Many Christian leaders are “losing altitude” in ways that most of us do not see or understand.  When we “suddenly” hear of a respected executive in our church whose marriage has disintegrated, or a well-known pastor caught in moral indiscretion, we should remember these “crashes” are usually the result of numerous bad decisions made during a long, downward emotional, mental, and spiritual spiral.  Sometimes the leader was seeking help during his descent toward disaster.  Often it was concealed to everyone.

Biblical Leaders in Downward Drift

The Old Testament does not disguise the emotional struggles of Israel’s great leaders.  We read about Moses losing altitude when he became overwhelmed with the monumental task of leading God’s complaining people.  He asked God to kill him and put him out of his misery (Numbers 11:15).

The first king of Israel, the strong and impressive King Saul, lost altitude when he became jealous toward the young and popular David (1 Samuel 18:9–12).

More than once, David, the anointed future king, lost altitude from weariness over running from Saul.  On one occasion, he fled to a Philistine city.  Afraid for his life, he pretended to be insane, slobbering on himself and scratching the walls in a ploy to survive.  On another occasion, he fled again to a Philistine city where he made an alliance with these enemy armies, which led to deeper complexity and disaster (1 Samuel 27:1).  Leaders losing altitude can behave strangely and irrationally.

Even the prophet Elijah, the recipient of God’s direct revelation, lost altitude after an intense confrontation with the prophets of Baal at Mt. Carmel.  Alone in the wilderness, deeply fatigued and coping with the threats on his life by Queen Jezebel, he prayed that God would let him just die (1 Kings 19:4).

In the New Testament, the apostle Paul at one point gave up hope of survival in the face of the severe trials in the province of Asia (2 Corinthians 1:8).  Similarly, the young leader Timothy lost altitude when he was overtaken by fear amid the spiritual challenges of leading the church at Ephesus (2 Timothy 1:7).  Demas, a trusted associate of the apostle Paul, lost altitude when he began to fall in love with the things of the world.  Eventually he completely self-destructed, abandoning his ministry (2 Timothy 4:10).

These are just a few of the many stories that remind us of the vulnerability great leaders can experience during the storms of ministry and the pressures of responsibility.  This kind of spiritual vertigo is nothing new to human leadership.  Everyone in leadership, modern and ancient, proves faulty and susceptible to the downward spiral.

Trained to Trust

When pilots are preparing for their instrument rating, instructors go to great lengths to train them to thoroughly understand and trust the instruments.  Textbooks for flight students and aspiring pilots address the physical challenges of flight with great detail and candor.  They call these the “human factors” of flight and note that human factors account for over 80 percent of all accidents.  One textbook published by the Federal Aviation Administration warns that flying in poor conditions can “result in sensations that are misleading to the body’s sensory system. A safe pilot needs to understand these sensations and effectively counteract them."

Textbooks on flying typically address three of the body’s sensory systems: the visual (eyes), the vestibular (ears), and the postural (nerves).  The effectiveness and complexity of these systems are a testament to God’s profound creative work.  Each is essential to safe flight.  Yet the three systems are fallible.  This unreliability leads to disaster if a pilot is not keenly aware of aviation physiology and resolute in managing each physical system with great care.

Disorientation That Can Lead to Disaster

During flight in “visual meteorological conditions” (clear visibility), the pilot’s eyes are a primary orientation source that usually provide accurate and reliable input.  As one training manual states, “When these visual cues are taken away, false sensations can cause the pilot to become disoriented."

The pilot’s inner ear and nerves can send confusing signals.  When the sense of balance is off, it is called vestibular disorientation.  When the nervous system becomes confused, it is known as spatial disorientation.  This disorientation can cause a pilot to overcompensate for perceived plane-control problems in ways that can endanger the pilot and passengers.

The worst of these confused attempts leads to “graveyard spiral,” where the plane dives rapidly in a circular pattern.  The pilot is usually completely confused about what is going on prior to the resulting crash.

Pilots actually practice controlled maneuvers during their flight training to gain a comprehensive understanding of this danger of disorientation.  They must learn through these training experiences about their own susceptibility to disorientation – and that their subjective judgments about the direction, pitch, and turn of their aircraft based on bodily sensations are frequently false.  All of this leads to a greater confidence in relying on the flight instruments rather than their own subjective sensations.

In What Do We Trust?

The task of leadership has several fascinating parallels to the task of flying a plane.  Just as a pilot’s vision can be restricted by poor weather or unusual conditions, so a leader’s perception of a given situation can be limited and flawed.  Just as the physiology of the inner ear can become confused, so a leader’s inner voice can give input that is confusing and erroneous.  And just as a pilot’s nervous system can misinterpret the environment, so a leader’s emotions can create subjective scenarios that lead to bad decisions.

Trusting our flawed perceptions, our confused internal conversations, and our wide range of emotions feels natural, but is ultimately perilous.

Choosing to Trust the Instruments

One popular textbook for pilots tells of the early airmail planes with limited navigation equipment, flown during an era when weather information often was unavailable.  Of the first forty aviators hired to fly the mail, thirty-one were killed while flying.  The reason:  Their planes were not equipped with the proper instruments and navigation equipment to allow pilots to safely fly in the clouds or in low visibility conditions.

So what instruments do we need to lift off and climb above the storms when they come? In my book, Defying Gravity – How to Survive the Storms of Pastoral Ministry, I describe a “leadership instrument panel” that presents nine vital areas of concern for the enduring leader.

1.  Applied Truth

2. Spiritual Intimacy

3. Personal Integrity

4. Biblical Identity

5. Genuine Accountability

6. Eternal Significance

7. Healthy Family Life

8. Indispensable Pain

9. A Captivating Call

Your gauges may be different – but I pray you identify them and trust them as you look intently into the unchanging and life-giving Word of God.  Proverbs 3:5 reminds us, “Lean on, trust in, and be confident in the Lord with all your heart and mind and do not rely on your own insight or understanding.” (AMP)

In life and leadership, storms are inevitable.  Survival is optional.  Victory and endurance are possible – and promised – as we trust the things we know to be true, available to us in the person, presence, and promises of Jesus Christ.

As president of a national renewal organization, I visit and interact with hundreds of leaders each year, the vast majority of whom are faithful and skilled servants of God. Yet many of these leaders open up to me about their personal and private challenges. The pain is deep. The struggles are real.  They are called to leadership, and want to remain faithful, but many are losing their way and hanging on for dear life. One of my great desires is helping leaders who are “losing altitude."

Leaders Taking Flight

I am a self-professing “leadership-aholic.” I love leading. I love reading about leadership and studying other leaders.

When Paul wrote his final letter to his “son in the faith” Timothy, he used three analogies to help his disciple understand the task of leadership.  He spoke of a soldier, an athlete, and a farmer (2 Timothy 2:3-7).  In similar fashion, in my most recent book, I liken the leadership assignment to a flight assignment; leaders and coleaders as pilots and copilots.  The similarities are fascinating.

The metaphor fits for most pastors and business leaders: Most of our lives are composed of numerous leadership flights.  Some business executives may stay with the same company for decades; others have numerous shorter leadership assignments in various locations and settings.  An experienced educator, civic leader, government official, or business manager may piece together an array of leadership flights that have made up a career.

For pastors, the average tenure in Protestant churches has declined to just four years, according to George Barna.  So most pastors will have numerous leadership flights in their ministry career.  Some have fewer, longer flights.  I followed one pastor in Sacramento, California whose leadership flight in one church lasted forty years.

Flight and Leadership

In brief, I see numerous parallels between flying and leading:

Training and Qualification – Just as pilots must be trained, be equipped, and earn a license and certification, so leaders must be equipped and qualified to lead effectively. Formal education can be a part of this preparation, though not always.  Mentoring, proven service, and faithful character are essential for the growing leader.  We find these biblical specifics in 1 Timothy 3:1–8 and Titus 1, given for those who take on the primary leadership roles in the church.  These traits are good qualifiers for Christian leaders in any realm of service.

Passion and Perseverance – Most pilots learn to fly because of a passion for the skies.  Experienced pilots have persevered, logging hours and increasing their certification in order to excel in the skills of flying larger and more sophisticated aircraft.  Leaders also have a God-given desire for influencing other people and making a significant difference in the world.  Great leaders remain faithful, develop their understanding of leadership principles, and maintain noble character and winning habits.

Risk and Reward – At times flying can be risky.  Although commercial flights are statistically the safest way to travel, we all know that the consequences of a mechanical failure or pilot error can be disastrous.  Quite literally, lives hang in the balance.  Yet the effectiveness and exhilaration of flight makes it worth it.  For commercial pilots, helping people travel efficiently, whether to conduct vital business, share holidays with family, or enjoy a much-needed vacation, has to be fulfilling.

Leadership is also risky.  Decisions affect many people.  And like pilots, pastors can affect the lives of those in their care.  Setbacks, even failure, are possible.  Yet, the thrill of leading people to the achievement of a great cause, especially one of eternal significance, is a joy beyond human expression.

Responsibility and Accountability – Of course, experienced pilots carry a serious responsibility for human lives.  The bigger the plane, the greater the volume of precious human cargo.  As a result, pilots are accountable to strict standards of flight protocol, personal discipline, and compliance with regulations.  Pastors are accountable also.  Spiritual leaders influence people and, according to James 3:1, have a greater accountability for how they lead and what they teach.  There are no solo flights in leadership.

Objectivity and Trust – The best pilots learn to trust their instruments, the information from ground control, and the proven technology necessary for safe and trouble-free flight.  Good leaders must also learn to trust objective indicators, including God’s authoritative, holy Word, for their leadership flight.  When self-trust and emotional justifications outweigh the proven realities for effective leadership, destructive behavior and disaster happen.  Leaders lose altitude.  People are at risk.

Staying in Flight: Keeping Perspective

Too often, a crash occurs and the human casualties are devastating.  Using the flight analogy, I’ve written my book to help pastors and other leaders maintain their leadership altitude in a world that wants to bring us down.  I believe the biggest challenges to an effective and enduring leadership flight are our own flawed perceptions, subjective emotions, and misjudgments that can put us in real danger.

Paul’s final words of advice to Timothy reflected this same concern.  He wrote in 2 Timothy 4:5, “But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.”  The Amplified version says it this way: “As for you, be calm and cool and steady, accept and suffer unflinchingly every hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fully perform all the duties of your ministry."

God wants us to soar through the storms of life and has provided an indispensable instrument panel of biblical truth for our success and endurance as leaders.  It’s time, with God’s help and our commitment, to defy gravity.

Pray for the pastoral leaders in your life today, asking God to give them the grace to keep perspective and soar in their leadership assignments, for the glory of Christ.  Much is at stake.

Copyright © 2010 Daniel Henderson. All rights reserved.

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These tumultuous times are pushing many believers toward a necessary redefinition of the meaning of life.  Things we counted on in previous years (a home, a job, a vacation, a retirement) are threatened by a very uncertain economy.  Others may be skating thorough these storms of financial insecurity but might be facing a battle with terminal illness or family breakup.  Whatever the nature of life’s problems, they clearly provide an opportunity for a deeper understanding of the nature of the Christian life.

In part one of this devotion (which you can read below), we considered the meaning of Colossians 3:4, where we read of “Christ, who is our life.”  In an effort to embrace this truth, we looked at two key commitments:

Remember Your Status - We are “raised with Christ” (Colossians 3:1) and must fully embrace the implications of this truth.

Refocus Your Pursuit - We must “seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God” (Colossians 3:1).

Three additional commitments, found in Colossians chapter three, are vital to a core redefinition of our life.

Recalibrate Your Thoughts - When a computer fails to function properly, the user is commonly instructed to reboot, or restart, the computer.  Our cluttered and distracted minds often need a similar intervention – usually many times throughout each day.

Colossians 3:2 states, “Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth.”  Literally, this is the idea of a continual commitment to “fix the attention” or “give serious consideration” to something.  “Things above” speaks of matters of eternal significance.  These should become the dominating focus of our mind and its considerations.

Our thoughts determine our behavior and future.  In light of the constant bombardment of needless information, tempting images, and carnal input from people around us, we must re-engage our disciplines of thought on a daily basis.

Our minds naturally drift to temporal and worldly concerns.  They become polluted by the influence of the media and culture.  We must embrace a proactive and purposeful pursuit of things that are noble, just, pure, lovely, good, virtuous, and praiseworthy (Philippians 4:8).

Reaffirm Your Death - Dead people do not respond to any external stimuli, no matter how enticing it may be.  Colossians 3:3 tells us, “For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.”  As Galatians 2:20 says, “I am crucified with Christ.”  In writing to the Christians in Rome Paul reiterates that believers are dead to sin (6:2, 7 & 11).  Previously in Colossians, Paul has told these Christians that they are not subject to religious regulations because they died to the power of rules and legalisms (2:20).

Every day, because Christ is my life, I must reaffirm that I do not have to respond to the values, demands, and expectations of a fallen world.  I can live as one “dead” to these allurements and one fully alive and defined by Christ.

Relish Your Destiny - Ultimately, we must keep our hearts fixed on the hope that “Christ who is our life” will appear, and that we will appear with Him in glory (Colossians 3:4).  Eternity, along with its reward and ultimate worship, is just around the corner.  Any definition of life, other than Christ, is going to evaporate into irrelevance.  All that we currently see with our physical eyes will be gone.  The real scoreboard of life will triumph and we will receive everlasting reward for a life dedicated to the Lordship and centrality of Christ.  It will be worth it all – and that will be glory for us.

Copyright © 2010 Daniel Henderson. All rights reserved.

What defines your life?  Good Christians know the “right” answer – but what is our real answer?  In truth, the things that dominate our thinking and consistently spark our interests are what define our life.  The real definition of our life can often be reduced to those things that we rely on for security, acceptance, and hope in this life.

The bad news for many people in today’s unsteady world is that their core definition is being threatened by the stripping away of possessions, position, and pleasures.  Like a dead bouquet of flowers, no life remains in what used to be a colorful and carefree existence.

For the true Christ-follower, these present days force a decision upon us.  Will we redefine our brief appearance on this planet in the terms of biblical truth, leading to a fresh discovery of true meaning and fulfillment?  Conversely, will we prolong the pain by clinging unnecessarily to those phantom trappings that cannot be preserved and will not provide purpose?

The Truth about Life

Colossians 3:4 speaks of “Christ who is our life.”  Christ is the definition of life itself.  The Scriptures affirm this powerful truth.  For example:

• John 10:10 – “I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly."
• John 14:6 – "Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life.'"
• John 20:31 –  “But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name."
• Galatians 2:20 – “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me."
• 1 John 5:12 – “He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life."

When we actually embrace this powerful truth of Christ as our very life, we can enjoy the freedom of a redefined existence.  Practically, we experience a transition in focus and a transformation in heart:

• From a life obsessed with accumulation to a life embracing simplicity
  
• From a life controlled by busyness to a life that cherishes relationships
  
• From a life worried about reputation to a life pursuing integrity
  
• From a life consumed by ambition to a life discovering contentment
  
• From a life sustained by success to a life resting in significance
  
• From a life ruled by competition to a life rejoicing in brokenness
  
• From a life enamored with status to a life in pursuit of humility
  
• From a life marked by drivenness to a life existing in peace
  
• From a life concerned about winning to a life poured out in love
  
• From a life preoccupied with earthly recognition to a life pursuing eternal reward
  
• From a life fearing earthly loss to a life delighting in eternal gain
  
• From a life of frenzied effort to a life of fulfilling purpose
  
• From a life of debilitating insecurity to a life of mature identity

Yes, But How?

So how do we embrace this core definition? This necessarily involves a daily redefinition in our thoughts and affections because our flesh constantly seeks to glom on to the false realities of this temporal world.  From the first four verses of Colossians chapter three, let me offer a few practical steps.

Remember Your Status!

Because I fly so much these days, I enjoy “elite” status on several airlines.  This simply means that I get to board early, avoid luggage fees, and enjoy occasional first-class upgrades at no charge.  I earned this status by the number of miles I have accumulated in flight.  I only maintain this status by continuing to fly in excessive amounts.

Because of Christ, every believer has a supernatural status.  Yet, we did not earn it nor do we need to maintain it.

Colossians 3:1 says, “If then you were raised with Christ.”  This is a bedrock truth for a redefined life.  Ephesians 2:5-6 describes our status: “Even when we were dead in trespasses, (God) made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.”  We are literally “co-resurrected” with Christ.  This is our status, because of His death and resurrection.

I remember the old Gospel song that said, “This world is not my home.  I am just passing through.“ Hebrews 11:13 describes people of faith as “strangers and pilgrims on the earth.”  Paul reminds us that our “citizenship is in heaven” (Philippians 3:20). After saving us by His grace, God left us here “on assignment” to share His life with others.  Yet, our actual status is already Heaven – and we should live accordingly.

We do not move our living room furniture into the Holiday Inn when we check in for a one-night stay.  We do not install an expensive stereo in a rental car.  Neither should we pretend that this world is a permanent reality for us.  Because of grace, our status is secure and settled in Heaven.

Refocus Your Pursuit!

Living in the reality of this truth requires a daily commitment to “seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God” (Colossians 3:1).  Literally, this means to “keep seeking.” It is a continual choice and commitment.

Most of us go where we look.  When we drive, we gaze at the road ahead – and tend to go there.  When we walk, we focus on the things in front of us and usually move ahead safely.  Conversely, when we get distracted and focus on something other than our desired destination, havoc occurs.  We wreck.  We trip.  We get hurt – and often hurt others.

Therefore, we must presently and actively seek the things of eternity.  Literally, this is a command to “desire”, to “set the heart” – even to ”worship”.  In spite of the many enticing distractions of the lusts and attractions of this world, we can refocus our passion moment-by-moment on the greatest reality of Christ, at the throne of God – calling us to Himself in worship and reinforcing us with holy passions for the best life possible.

Today, let us remember our status and intentionally refocus our pursuit.  A better definition of life will burn within our souls and we will find the strength we need to live righteously and godly in this present age.

Copyright © 2010 Daniel Henderson. All rights reserved.

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