Praying is part and parcel of a spiritual leader’s life. A spiritual leader cannot go about his service to the Lord without praying. The Bible has many examples of leaders who prayed right from the start of their ministry, throughout their service to the Lord and his people, up to the end of their lives. They prayed in times of peace and in times of trouble. They prayed to show their dependence on God and in thanksgiving for his victory.
Leaders who believe change is possible, align their conduct and conversations with their faith, not worry or fear.
Spiritual leaders ultimately place their faith in God. They do this because they know God has called them and that whatever God begins, he also completes (Philippians 1:6). Perhaps the clearest way leaders demonstrate their faith in God is through their prayer life.
Why Leader’s prayer life is critical
In Spiritual Leadership, Henry and Richard Blackaby point out why the leader’s prayer life is critical:
1) Nothing of eternal significance happens apart from God.
Jesus declared: Apart from me you can do nothing (John 15:5). Leaders who neglect a close relationship with Christ will not achieve God’s will through their organizations. Prayerless leaders can keep full schedules only to discover later that despite their best efforts, little of eternal consequence occurred. Prayer can be the most challenging, exhausting, laborious, and yet rewarding thing leaders do.
2) Prayer is fundamental because to be a spiritual leader, one must be filled with the Holy Spirit.
Leaders cannot fill themselves with the divine presence. Only God can do that (Ephesians 5:18). While all Christians have the Holy Spirit’s presence in their lives, the condition of being filled by the Holy Spirit comes through concentrated, fervent, sanctified prayer. God’s promise is, You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart (Jeremiah 29:13, NKJV). Without the Holy Spirit, one may be a leader, but not a spiritual leader.
3) God’s wisdom is a reward for dedicated prayer time.
God knows far more than the best-informed executive (Romans 8:26-27; 1 Corinthians 2:9). He sees the future. He knows the spiritual needs of the leader’s staff. He is aware of what turn the economy will take. God knows what he wants to accomplish and how he intends to do it. God’s invitation to leaders is, “Call to Me and I will answer you and tell you great and incomprehensible things you do not know” (Jeremiah 33:3). For leaders to have this relationship available to them and yet choose not to communicate with the one who offers to guide them is a gross dereliction of duty.
4) Leaders pray because God is all powerful.
God can do far more than even the most resourceful leaders. His promise is open-ended: “Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you” (Matthew 7:7, NLT). If someone is angry with a leader, reconciliation might look impossible. But God can melt the hardest heart. If followers refuse to cooperate, God can change their attitude. There are times when even the most powerful CEO’s can do nothing but retreat to the privacy of their executive office, pray, and let God work. Life is filled with situations that only God’s power can overcome. The most powerful position leaders assume is when they kneel.
5) Prayer is the leader’s foolproof remedy for stress.
Leaders are intimately acquainted with pressure. Scripture encourages leaders to “Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you” (1 Peter 5:7). Leaders carry a heavy load of responsibility. Sometimes, it may be difficult to find someone with whom to share their concerns. Circumstances may dictate the need for complete confidentiality. But there is one who always stands ready to carry your burden. Christ said his yoke is easy and his burden is light (Matthew 11:28-30). Leaders who allow Christ to carry their emotional and spiritual loads are relieved of enormous pressure and can face the most arduous assignments with peace.
6) God reveals his agenda through prayer.
Jesus modeled this truth (Mark 1:30-39). At the outset of his public ministry, when Jesus was staying in Peter and Andrew’s home, crowds of sick and demon-possessed people came seeking healing. Jesus healed many people until late into the evening. Early the next morning Jesus rose to pray. The people wanted to keep Jesus in their city as the resident healer and were reluctant to let him go. Had Jesus been a modern leader, he might have said
to himself, “I am obviously having success here and receiving a good response from the people. Perhaps I should remain here for a while until my reputation is firmly established.” Instead, Jesus sought his Father’s will. As Jesus prayed that morning, the Father helped him understand what the crowd’s agenda was, and he reaffirmed his will for Jesus to preach and teach in all the towns and villages and eventually to be crucified in Jerusalem. When the disciples found Jesus and told him the entire town was looking for him, Jesus responded, “Let us go to the neighboring villages” (v.38). Because Jesus was in regular communion with the Father in prayer, he was not sidetracked from his assignment.
PAUSE
Evaluate your prayer life. If God’s blessings on your leadership were based solely on the quality of your aprayer life, what results would you anticipate?
Making Prayer More Effective
You can be a leader who draws on the power of God through prayer. Whether you lead a church, a para-church ministry or secular organization, you can begin to see the power of God blessing your people. By working on your own prayer life, you will stimulate effective prayer in the lives of your followers, generate serious prayer for your organization, and recruit a team of personal prayer partners who will serve as your “prayer shield.”
If leaders desire to pray more effectively and help those they lead draw on God’s supernatural power through prayer, they would do well to consider the following principles suggested by George Barna.
1) Prayer is a two-way street
At its core, prayer should be seen as a relationship between two persons. A common assumption about prayer is that it is monologue. Prayer is not only talking to God, but also listening for, and actually hearing his voice. If God is our Father, it stands to reason that we should listen to what he has to say.
2) Prayer works
When we pray, things will happen that would not have happened if we had not prayed.
3) Plan A or Plan B
God designed human history with what we might call in current language, “Plan A” and “Plan B.” In any particular situation, whether we end up with Plan A, the best, or plan B, the second best, can frequently depend on the choices we make. For example, in the garden of Eden, if Adam and Eve obeyed God
rather than the devil, human history would undoubtedly have been a lot different. Elijah prayed that it would not rain, and it didn’t; then he prayed that it would rain, and it did. The presumption is that history would have been different if Elijah had not prayed.
We need to remind ourselves that the supreme example of prayer in the life of a leader was the Lord Jesus. Unquestionably, Jesus is the greatest leader of men and women the world has ever seen! No other life has had the universal, sustained, transforming impact that Christ has. He has had that impact without doing many of the things that we normally associate with great leadership. Christ’s life and leadership was bathed in prayer. Prayer was a dominant feature of his life and a recurring part of his teaching.
It is only through a life of personal and corporate prayer that a leader will be able to stay in touch with God and man. Without either of those relationships, authentic spiritual leadership cannot take place. It is only through prayer that we learn to focus on God and delight in his presence. In the crucible of that holy relationship, God will purify our purpose as a leader.
Only prayer will purify our hearts… clarify our vision… rearrange priorities… refine our goals… cleanse our motives… sanctify our leadership.
Only prayer will cause our character to be developed into Christlikeness. It is through seasons of prayer through the Spirit and the word that God increasingly engraves the character of Christ into our lives. Nothing other than prayer will stamp the image of Christ into our lives. Only then will our leadership have the authenticating mark of the cross, signified by selflessness. Character is Christ-likeness in the inner man or woman. It is always true that our inner character soon manifests itself in our outer conduct. The more Christ-like our character is, the more Christ-like our conduct will be.
Authentic Christian character is compelling. It causes people to be drawn to a truly spiritual leader. Character also communicates trust. It compellingly communicates trust from the leader to the followers, just as it does from a husband to a wife, a parent to a child, a politician to the people. There is just no substitute for character in the life of a leader!
Almost every spiritual leadership failure is a failure to be like Christ in character and conduct. Christian leaders must have character that matches their calling. A person with a blemished character is one who has forfeited his anointing and authority as a spiritual leader. Spiritual character is only sustained through prayer.
It is through prayer that God leads and empowers us, so that we can in turn lead and empower others. Through prayer, God shares his vision for us, so we can share that vision with others. Through prayer, God anoints us with his power, so we can in turn empower others. Prayer propels us toward our potential, so that we can lead others to their potential. Prayer must be the very life-breath of spiritual leadership.
Therefore, it is only prayer that will:
a) Purify our purpose.
b) Make us truly prophetic.
c) Give us a people-focus rather than material-focus.
d) Keep us consistent.
e) Keep us positive and passionate in our pursuits.
f) Help us strive toward perfection in all we do.
g) Make us discerning and perceptive in the spirit.
h) Give us the wisdom to be problem-solvers God’s way.
i) Impart creativity for the promotion of God’s vision in our
lives.
j) Motivate us to be pacesetters who stay ahead through the
Spirit.
k) Cause us to be precipitators who make things happen for the
kingdom.
l) Teach us how to be good biblical planners around God’s
priorities.
m) Help us be practical and pragmatic in leading others.
n) Motivate us to be punctual and “on time” leaders.
o) Produce the needed balance of persistence and patience in
our lives.
p) Cause us to be true partner-leaders who share responsibility
with others.
q) Give us the natural and supernatural power we need to lead
for God’s glory!
James 5:16-17 reminds us that “…The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective. Elijah was a human being, even as we are. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the land for three and a half years.” The leader’s prayer can make a difference.
BIBLE VERSES ON PRAYER
Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened (Matthew 7:7-8).
Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me,and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart ( Jeremiah 29:12-13, NKJV).
The LORD is near to all who call upon Him, To all who call upon Him in truth. He will fulfill the desire of those who fear Him; He will also hear their cry and will save them (Psalm 145:18-19, NKJV).
Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving (Colossians 4:2, ESV).
Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. 15 And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him (1 John 5:14-15, NKJV).
Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you
(1 Thessalonians 5:16-18, NKJV).
REFLECTION
- What challenges do you face in your prayer life?
- What can you do to overcome these challenges?
EVALUATION AND ACTION
- Do prayers play a critical role in your leadership role?
- What transformation have you experienced through prayer in your leadership role?
- Read John 15:1-7. What lessons about our relationship with God can we draw from this passage?