The Biblical Leadership Show
Inspiration. Wisdom. Leadership from a Higher Perspective.
Welcome to The Biblical Leadership Show, your go-to resource for discovering timeless truths from Scripture that empower leaders to inspire, influence, and impact their world. Hosted by Tim Lansford and Dr. Dean Posey, this podcast takes a deep dive into the Bible’s profound lessons on leadership, bringing fresh perspectives to timeless principles that resonate in today’s fast-paced, ever-changing world.
Each episode is packed with:
- Powerful Biblical Insights: We explore the leadership styles of biblical figures like Moses, Esther, David, and Jesus, extracting practical strategies for overcoming challenges, building trust, and creating lasting impact.
- Real-World Applications: Learn how to integrate biblical leadership principles into your workplace, team, or organization while navigating the complexities of modern leadership.
- Inspiration for Growth: Whether you’re a seasoned leader or just stepping into a leadership role, our content is designed to motivate and equip you to lead with integrity, compassion, and vision.
- Stories and Wisdom: Hear personal stories and guest interviews that highlight how biblical leadership transforms lives and businesses.
Leadership isn’t just about titles or power—it’s about serving others, making wise decisions, and leaving a legacy of faith and purpose. Through relatable discussions, actionable takeaways, and encouragement rooted in Scripture, The Biblical Leadership Show provides the tools and insights you need to lead boldly and faithfully in every sphere of life.
Whether you’re leading in the boardroom, the church, your community, or your home, this podcast is for you. Together, we’ll navigate the intersection of faith and leadership, bridging ancient wisdom with modern relevance.
New episodes drop every Tuesday. Subscribe now and lead with purpose, faith, and courage!
The Biblical Leadership Show
Raising Lazarus: Leadership Lessons from Jesus
The shortest verse in the Bible—"Jesus wept"—reveals one of the most profound leadership principles we can apply today. When faced with the death of his friend Lazarus, Jesus didn't hide his emotions but expressed them authentically. This teaches us that great leaders aren't afraid to show appropriate emotion, creating space for genuine human connection even while maintaining authority.
The story of Lazarus's resurrection demonstrates how exceptional leaders empower their teams. When Jesus arrived at the tomb, he could have single-handedly removed the stone and grave clothes through divine power. Instead, he deliberately invited participation: "Take away the stone," he commanded, involving his disciples in the miracle process. After Lazarus emerged alive, Jesus again delegated: "Take off his grave clothes." This pattern reveals that truly transformative leadership doesn't hoard meaningful tasks but creates opportunities for team members to participate in significant achievements.
Perhaps most powerfully, Jesus saw life where everyone else saw death. After four days—when Jewish tradition held resurrection was impossible—Jesus envisioned possibility beyond apparent limitations. This exemplifies how visionary leaders consistently see potential where others perceive only obstacles, then inspire their teams to embrace this expanded perspective. The aftermath also teaches valuable lessons about managing success: the miracle created both positive momentum and intensified opposition, mirroring how organizational breakthroughs often generate complex consequences requiring strategic navigation.
What leadership situations are you facing where you need to show authentic emotion, empower your team through meaningful delegation, or see possibilities where others see only limitations? Join us next week as we explore Jesus's triumphal entry into Jerusalem and the beginning of his final week of ministry.
uh-huh, now, yeah, uh-huh, yeah, come on, come on.
Speaker 2:All righty welcome, welcome, welcome, oh, wow, okay.
Speaker 1:Welcome. How you?
Speaker 2:doing Dr P. I'm doing great Tim.
Speaker 1:How you doing. Oh my gosh, I am hanging in there.
Speaker 2:Hanging in there, gosh. Yeah, can you believe it? October. We're half through October, more than half through.
Speaker 1:I know, I know it's crazy, it's crazy.
Speaker 2:So we're still we got like 10 weeks before the dad joke phenomenon, the end of the year. Right, I mean before like January 1st, we got 10 weeks, it's crazy to even think about that.
Speaker 1:We better start stocking up on dad jokes now I am ready.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I am more than ready.
Speaker 1:So our between Christmas and anniversary, our anniversary show. There you go. We do dad jokes the entire time between Christmas and next October. We do or September no our New Year's Eve show. We sort of do pretty much all dad jokes. We threw a couple things in there last time.
Speaker 2:We did.
Speaker 1:But not very much. It was pretty much all dad jokes, Just because I mean we have to like we're not in the studio, I'm probably I'm out of town, You're out of town, or we're with our kids, yeah, with kids. So we have fun, and, boy, we had a lot of jokes that day.
Speaker 2:So, Dad, you know, you talked last week about the place that had burgers and smash burgers and dad jokes.
Speaker 1:So maybe we can just have dad jokes and snacks, dad jokes. Well, you know, we're going to have snacks, we're going to have something going on there.
Speaker 2:Oh, so today we are up to John, chapter 11. We're in the 22nd week of the book of John. But before we get to John, chapter 11 and some dad jokes, I just want to say that I read an article in the news just yesterday about an archaeological dig that was happening in.
Speaker 2:Jerusalem, and it goes back to an event that we talked about a couple weeks ago on our podcast in John chapter 9, about a man who was healed by the pool of Siloam there in Jerusalem, and the archaeologists have found what they believe is that pool. And just an amazing. The official release of this data was only August, the 30th of this year.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And so very recently, and so we're not going to go into that. You can look it up online for yourself. But the archaeologists said that the discovery, they believe, went back 2,800 years.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And they could tell that because of the way it was built, the material that was used, the mortar that was in the brick and all that kind of stuff. And here's one thing, and then we'll just move on, and that is that if you look at biblical archaeology and I was privileged to go to Israel right after I finished with seminary and one of the professors that went with us was an archaeologist- oh nice. So yeah, we went to Jordan, we went to Petra, where the Indiana Jones thing was filmed.
Speaker 1:I must become a geologist or archaeologist. That's what I was going to do before I got a football scholarship and then I went that direction, different direction marketing but I was going to be a geologist or archaeologist. That's what I wanted to be.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's amazing because what we see in biblical archaeology, if you look at anything that's been dug up from the ground, every single time it confirms the Bible. There has not been one archaeological anything found to disprove the Bible, and I just think that's phenomenal Over, you know, thousands of years.
Speaker 1:Thousands of years, yeah.
Speaker 2:And so I just wanted to bring that to our listeners' attention. You can do your own research. And before we get to John, chapter 11, you know we're going to start off with some dad jokes.
Speaker 1:You think yeah, I think so.
Speaker 2:They're not going to be good ones. So y'all get ready.
Speaker 1:They're not going to be. That restaurant that's coming to Frisco is called Dad Jokes Cheesy Burger. Oh yeah, that sounds fantastic yeah we're definitely going to have to do that Can.
Speaker 2:I have a double with an extra dad joke on the side Exactly right Can. I have a. It's one of their dipping.
Speaker 1:Can you make it really cheesy, yeah, really.
Speaker 2:I wonder what their dipping sauces are called Right, wow, right, that would be great.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I bet they have names for all the different things I would think right, you know yeah. Yeah, whatever we got to check that out.
Speaker 1:We do.
Speaker 2:That'll be fun, Okay. So the other day my wife, amazing wife Diana, Diana and I were having a race to see who could clean the dishes the fastest.
Speaker 1:I just thought about maybe we should do. Sorry to interrupt, we got to start, but maybe we should go and ask them if we can do a live broadcast at.
Speaker 2:Dad Jokes Cheesy Burger. That would be awesome.
Speaker 1:We should do a kickoff party with them and all that stuff. So there you go.
Speaker 2:We've been doing this for two years and Dad Jokes is part of our thing we need to broadcast from there. We could do it live we might have to so yeah anyway, just keep going with your dad joke. That's better than the joke I'm excited about that I'll have to work on that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, wow.
Speaker 2:Okay, so my wife and I were doing dishes and we had a race to see who could clean the dishes the fastest. Okay, yeah. It was so close that we had to call it a wash. I always clean mine with a dish towel, you know. Rinse them off. It's like, oh, that one's not done, I'll just wipe it down. You know, I was talking to my kids the other day and they live out of state, but you know, sometimes we're on the phone at the same time, and I said kids.
Speaker 1:if there's one thing I've learned in all my years, it's that I'm older than you Okay. I was trying to think if I had any good ones. Told my son I was going to buy him a book on procrastination.
Speaker 2:You can't get around to it yet I am Keep putting it off, okay. So how can you win a fight against a rock?
Speaker 1:Do not know.
Speaker 2:Paper.
Speaker 1:Oh, my God, Doesn't happen too many, but I'll give you that one. That was actually a pretty good one. How does I'm going to have to tell my kids that one this afternoon? How?
Speaker 2:does a taco say grace? Don't know, let us pray. All right, maybe we should get into the Bible. We should get into the Bible.
Speaker 1:So we can pick up two more listeners, the ones that just went. Let's just drop, exactly, right?
Speaker 2:Okay, so I like your idea of being a live broadcast.
Speaker 1:I'll have to work on that.
Speaker 2:Tell them not to listen to the show before they make a decision Okay so anyway, john, chapter 11. Let's just say this this is just my personal opinion.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:If you look at the first four books of the New Testament Matthew, mark, luke and John we've talked about those, the Synoptic Gospels and John a lot of the same stories. Okay, the book of John, chapter 11, is, if you don't look at the or don't count the birth story of Jesus in Matthew and Luke, if you don't look at the story of the Last Supper, which we'll talk about next week, or really the Palm Sunday, or the Last Supper, or the crucifixion and resurrection, okay, those are very, very significant. John chapter 11 might be the most significant other chapter. Now you have Luke, chapter 4 with the calling of Jesus and that, but it could be up there in the top three to five most significant chapters and stories in the entire first four books of the New Testament, and it is the raising of Lazarus from the dead, and so let me just give you a background if you're not familiar with that story.
Speaker 2:Jesus had some really good friends, okay, and these particular friends, I mean he had a lot of good friends, but these particular friends that he had two sisters and a brother, okay, lazarus, and then Mary and Martha. They lived in a little town of Bethany, which was about two miles from Jerusalem, and so what we see in John 12 is that it's Palm Sunday. So you look at John chapter—the book of John has 21 chapters. The first 11 chapters cover three years of Jesus' public ministry, from chapter 12 to chapter 21,. It covers a week of Jesus' ministry.
Speaker 2:Okay well yeah, and so, or a little more, because there's a story at the very end about after he was resurrected, but basically it covers a week, okay, so that last week is very significant and we're getting into that in the next couple weeks, but this particular story is like the end of the ministry before that last week. So what we read is that Lazarus, jesus' friend, was getting sick. Jesus was not there and Mary and Martha were concerned about their brother, obviously, and Jesus found out that Lazarus was sick. And what's interesting is Jesus, normally when he knew someone was sick, he went immediately to help them. This time he didn't do that and so he stayed and then he went. By the time he got to their home, lazarus had died. Well, obviously the sisters are distraught, they're grief-stricken. They both say, hey, if you'd been here you wouldn't have died.
Speaker 2:We see that Jesus right here, which to me is a great leadership principle. It's the shortest verse in the Bible, two words Jesus wept, which tells us a lot about the person and the humanity of Jesus, that he had really human emotions. So let's just stop right there and talk about the emotional side of leadership, because leaders, everybody has emotions. The question is, what do you do with them and do you show them? Do you not show them? Do you swallow them? Do you only show them to certain people? Do you show them in board meetings, whatever? And Jesus was not afraid of showing his deep sadness to the people that he was around.
Speaker 2:And so the question is for those who are leaders, this leadership show. What do you do with your emotions? Do you just hide them? Because there's things that happen in any organization that could be frustrating, that could be disappointing, that could be joyous, that could be. You're excited about it. And if you just kind of level and your people don't know what's going on in your heart or your emotions, that's not always a good thing. And so the question would be how do you share those? When do you share those or to whom do you share those? Jesus wasn't afraid to share those with anybody that was around, and so I know at some point there's times when you can't do that. You might share with a small group of people, you might not share with everybody. Do that. You might share with a small group of people, you might not share with everybody, but you don't want to just bury your emotions and then take it out in your family at home.
Speaker 1:You've got to have a way to in a positive way or in a way to filter that, to share those and not just swallow them at your office.
Speaker 2:Is there a book or chapter that talks about the backstory between Jesus and Lazarus? No, there's really not. We just know that they were friends and it says that in this chapter, but it doesn't give the story as to how that happened.
Speaker 1:Did they grow up together? Did they bump on in on the trail? Yeah, there's not a story about that. It's a sort of kin of mine.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So if you're watching the Chosen, okay, there's a little bit of backstory about that, but really that's just their imagination. There's really nothing in the Scripture that says okay, like you said, they were next-door neighbors growing up or their parents knew each other. We don't know any of that. We just know that they were really, really good friends, so, anyway. So Jesus went to the tomb and he this is chapters 38, round, 38, 39.
Speaker 2:Yeah verse 38,. He's there, he's at the tomb, and then this is I don't want to get into preaching, but this is important and so he tells the disciples to take away the stone. Now let's just talk about what that means. If you're not familiar with Jewish tradition, the graves back then were not like graves they have today, where you actually put someone in the ground. They would actually dig a hole in the side of a mountain like a cave, and that would be the grave, and they would have a, not just a hole, they would have like a room and then a shelf where they'd actually lay the body. And then in front of that cave there would be a little ditch and they would get a big rock and carve it to make it a little bit bigger than the opening of the cave and that would be the door. And so when Lazarus' body was wrapped in traditional burial cloths I'm not going to say like a mummy, but similar to that- and he was placed in the tomb and then the stone was rolled away.
Speaker 2:And so Jesus comes to the tomb and he says to the of the tomb, and he says to the people disciples, take away the stone. Now here's, I think, a very, very good leadership principle. Okay, jesus did not need anyone's help to take the stone away. He could have done it all himself, but he didn't. He chose to not do that, but he didn't. He chose to not do that because he wanted his disciples to participate in the miracle. And so the leadership principle for me, at least one of them is how much does the leader feel they have to do themselves, or how much are they willing to empower their people to help with the process of growing the company or whatever it is? And I know the saying if you want to have done it right, you're going to do it yourself, and yes, I've practiced that too often. But if you want to grow the company, you have to grow your people. And in order to grow your people, you have to continually trust them to do more and more and more and empower them and encourage them and train them.
Speaker 2:Jesus, this is like they've been with him for three years, and so they were willing to do anything that he asked and he said take away the stone. But he had been. If they had, you know, this had happened at the very beginning of his ministry and they would have said take away the stone. What are you talking about? Why, why. But he had been preparing them for three years and so they said take away the stone. We don't see in the scripture. But they said, why are we doing this? They trusted the leader, yeah, but he had also trained them, he empowered them, he invested in them, he believed in them, and so when he said take away the stone, they just did it.
Speaker 2:They did. The leadership principle about that is that he was promoting a team effort, okay, and that to me is really really good, yeah, okay. So then he said Lazarus, come out Now.
Speaker 1:This is a powerful miracle, yeah because he'd been dead for four days.
Speaker 2:He'd been dead for four days, and so one of the things about Jewish tradition is, after three days, they felt the soul of the person hovered around the body for three days just in case they came back to life. But after four days that was gone and there was literally no possibility of that ever happening. And so just think about the leadership principle. Jesus saw life when everyone else saw death. And so the question for leaders is do you see life when other people see death? Do you see possibilities where other people see obstacles? Do you see possibilities where other people see obstacles? Do you see potential where other people don't? I mean, I think good leaders see things that other people don't, and then they inspire their people to see what they see.
Speaker 2:And so Jesus had them roll away the stone. They did that. He said Lazarus, come out. And the man came back to life, came out, walked out, and then Jesus said, hey, take off his grave clothes. And they did the same principle. Now the guy had been dead for four days. So it's like, wow, okay, you know, but they did. They took off the grave clothes and Lazarus was living just like he had never died. But again, jesus didn't need any help. He didn't need any help on Easter Sunday morning to take off his grave clothes. He didn't need help then, but he wanted his followers to participate in something that they would never forget, and so to me, the same principle is taking away the stone. He wanted them to participate and instead of just doing it all himself. He wanted them to participate and instead of just doing it all himself.
Speaker 2:he wanted them to participate. And to me, what a great leadership principle that Jesus was willing to say hey, I know I could do this by myself, but I want you to help, I want you to participate.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he delegated all the tasks through the whole process and that way the disciples could finish the whole process together as a team, yes, they could, and to me so, the teamwork of the leader.
Speaker 2:He delegated this. They did it. And to me I'm thinking of all the things that happened and there was a lot right that happened in Jesus' life. This, to me, would be probably one of the ones they would never forget until their last breath.
Speaker 2:It's like we took away the stone and then the guy walked out and then we took his grave clothes. We actually got to touch this guy. I mean we didn't just watch it, we helped do it. I mean we didn't bring him back to life, but we helped Jesus do this. And I'm just thinking, wow, if you empower your people to do something that they've never done, okay, yeah, go be creative, come up with a new product, come up with a new logo, do this, do that. Just, you know, just be and do it as a team. Wow, and you encourage that and you help promote that. They're going to just be, they're going to invest more in you. So now they have that high, okay.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And we'll stop here in just a minute with John, chapter 11, because after that some of the Jewish people, they didn't just want to kill Jesus, they wanted to kill Lazarus, because he was now testifying to Jesus, Because there's a reaction from that right, there was a big reaction like what, what's going down here?
Speaker 2:And so, anyway, they're up on a high, okay. And then in John, chapter 12, there's another high of the Palm Sunday, which we'll get to that next week, and then you have the last week of his life, and so this was one of the last miracles, not the last miracle that Jesus did in his ministry, okay, and so it's just very powerful. It's only found in the book of John and there's so much, so much. And if you think about it, if there was some conflict between him and Jesus and the religious leader before, this only increased that. And so you have to think, if you're going to be a leader, sometimes you've got to be willing to stand up to the conflict of other companies, other teams, other whatever they're going to just try to put you down and you just have to stand strong.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's what sort of did. And what happened is through his miracle it created momentum and that momentum was good for Jesus. But it also was bad in the thing where the Pharisees sort of said well, we're not looked at as highly, now the Romans are going to come, take our temples and take our nation and some of the different things that become very worrisome to them. And it's a good and bad scenario after this whole miracle.
Speaker 2:Yes, it is A miracle. Yes, it is, but it was one of the highlights of the whole ministry of Jesus prior to the Palm Sunday story.
Speaker 1:And it's just a powerful, powerful. I just want to know the back story now. I want to know how they know each other.
Speaker 2:I don't know, maybe they met as kids.
Speaker 1:I really don't know. I really don't know.
Speaker 2:So okay, so that's good, john, chapter 11. I really don't know, I really don't know so, okay, so that's good.
Speaker 2:John, chapter 11. We'll just finish there. We'll take it up to John, chapter 12. It starts in verse 12, where the Palm Sunday and if you didn't know what Palm Sunday was, it's when Jesus rode on the back of a donkey into the city of Jerusalem. People were shouting about all of that. It's the beginning of the last week of his life, and so if you're not familiar with Christian tradition, the Sunday before Easter is called Palm Sunday, and then that begins Holy Week, what's known as Holy Week, and you have Holy Thursday, you have Good Friday, holy Saturday and Easter Sunday, and we'll get into all of that in the coming weeks and what's going on and we look forward to it. So maybe we'll finish the book of John by 2027. We might. It's taken us many weeks to get through this far and we're coming at some crucial parts coming up in the next couple of weeks. We really are.
Speaker 1:So I'd be curious to see how that works. But yeah, so great lessons out of there, lots of leadership lessons, and just make sure you're empowering your people. To finish right To go the distance and don't? You know? One of the biggest things about empowering, I say, is empowering means they're ready. That means they're ready to step up and do some of your tasks for you. Don't micromanage, don't have controls in place if you're truly trying to empower somebody.
Speaker 2:Yeah, excellent point. Excellent point if you're truly trying to empower somebody. Yeah, excellent point.
Speaker 1:All right, you know taking it in a different direction now, I'm sure. I'm sure it's been 25 minutes since we've had a dad joke Right, okay, let's go, okay, so.
Speaker 2:I heard the other day that sandwich sales are up in the capital of India.
Speaker 1:Uh-oh, sandwich sales are up in the capital of India.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there must be a new deli.
Speaker 1:Oh my, I got to give you that one. I was really trying to think about that. I'm like what I don't know.
Speaker 2:You know, when you go online you say well, Google, that I don't have anybody. Normally say Safari that okay, they normally just say Google that. So I was reading a news story the other day that Google sometimes is a bad influence because there was someone was searching how to become an arsonist and it gave them 50,000 matches.
Speaker 1:Or maybe I should just do that, you know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, maybe you should do that, I got all kinds of boring ones, right? Well, let's just hear a boring one.
Speaker 1:What state has the most streets? You're an avid park going to all the national parks.
Speaker 2:What state has the most streets?
Speaker 1:Yes, let's see how good he is. See, the problem is Dr P usually knows a lot of my dad jokes.
Speaker 2:I don't know.
Speaker 1:Rhode Island Rhode Island, oh, that's a good one.
Speaker 2:You know, one of the things I've always wanted to do I just never have done was take up fencing. So I decided recently to take up fencing, but my neighbors keep asking me to put it back.
Speaker 1:There you go.
Speaker 2:I always thought fencing would be so cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I always thought it would be sort of cool too. Yeah, I just never have. I've never done anything, I just think it'd be cool.
Speaker 2:I don't know how good I'd be, but that's not the point.
Speaker 1:No, that's not the point. No, just have fun, Just get no that's not the point.
Speaker 2:No, just have fun. Yeah, you know, just get a long stick and just you know whatever those people have such quick reactions. Yeah, they do I mean in literally a split second. It's unbelievable how fast they can be.
Speaker 1:It is, you know.
Speaker 2:I'm not that fast anymore.
Speaker 1:No, no, no.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, so let's just a couple of dad jokes to finish out the show today. What does coffee say when it's feeling sad? What does?
Speaker 1:coffee, say when it's feeling sad. I'm craving coffee right now too, so Okay, then you should get this one, I don't know.
Speaker 2:Pour me, pour me All right, I'll give.
Speaker 1:Get this one, I don't know, poor me, poor me. All right, I'll give that to you.
Speaker 2:Okay, so what do you call a moose? We were in Alaska this summer and we tried to see a moose. We never saw a moose. What do you?
Speaker 1:call a moose with no name. Somebody's out there going, I know this one.
Speaker 2:I know this one too. Why do you not know this one?
Speaker 1:Tim, I do not Anonymous. Anonymous, sort of like. What do you call a fibbing cat? What A lion. A lion, all right, one more, take us out.
Speaker 2:Okay, why did the remote control feel useless? I do not, because it lost control.
Speaker 1:Nice. All right, check us out biblicalleadershipshowcom. We're going to come back next week. It's sort of coming close to our Halloween, yeah.
Speaker 2:Halloween show.
Speaker 1:To our Halloween Halloween show maybe I'll wear a costume pirate costume out there and go in costume next week.
Speaker 2:See if we can come up with a good costume too bad, we're not on video, right, we started out we got a lot of videos and we're going to probably get back into videos.
Speaker 1:I need to probably get that. I was going to start that at the turn of our season here, so I had it hooked up.
Speaker 2:See, you can see the little cameras and stuff. I see the little camera there.
Speaker 1:But maybe I'll work on getting the rest of that hooked up for us and then we can start broadcasting on it. Maybe that'll be a kickoff of our video. So, anyway, check us out Biblical Leadership Show. Other than that, we'll see you next week. Dr P, thanks for having us. You're making a great night. Thank you, guys.
