Jesus on Leadership by Gene Wilkes (Wheaton: Tyndale, 1998)
Review from the Foreword by Calvin Miller.
Gene Wilkes knows the literature of leadership but that is not why this
book is the finest of its kind in the marketplace. There are four major contributors to Gene Wilkes’s great- ness as
a scholar and teacher. These same four
forces permeate this book and make it a must for all of those who want to
become informed and capable leaders.
First, Gene Wilkes loves Jesus.
Please don’t think this a mere saccharine appraisal between
friends. This simplicity provides Gene
his passion to serve both God and his congregation. Further, this love for Christ carries a subtle and pervasive
authenticity that makes Gene Wilkes believable. Whether you read him or hear him lecture, you walk away from the
experience knowing that what you’ve heard is the truth - the life-changing
truth from a man who lives the truth and loves getting to the bottom of
things. All this I believe derives from
his love of Christ.
Second, Gene is a practitioner of servant leadership. When he encourages you to pick up the basin
and towel and wash feet, you may be sure it is not empty theory. He teaches others what he has learned in the
laboratory of his own experience. Gene
is a servant leader, and even as he wrote this book, he directed his very large
church through a massive building program.
His church leadership ability, which he exhibited during this writing
project, does not surface in this volume, but it undergirds and authenticates
it.
Third, Gene Wilkes knows better than anyone else the literature of
leadership. As you read this book, you
will quickly feel his command of his subject.
Footnotes will come and go, and behind the thin lines of numbers, ibids,
and the like you will feel the force of his understanding. No one knows the field of both secular and
Christian leadership like this man. So Jesus
on Leadership is a mature essay. It
has come from the only man I know with this vast comprehension of the
subject.
Finally, Gene Wilkes is a born writer.
It is not often that good oral communicators are good with the pen. But throughout this book, you will find the
paragraphs coming and going so smoothly that you will be hard pressed to remember
you are reading a definitive and scholarly work. Books that are this critically important should not be so much
fun. Gene Wilkes is to leadership what
Barbara Tuchman is to history. You know
it’s good for you and are surprised to be so delighted at taking the strong
medicine that makes the world better.
Here are the chapter headings:
Down from the head table:
Jesus’model of servant leadership
Principle 1: Humble your heart
Humility: the living example
Principle 2: First be a follower
Jesus led so that others could be followers
Principle 3: Find greatness in service
Jesus demonstrating greatness
Principle 4: Take risks
Jesus, the great risk taker
Principle 5: Take up the trowel
Jesus’ power – through service
Principle 6: Share responsibility and authority
How did Jesus do it?
Principle 7: Build a team
The team Jesus built
And some great quotes from page 2:
All true work combines [the] two elements of serving and ruling. Ruling is what we do; serving is how we do
it. There’s true sovereignty in all
good work. There’s no way to exercise
it rightly other than by serving.
Eugene Patterson, Leap over a Wall
Above all, leadership is a position of servanthood.
Max Deere, Leadership Jazz
The principle of service is what separates true leaders from glory
seekers.
Laurie Beth Jones, Jesus, CEO
People are supposed to serve.
Life is a mission, not a career.
Stephen R. Covey, The Leader of the Future
Ultimately the choice we make is between service and self-interest.
Peter Block, Stewardship, Choosing Service over Self-Interest
Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself
will be exalted.
JESUS, Luke 14:11
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© Renewal Journal #16: Vision
(2000:2) www.renewaljournal.com
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