True Leaders Serve

Then King Rehoboam consulted with the elders who had served his father Solomon when he was alive, asking, "How do you advise me to respond to these people?" They replied, "Today if you will be a servant to these people and serve them, and if you respond to them by speaking kind words to them, they will be your servants forever." - 1 Kings 12:6-7 HCSB

Studying the Scriptures late one night, a wise elder overheard the conversation of two paupers who were lodging in a side room. One asked the other, “Please accompany me to the well. I’m thirsty but I’m afraid to go out alone so late at night.” The other drowsily mumbled a refusal. The elder immediately interrupted his own studies and went to the well to fetch water for the pauper.[1]

Let me ask you a question. Would that pauper be more or less likely to listen when the elder invited him to worship? Would that pauper be more or less likely to listen as the elder explained how God and the Scriptures have changed his life?

Many pastors work in air-conditioned offices, study hard, get degrees, expound the Scriptures to audiences every week and sometimes even get complimentary remarks for their work. They are told how wise they are or what good points they made. This is all fine and good but any good elder will tell you that the favor of the people is a fleeting, ephemeral thing.

If a pastor begins basing his attitude on the attitudes of his people, he will quickly become bi-polar if not suicidal. If he begins to think that the church is about serving his needs; that he is the “star of the show” and that the work of the Lord would not proceed without him – that pastor is in deep trouble.

King Rehoboam was approached by the people of Israel who told him, "Your father made our yoke harsh. You, therefore, lighten your father's harsh service and the heavy yoke he put on us, and we will serve you."[2] After they left, he turned to his nation’s elders and asked their advice which we can see above. He heard the same thing from his subjects and his wise counselors. He chose to listen to a bunch of young courtiers with whom he’d grown up. He answered the people harshly, chose to not serve them and as a result they all walked away. He lost his kingdom.

Leadership is essentially about service. We live to care for our people. Sometimes that means we give hard answers as compassionately as possible. Sometimes it means that we speak gently and comfortingly to them. Sometimes serving our people means spending time with them in their moment of need and sometimes it means serving the needs of the many by excommunicating the one.

Regardless of the approach each moment demands, the ultimate virtue of a servant of God is service.


[1] Chayai hamussar vol.2, p.218
[2] 1 Kings 12:4 HCSB