As a follow up to last week’s post on the difference between owners and hired hands, today’s post is going to shift gears, for a moment. But before reading further, you need to read this post.
Jesus was the ultimate example of an owner teaching hired hands to become owners.
If you think about Jesus’s interactions with the disciples in the Gospels, he was constantly preparing them for a day when he would not be there.
The disciples, however, were slow learners. They regularly missed the point (see the Sons of Thunder), or only made sense of what was happening much later.
But, when push came to shove, in Acts we read how the disciples were able to step up when the situation called for it. Jesus prepared them for the leadership call they were going to face.
In your leadership, I’m not saying you have to be Jesus. But one of our strongest goals should be the desire to help people moved from hired hands to owners.
In ministry, this means equipping people to find a place to serve, and to allow them to serve!
Some of my favorite conversations are with teenagers when I tell them they have the freedom to make a decision and I’ll deal with the followup, or that when they are serving their way, I don’t have to worry about what they’re doing.
Leadership means bringing other people into ownership. But you have to extend the invitation. Find the people who are willing and ready to serve, and test the waters.