In the first part of this series, I said that the first thing you have to do as a leader is prove yourself. So, let’s consider this. Jesus made it obvious, but in a world where what Jesus says is often ignored, even in the church, let’s take the time to carefully consider what He said:
Ye shall know them by their fruits (Matthew 7.16, KJV)
By their fruit you will recognize them (Matthew 7.16, AMP)
You can identify them by their fruit (Matthew 7.16, NLT)
Jesus is telling us that we know people by their fruit. Not by their reputation, not by their title, not by how loud they are, not by how gifted they are, not by their place on the org chart, not by how well they suck up to others. But by their fruit.
There are two kinds of leaders in the world – those who are bearing fruit and getting results, and those who are not. We should be aiming to be those who bear fruit! That’s what we should be doing. It is what you produce that matters, it is what you produce that proves yourself.
Which pastor is better to learn from? The pastor who has over the last ten years planted several churches, the churches are growing, people are happy to be there, people have been saved, healed, baptised in the Holy Spirit there, miracles are happening, learning is happening, offenses are dealt with – or the one who has been to the “correct” Bible College and is platformed by the right people?
When you make it that stark the answer is obvious, but many are still confused or they just do not care about Jesus and what He said.
What you produce is what proves you. What you produce is what gives you credibility. And here is the truth, you cannot fake results. You cannot fake fruit. Either you are producing something or you are not. Either you are adding value or you are not. Either you are fruitful or not.
This is the first step to all authentic leadership – be fruitful. Be fruitful BEFORE you try and get a platform to help others be fruitful (if you are in the position where you platform others, do not platform the unfruitful because they cannot produce fruit in others if they cannot in themselves). Be fruitful. The amount of people I know who are setting themselves up as pastors of pastors, as Regional or Area pastors, as pastor’s advocates who have never been fruitful pastors is truly horrifying to me.
Be more fruitful than the people you lead – so that means, and in our age of freedom and rights most people do not understand this – it means you have to hold yourself to a higher standard than the people you lead. You should be reading the Word more, praying more, fasting more, living more victoriously, more humble, more kind, more gracious. It’s not easy, but you need to do that.
How are you led as a leader? Who is holding you accountable for bearing fruit? What is your dream for the future? You cannot be vague about having dreams or goals, you cannot mock or make light of this. If you are going to lead, you need to have goals of your fruitfulness. These are all immense issues and not side issues and must be addressed for your leadership to have any credibility.
You need to take responsibility when you make mistakes. To continue the metaphor of fruitfulness, you need to be the first to prune yourself. You cannot go around pruning others if you are not pruned. I was once at a conference and the worship was going on before the first session, and I was absolutely lost in worship. It was like it was just me and Jesus in the room, and suddenly a speaker got up and started shouting at the people that they were not worshipping well enough and for twenty minutes ranted about people using their phones during worship, thinking about dinner and whatever else.
It later transpired that this person had been actually clipping their nails during the worship, and God had spoke to them about this. Rather than lead themselves into worship, this person just ranted at everyone else in the room for twenty minutes – time that could have been spent lost in wonder at how awesome Jesus is.
You have to lead yourself first – if you are a preacher, preach to yourself first, if you a worship leader, lead yourself to worship first, if you are a pastor, make sure you lead yourself to green pastures first. As a pastor of pastors, I watch carefully to ensure our team are leading themselves first. Do not ask people to go to places you are not prepared to go to! When I see a pastor who is leading but not being led, who is feeding others but not themselves, who expects others to listen to them when they preach but they never listen to another preacher and are never in a conference unless they are platformed there – that’s someone who is not a leader!
Also, another difficult conversation we all need to have with ourselves is that intention is not fruit. Jesus did not say by their intentions you shall know them. A while back, a man with a church of around 20 people not only offered to mentor me, he very kindly offered to receive payment from me for the job. I said I am pastoring a church of 150 people, how can you help me progress? He said that he always intended to have a church of 200. That’s not fruit, that’s a dream. I believe in dreaming, dreaming is good, but dreaming does not prove you – what you produce does, fruit does.
So, focus today not on getting a title, a platform or anything else. Rather ask the Lord: what do I have to do to be more fruitful?
Next week: how to be proving by improving.