Lethal Leadership and It’s Antidote

I found these words of timely truth in Carl L Trueman’s book “Minority Report” pages 187-188

“ Leadership is a potentially lethal position. Those who are leaders are not simply given more opportunities to sin; they actually inhabit a place which positively fosters the kind of self-deception which lies at the very heart of what sin is. If routine sin allows us, even momentarily, to think that we are gods, then the leader lives in a world where that potential image of self can be reinforced again and again by power and by the adulation and/or obedience of others. Perhaps the people we need to lead us, whom we can really trust, are, first and foremost, those who do not want to be leaders but have that role thrust upon them. Scripture tells us, of course, that it is a good and noble thing to desire to be a leader; but perhaps we need to pay careful attention to how someone desires to be a leader, and how responsible they have proved in the small things of life before we automatically assume that the desire to be a leader actually confirms the call to leadership.

Accountability is thus crucial in leadership. Choice of advisors and confidants in critical. if we want to avoid personal moral disaster as a Christian, we need to establish mechanisms of accountability before we think we have any problems; and for leaders this is even more imperative. Being surrounded by yes-people and lackeys might stroke the self-image; but it will do nothing to prevent self-destruction.”