Hello friends. After learning skills to lead, we must know that snares are equally important. Today, let’s follow Pastor Foo and find out potential snares that may trick us to fall badly.

There is only one reason we are ever to go against authority, that is, when we are told to do anything that violates the word of God. If our employer asks us to falsify accounts, for example, we must stand our ground and refuse even if that costs us our jobs. In the marketplace, there are lines and boundaries we must draw and maintain all the time when it comes to activities that are harmful and contrary to Scripture. We must yield our struggles to the Lord instead of repeat the old saying, “It is better to ask for forgiveness than permission”.

PRIDE

Pride can lead us to fall into other areas of concern. A proud spirit makes a person expand his view of himself, take credit for others’ achievements and become unteachable. Proverbs 16: 18 warns us, “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall”.

Proud leaders see themselves as indispensable, and come to trust in their own abilities rather than God’s help and the strength of a good team. Such leaders ignore their blind spots and weaknesses and seek to maintain or elevate their position rather than serve those under them.

Testimony:   Gayle is a senior executive in the financial industry. Immediately after a colleague joined her department, he started to form his inner circle with followers who listen to his instructions and support his initiatives. As a result, other members of the department were sidelined. But the bosses did not stop him and he began to get more brazen and flaunt his power.

Although Gayle was not impacted directly, she was very troubled in her spirit as she had to work diligently in order to be promoted. One day, God gave Gayle a promise from Isaiah 37. Just as King Sennacherib of Assyria had mocked Israel’s King Hezekiah and God – only to suffer a terrible defeat – God would deal with this colleague and turn him back (verse 29).

As it happened, there was an economic downturn. The company decided to downsize and restructure. Some employees had to be retrenched and this particular colleague was one of them. He was moved back to the city he had come from, with a demotion and the team he had built up was disbanded.

Pride goes before a fall, for James 4: 6 says, “… God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

A true outstanding leader would recognise the wisdom in that principle. Instead of focusing on gathering glory and honour for himself, he will centre his life on the Lord, who is the same yesterday, today and from Whom all help and favour comes.

Administrative & Financial Issues

If a company does not handle its administrative issue well, it might lead to poor communication and discord amongst team members. In fact, administration is an area that is lined with many potential pitfalls. 

In organisations, leaders are often tempted to approve their own claims for reimbursements and expenditures. It may seem like a small matter but over time, it will lead to serious oversights when external auditors make their checks.

Richard and Henry Blackaby, in Spiritual Leadership, pointed out that the health of an organisation can be determined by how long the top leader takes to become apprised of a problem on the ground. If he neglects these smaller issues at the expense of more seemingly important matter, they can quickly morph into major crises. The Blackabys note, “A single problem neglected today can multiply into a cluster of problems tomorrow”.

LACK OF BOUNDARIES

The author of the book Why Pastors Fall Into Sin, Jack Frost wrote how he nearly committed sexual immorality as he spent too much time with women who affirmed him and appreciated his ministry. When he realised he was on the road to committing “emotional adultery”, he confided in another pastor and took steps to restore his marriage.

We need to protect our friends and community, and proper boundaries for inter-gender relationship are critical in this regard. The church is a place where God-ordained institutions of marriage and family are held in the highest regard. Apostle Paul writes in Ephesians 5: 3, “But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people”.

I often advise our male leaders, who work in the marketplace, to practise accountability especially when their jobs involve a lot of travelling and after-hours entertainment. Informing their wives and families about their whereabouts is the priority, but they should also always have a band of brothers with whom they can be transparent, and share with them struggles about sexual temptation.

“Sexting”, or sexually-charged flirtation through text messaging, has become more popular. It is so easy for many people to exchange explicit messages with people who are not their spouses. If their marriages are already weak due to lack of physical and emotional intimacy, they become even more vulnerable to falling into sexual sin.

FAMILY ISSUES

When a leader is so engrossed in his ministry, he has insufficient time to nurture his marriage and will gradually drift apart from his spouse and children.

The institution of marriage is strengthened by shared experience. The core of a marriage is to walk in agreement with each other. When one party fails to walk with the other, the marriage will weaken and fall apart.

However, having identified unresolved family issues as a potential pitfall, we must recognise that the strength of our family must flow out of our walk with God. We have heard people say that we should put God first, followed by our families, the third is our work and finally serve God. Some people have used this as an excuse and turn away from being involved in ministry. The fundamental issue is that they have not put God first in their walk in the first place.

The paradigm of a Christian is that we must put our walk with God at the centre of our lives (Matthew 6: 33). Our family, work or studies and ministry (serve God) are areas built from that centre and embrace it.

All these four areas will demand 100% of our attention at any one time, but when God is first, He will instruct, teach and guide us to prioritise the areas of our family, work and ministry accordingly as we walk with Him.

EMOTIONAL LEAKAGE

It is not enough to do things for God; we need to spend time with God! Intimacy with Him and knowledge of His Word must fill and pervade everything that we do. Jesus promises in Matthew 11: 28, “Come to Me, all you who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” He is the Good Shepherd who guides us by the still waters, and leads us to graze in the green pastures of His rest (Psalm 23). Rest assured, friends, He is able to help us in our burdens.

As pastors, my team and I spend a lot of time with hurting people. While the Word of ministry refreshes, encourages and guides us, the work of ministry can drain us. We officiate at funerals, mediate between feuding spouses and counsel believers undergoing incredible trials such as terminal illness. While ministering, we great suffering and death firsthand, and the emotional toll of our work can overwhelm us over a period of time. Physically, we fall sick due to exhaustion and fatigue. Our emotions and mental state become fragile and fraught with tension, and we become discouraged.

The need to refill our spiritual and emotional “tanks” is a must and vital. Some people relax over a cup of coffee in a café; others take a walk in the nature or spend an hour in prayer and solitude. Some, over a quick nap and they are refreshed and recharged. Whatever the method, we must ensure that we keep ourselves topped up regularly so that we can stay effective over the long haul.

FAILURE TO GROW SPIRITUALLY

The New Testament repeats the call to grow spiritually. The apostle Peter writes in 2 Peter 3: 18, “But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.”

All of us face the danger of doing so much for God that we neglect spending time with Him. For pastors and church leaders, many look to us for guidance on how to lead their lives but we ourselves must always look to the Lord. It is the Lord who exalts us – did He not exalt Moses in the eyes of Israel? Thus, we give all glory to the Lord: “Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but to Your name give glory, because of Your mercy, because of Your truth” (Psalm 115: 1).

The trapping of spirituality can grow to replace true spirituality, and we can find ourselves just going through the motions of ministry work without the power source of Scripture and the Holy Spirit.

It is important to maintain a Bible-reading goal especially those who speak and preach regularly. We must work from the flow of God’s reservoir within us. We must pursue a guilt-free, condemnation-free relationship (Romans 8: 1) and maintain a humble posture before our subordinates, fellow church leaders or friends. And check constantly from them about how we can improve the way we lead.

Be vigilant, friends! All of us are vulnerable to a fall in our own way. So we must keep our walk with God vibrant – let Him fill us emotionally, spiritually and mentally. This can make all the difference in whether we experience success of collapse.

HE WHO KEEPS YOU FROM FALLING

What is the ultimate power that keeps us from falling? The answer is the Lord who works in us to do so (Jude 24). Such power does not happen automatically. It must be continually accessed, drawn from and lived in. Jude points in verses 20-21, “But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.”

God’s keeping us is conditional. Jude highlights four ways that we can keep ourselves from stumbling:

① We have to build ourselves up in the faith, knowing the Word and living it out.

② Connect with God continually.

③ Keep ourselves in the love of God   and

④ Look to the mercy of Christ.

2 Peter 1: 5-10 say, “But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue, to virtue knowledge, to knowledge self-control, to self-control perseverance, to perseverance godliness, to godliness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things are yours and abound, you will be neither barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For he who lacks these things is short-sighted, even to blindness, and has forgotten that he was cleansed from his old sins.

Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble.”

As we continue to do these things in increasing measures, we will grow stronger spiritually, making our calling and election sure and protecting ourselves from falling.

Friends, let us do all this and one day we can say with joy “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith” like Paul did in 2 Timothy 4: 7. Next week, we shall discuss the Posture of the Leader, the last episode of the series. Have a pleasant week!

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