The starting point of all Christian leadership isn't the leader but the eternal truths that God has revealed to us.
When the leader walks into the room, a passion for truth had better enter with him.
Authentic leadership does not emerge out of a vacuum. The leadership that matters most is convictional—deeply convictional. This quality of leadership springs from those most deeply held beliefs that shape who we are and establish our beliefs about everything else. Convictions are not just beliefs; that is, they are not those beliefs that are merely held by us. Instead, convictions hold us in their grip. We would not know who we are but for these bedrock beliefs, these convictions, and without them, we would not know how to lead.
Christian leaders recognize that conviction is essential to our faith and discipleship. Our Christian experience begins with belief. That most familiar of all New Testament verses, John 3:16, tells us God sent Jesus Christ, His only Son, “that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.” When Paul and Silas told their terrified jailer how he could be saved, they expressed it with powerful and unmistakable simplicity: “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household” (Acts 16:31).
The command to believe is central to the Bible. Christianity is founded upon certain nonnegotiable truths, and those truths, once known, are translated into beliefs. The beliefs that anchor our faith are those to which we are most passionately and personally committed, and these are our convictions. We do not believe in belief any more than we have faith in faith. We believe the gospel, and we have faith in Christ. Our beliefs have substance and our faith has an object.
Put simply, a conviction is a belief of which we are thoroughly convinced. I don’t mean that we merely believe that a given set of statements is true but that we are convinced that these truths are essential and life changing. We live out of these truths and are willing to die for these truths.
Justin Martyr, one of the leaders of the early church, also serves as a portrait of convictional leadership. As he led members of his own congregation to execution at the hands of the Roman authorities, Justin encouraged his people with these words: “Remember, they may kill us, but they cannot hurt us.”
Now, that is authentic leadership in its clearest form—the leadership to lead people to their deaths, knowing that Christ will vindicate them and give them the gift of eternal life. Thankfully, most of us will never have to experience that kind of leadership challenge.
Nevertheless, the convictions remain the same, and so does the function of those commitments in the life and thinking of the leader. We know these things to be so true that we are willing to risk for them, live for them, lead them, and, if necessary, die for them.
The leadership that really matters is all about conviction. The leader is rightly concerned with everything from strategy and vision to team building, motivation, and delegation. But at the center of the true leader’s heart and mind, you will find convictions that drive and determine everything else.
I find many of my most encouraging and informative models of convictional leadership from history. Throughout my life, I have drawn inspiration from the example of Martin Luther, the great sixteenth-century Reformer who was so convinced of the authority of the Bible that he was willing to stand before the intimidating court of religious authorities that had put him on trial, and even to stare down the Holy Roman emperor, declaring, “Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise, God help me.”
Here I stand. Those words are a manifesto of convictional leadership. But Luther was not merely ready to stand; he was ready to lead the church in a process of courageous reformation.
Did you see the movie A Man for All Seasons, based on the play by Robert Bolt? The story concerns the final years of Sir Thomas More and his trial on charges of treason. The former Lord Chancellor of England More earned the fury of King Henry VIII for refusing to take the Oath of Supremacy, which declared the king to be the supreme governor of the church.
More persecuted the Lutherans and William Tyndale, the great translator of the Bible into English.
Bolt’s version of Thomas More did not tell the whole truth, but it is still inspiring by the example More set as he went to the scaffold in order to be true to his convictions. Facing the crowd gathered to witness his execution, More stated:
“I am commanded by the king to be brief, and since I am the king’s obedient servant, brief I will be. I die His Majesty’s good servant, but God’s first.”
That is the kind of conviction that makes all the difference. Sadly, far too many of today’s leaders seem to have little idea what they believe, or they appear to be driven by no clear and discernible convictions. How many of today’s leaders are known for the convictions for which they are willing to die—or even to live?
You can divide all leaders into those who merely hold an office or position and those who hold great convictions. Life is too short to give much attention to leaders who stand for little or nothing, leaders who are looking for the next program, riding the latest leadership fad, trying on idea after idea, but driven by no deep convictions.
