What makes a good leader?   Or a great leader?   On my bookshelf I have scores of books on leadership.   Some are written by business leaders.   Others are written by theologians.   Most of the books have to do with leadership in the church.   The authors are well known and well respected — people like Robert Clinton, Stephen R. Covey, John Maxwell, Bill Hybels, Norma Cook Everist, just to mention a few.  But the one book I turn to most in my leadership quest is

 
a book not on my shelf but on my desk:  the Bible.     It has been a political circus in Australia this past week with the Labor Party squabbling over who will be their leader.   Where we live, in Queensland, a state election is being held in just over three weeks.   One of the candidates running for office lives two doors down from our home.   What do you look for in a leader?  What qualities make for a great politician?   A great pastor?   A great business woman?   A great leader?Two qualities rise to the surface for me, and they come from smack dab in the middle of the Bible:  Psalm 78.   In this Psalm the author Asaph recounts salvation history — a history that was not pretty.   These were stories that Asaph heard from his ancestors, stories that were life-lessons to be passed on to future generations, “even the children yet to be born” (vv. 2-6).   Important lessons.   But not pretty.   Asaph tells us stories of how the people of Israel were “a stubborn and rebellious generation.” (v. 8)   Disloyal hearts.  Unfaithful spirits.   In spite of all God’s miraculous deeds the people continued in faithless rebellion.   They “ate the bread of angels” (v. 25) but still did not believe; they kept on sinning.   Stomachs gorged with food but hearts empty of faith.  

Aspah tells these stories like a MP3 track stuck on repeat.   Time and time again his ancestors sinned.    “Time after time [the LORD God] restrained his anger … he was merciful; he forgave their inquities and did not destroy them.” (v. 38)   Why?   Why boundless grace and not deserving punishment?   God “remembered that they were but flesh, a passing breeze that does not return.” (v. 39)   The pattern continues on in every story — God’s miraculous goodness and grace and our stubborn rebellion.  Not unlike today.I tried to imagine Asaph sitting around a campfire hearing his grandmother tell him the stories of old.   He must have been rivetted to the details.   The stories go on for 72 verses. Honest stories. Stories of God’s mercy but also his fury.  Word pictures abound.   God “rained meat down on them like dust, birds like sand on the seashore.” (v. 27)  The people were “unreliable as a faulty bow.” (v. 57)   There were times when God’s anger and jealousy was aroused and he rejected humanity.   Asaph describes God preparing “a path for his anger.” (v. 50)   Many were put to death (vv. 31, 63).   Young men were killed and the “young women had no wedding songs.” (v. 63)    Funeral dirges, not happy songs. The most telling word picture of all is found in v. 65:   ‘Then the Lord awoke as from sleep, as a warrior wakes from the stupor of wine.”    It is as if God sobers up and finally raises up a leader that was used by God to help an entire nation make a total direction correction.  Not a sinless leader.   Not a perfect leader.   He had his issues, but he was a great leader.   His name was David, and what made him a great leader were these two qualities:   integrity of heart and skillful hands.    Asaph put it like this:   “David shepherded them with integrity of heart; with skillful hands he led them.” (v. 72)   And on that climatic note, the Psalm comes to an end.May the days of our lives be like the time when God awoke as from a sleep.   The church of the 21st century needs leaders like David, men and women who have integrity of heart and skillful hands.   Men and women who not only talk the talk, but walk the walk.   People who say what they mean and mean what they say.   Fair dinkum people.  People who “become in mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fulness of Christ.” (Ephesians 4:13)   Christ followers who become like Christ, the Good Shepherd, the ultimate fulfillment of one who shepherded his people with integrity of heart and skillful hands (see Matthew 2:6; John 10:11; Revelation 7:17).   Great leaders are people who have integrity of heart.   And skillful hands.   Teachers and ministers of the Word who know how to correctly handle the Word of Truth (2 Timothy 2:15).    Correctly handling Holy Scriptures — books that are “useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.” (2 Timothy 3:16-17)   Thoroughly equipped for every good work.   Read:  have skillful hands to lead.   Not just teachers and ministers, but students and house-husbands, judges and ecologists, youth leaders and politicians, any follower of Jesus who desires to be a difference maker in the world.    People thoroughly equipped — skilled for everything that promotes “whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable … anything [that] is excellent or praiseworthy” (Philippians 4:8).   Skillful leaders who have hearts of integrity.   These are kinds of leaders the church needs today.   Great leaders.   Like David.  Most of all, like Jesus.    God does not need to sober up  nor does he have to be aroused from his sleep.   “He who watches over you will not slumber; indeed, he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.”(Psalm 121:3-4)   We are the ones who need to be aroused, as Paul quotes a hymn or ditty well known in his day:  “Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.” (Ephesians 5:14)    May the church of Jesus Christ wake up and may we who lead be men and women who lead with hearts of integrity and skillful hands!   SGD