Biblical Leadership: What Is Your Leadership Purpose?Sample

2. Support my Church; Provide for Others

Beyond providing for your family, God may have given you much more than you actually need. And so, you are also called to give back – by supporting your church, missionaries, or those less fortunate in your community.

The idea that you use your leadership gifts for the benefit of others outside of your family is also scriptural. In fact, the Bible teaches a long history of giving the first fruits of one’s labor or a “tithe” back to the Lord – and with further blessings attached to such obedience:

“Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the Lord Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.”  – Malachi 3:10 

The New Testament gives an even more dramatic view on giving to the church, providing a record of a married couple pretending to bring in a full gift, but secretly keeping some back for themselves. The full account is given in Acts 5:1-11, with an excerpt below:

Peter asked her, “Tell me, is this the price you and Ananias got for the land?”

“Yes,” she said, “that is the price.”

Peter said to her, “How could you conspire to test the Spirit of the Lord? Listen! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also.”

At that moment she fell down at his feet and died.  – Acts 5:8-10

Clearly, giving back to God is a very real and serious requirement of your Christian walk.

There are many other passages in the Bible around the topic of giving to the church or supporting the spread of the gospel, but the Bible also teaches that you should be helping those less fortunate than you:

If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person?  – 1 John 3:17

In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’  – Acts 20:35

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’  – Matthew 25:34-36

These verses underline the importance of using your material wealth to also bless others.

This is especially true given the higher pay and other financial rewards often associated with leadership work. God may have produced a crop of abundant financial harvest for you in your work as a leader, and it is expected that you use these blessings as the Bible commands.

Even though the command to share is so clear, many of us may have a difficult time with this, don’t we? Just like Jesus said:

Then Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly I tell you, it is hard for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”  – Matthew 19:23-24

Reflection / Application

1. Have you been blessed with abundance from your work? On what basis do you say that?
2. Can you see giving to the church or others less fortunate than you as a requirement or a purpose related to your leadership work?
3. Besides providing for the family, church, and those less fortunate, what other purposes might God have for you in your leadership role?