Leadership questions

Dear Editor,

We are hearing more about failures of Christian leadership than we have been accustomed to hear in the past. It is certainly not because such failures are a new feature of evangelical church life, though to make them the subject for a book seems a rather depressing task for an author to set himself (ref. en April review of Powerful Leaders). It is not, however, a new problem and the New Testament acknowledges this; indeed it provides us with a clear understanding of the roots of the problem and how it should be dealt with. The reviewer does not tell us whether or how Marcus Honeysett expounds the Biblical material.

Several of Paul’s letters speak of the problems that arose in the churches as a result of leaders intent on pressing their own theologies and practices on believers. In the letter to the church at Colossae Paul is particularly definitive and exposes precisely where things have gone wrong. In just half a sentence he pinpoints the challenge that every believer is familiar with in their own experience: They have lost connection with the Head. (Col. 2:19) This had resulted in strict legalism and a brand of super-spirituality (2:16-18). The loss of their personal walk with the Saviour had exposed this group in Colossae to ‘the elemental spiritual forces of this world’ which inevitably led them to a spirituality that was adrift from truth.