Anytime I hear the word leadership, I just cringe. I wouldn’t have paid to go and listen to John Maxwell last night (to be as honest as I can be), but I got a free ticket from the radio station – so I brought my good friend Kary along and kept my expectations in check.
My intent is not prideful, thinking that I can’t learn a thing or two from Mr. Maxwell. He did guarantee that I (and the rest of the crowd) would learn “something” from the 90 minutes we got to spend with him. My intent in writing this, as I always pray is my goal, is to not just listen to people because the world thinks something of them. It’s to listen to them and channel EVERY thing they have to say through the truth of God’s Word, regardless of their accolades or the amount of followers / readers they have.
So here’s the truth (if the blog goes long, it goes long). I wasn’t expecting this when coming to the event, but while on the way out Kary asked me what I thought. My first response was (knowing that John’s a devout follower of Christ) “He didn’t share anything at all from the Word of God”. That might seem harsh. You might suggest that I give him a break, or that I shouldn’t expect him to preach to us since his area of expertise seems to relate to business.
I can tell you that I did learn at least 1-2 things when listening to him. But hearing him being neighbors with Joe Namath, having a meal with Gail Devers, consulting the United Nations, blah blah blah blah blah……..shouldn’t and doesn’t impress me. And honestly, knowing he’s considered the leadership expert, I was thinking an evening listening to him would have left me wanting an encore. If you read through my notes from yesterday, I’m sure you’d agree that most, if not all, of the 10 tips he shared with us could be found somewhere else. It’s not hard understanding that all of this “worldly wisdom” has been around for a long time.
In my eyes, no matter if you’re wealthy and famous or 8 years old and selling lemonade along the street for a quarter, if Jesus Christ has changed your life – your life should be about Jesus. To hear that he’s now creating a coaching network for thousands of individuals, charging them each $4,800 in an effort to leave “his legacy” with others, actually now scares me a bit. There’s a chance they’ll get hundreds of one-liners that they can share with people who might need it, but maybe never be challenged to share who the real life-changer actually is.
What if I were to tell you that I think we need more followers in this world than leaders? People who have the leader in Christ that they need, and if they’re doing any counseling they’re sharing advice from the source that has led many men and women to greatness through the centuries? What are we to think of leaders when we attend sessions like these and then return home and open up Jeremiah 9:23, 2 Corinthians 10:17-18 or 2 Corinthians 11:15?
I guess you probably get my point by now. Leadership to me is a megaphone. When you speak through your megaphone, do people hear the Word of God or your own words? Don’t be afraid to lead, just make sure you’re not standing in everyone’s way as they’re trying to follow the footsteps of Christ.
