough money to provide for ourselves and those we love.
• Feeling important and valuable in our own hearts.
• Loving and serving the people in our churches or ministries.

The things that can replace God as our first love aren’t always bad. They become unhealthy only when they take first place in our hearts. Leaders who plan to serve God faithfully for a lifetime learn to identify when they are tempted to let something else become their first love. We are building healthy lives and ministries when we make sure that God rules supreme and that our hearts are beating passionately for him. When his glory is our joy, when our hearts beat with his, when he rules with no rivals, we grow healthy as leaders.

There is something wonderful, life-giving, and perspective-altering about praying with others. As others speak with God, their faith overflows and touches our hearts. The Holy Spirit uses these sacred moments to move in the hearts of those gathered. One Monday morning during our time of prayer, Warren Burgess’s prayer inspired me to love Jesus more passionately. I was so moved, I wrote down his words.

He prayed, “O Lord, the longer we walk with you, the more we discover we are children. We need you. We need each other.” As Warren prayed, I glanced at him, as I had done so many times before. His hands were open and turned upward, moving gently as one would gesture while talking to a friend. His head was reverently bowed and his eyes were tightly shut, as if fixed on a face far away but so very close.

I saw a little child talking to his daddy. This precious man, almost eighty years old, loves God with a contagious natural ferocity. As we prayed together that day, I grew to love God more.

As leaders, connecting with God more intentionally and intimately is our starting point; it is the foundation for all we do in ministry. When we are falling more deeply in love with God with each passing day, all of our lives are driven by this simple reality: God loves me and I love God.

Loving the People We Are Called to Lead

I admit that I’ve said it on more than one occasion. I mean it as a joke, but it betrays a painful reality. I’m a little embarrassed to write it, but here it goes: “Ministry would be easy if it weren’t for the people!”

In my years of church ministry, I have had my fair share of painful encounters, nasty letters, unfair accusations, and head-butting. I have often thought that there is nothing more satisfying than being a leader in a church, and that there is also nothing more painful. When we open our hearts to those we lead, when we love people, when we sacrifice, when we invest ourselves, we risk getting burned. And I don’t know a single Christian leader who has made it far down the road unscathed.

Because I interact regularly with Christian leaders all over the United States and in other parts of the world, I’ve discovered that some deal with the pain of ministry by shutting off their hearts. They build a wall, an emotional buffer to protect them from being hurt again. They still do the work that is expected of them. They check off all the boxes on their daily to-do lists. They preach sermons, lead youth groups, meet with people, and lock eyes and nod their heads during conversations, but they have safeguarded themselves. They have shut off their hearts.

I understand this, because I have felt tempted to do the same thing. And at different times, I have protected my heart with the armor of cynicism and the moat of emotional distance. When I see myself responding this way, I’m moved to increase my efforts to love the people I am called to serve. I ask God to help me have the courage to love people even when it could mean personal pain. I invite the Holy Spirit to bring to mind the wonderful moments I’ve experienced in my years of church ministry. I fix my eyes on Jesus and remember how he served, loved, and sacrificed himself for the very people whose sin put him on the cross.

We need to remember that right on the heels of Jesus’ call to love God with all that is in us, he said, “This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments” (Matt. 22:38 – 40). Jesus understood that an authentic relationship with God leads to a deep love for people. These two commandments are inseparable. Yet if we are not careful, we can forget this call to a deep love for the people we lead. When we forget Jesus’ words and just seek to do the work of ministry, we can disregard the fact that people matter to God.

The movie Braveheart portrays two dramatically contrasting visions of leadership. On the one hand is William Wallace, the leader of the Scottish army. Although there are nobles in the land, they are more concerned with their position, lands, and wealth than with the people. But Wallace has inspired the people, and they follow him into battle again and again. The operative word is follow. Wallace is always the first onto the field. He loves the people and their nation. He fights at their side and bleeds with them.

After one epic battle during which the Scottish forces route the invading English army, the nobles decide it would be expedient to knight Wallace and then co-opt him. They all have ties to Edward the Longshanks, the king of England. They don’t have a vision of a free Scotland but are more concerned with covering their political butts.

After they knight Wallace, they begin to quibble over ancestral rights and try to pull Wallace into their ongoing internal battles. He refuses to play along. As the mood in the room deteriorates, he and his group of core leaders begin to walk out. The nobles ask him where he is going, and the following dialogue unfolds:

William Wallace	We have beaten the English, but they’ll come back because you won’t stand together.
Nobles	What will you do?
Wallace	I’ll invade England and defeat the English on their own ground.
Nobles	Invade, that’s impossible.
Wallace	Why? Why is that impossible? You’re so concerned with squabbling for the scraps from Longshanks’ table that you’ve missed your God-given right for something better. There’s a difference between us. You think the people of this country exist to provide you with position. I think your position exists to provide those people with freedom, and I go to make sure they have it!

Wallace’s words uncover a sinister motive in the nobles’ hearts. They see the people as stepping stones to their place of position. They do not love the people. Wallace reminds them that maybe, just maybe, they have been put in their place of leadership so that they can give to the people. Maybe their place of authority and influence should compel them to serve those they lead.

Yet another example of leadership occurs later in the movie. Longshanks, the king of England, is in command of his forces. He does not ride into battle, take up a sword, or risk getting even a scratch on his body. Instead, he stays out of the fray, at a safe distance, and gives orders.

The battle takes its twists and turns until the English have the upper hand. From his place of safety, Longshanks looks at the battlefield. The English soldiers clearly are defeating the Scottish and Irish forces. Then, Longshanks says one word: “Archers!” He calls for his commander to summon the archers to send volleys of arrows into the battlefield.

His captain says, “Beg pardon. Sire, won’t we hit our own troops?”

Longshanks responds, “Yes, but we’ll hit theirs as well,” and as an afterthought, he mutters, “We have reserves.” Longshanks says the word again, “Archers!” The flag is raised and the captain waves his arm. Volleys of arrows fly, hitting Irish, Scottish, and English troops.

As the scene ends, Longshanks turns to ride off and says, “Send us news of our victory. Shall we retire?”

Throughout the intercha...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction: The Life-Giving Power of Self-Examination
• Chapter 1 - Love Strengthens Every Relationship: The Leader’s Heart
• Chapter 2 - Lifelong Learning Expands Our Horizons: The Leader’s Mind
• Chapter 3 - Attentive Listening Informs Wise Decisions: The Leader’s Ears
• Chapter 4 - Clear Vision Sees What Lies Ahead: The Leader’s Eyes
• Chapter 5 - Affirming Words Bring Blessing and Energy: The Leader’s Mouth
• Chapter 6 - Humble Service Reveals Jesus’ Presence: The Leader’s Hands
• Chapter 7 - Laughter Sustains Our Sanity: The Leader’s Funny Bone
• Chapter 8 - Understanding and Harnessing Our Sexual Desires: The Leader’s Libido
• Chapter 9 - Bearing the Yoke of Jesus: The Leader’s Back
• Concluding Thoughts
• Discussion Questions and Prayer Prompters
• Notes
• Suggested Reading
• Acknowledgments
• Other Books By Kevin Harney
• About the Publisher
• Share Your Thoughts