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World Outreach Podcast
World Outreach Podcast
Ep 50 Lead, Invest, Empower: Shaping Future Leaders a conversation with Bruce Hills
In this enlightening episode, we dive deep into the heart of leadership with Bruce Hills, a seasoned leader and mentor dedicated to nurturing the next generation of Christian leaders. Bruce shares profound insights from his extensive experience in ministry, shedding light on the urgent need for intentional leadership development in today's ever-changing landscape.
Starting from a transformative encounter with the Holy Spirit in his youth, Bruce highlights how his leadership journey has been shaped by the invaluable lessons of mentorship and character formation. He addresses the critical gaps in traditional leadership training, particularly the lack of focus on personal and practical skills necessary for effective leadership in ministry. Throughout the episode, Bruce stresses that true leadership is not just about authority or charisma; it’s about empowering others to fulfill their God-given potential.
Listeners will gain fresh perspectives on the significance of investing in oneself and others for sustainable growth. With practical tips on prioritizing character development and fostering mentorship relationships, Bruce inspires us all to cultivate a culture of leadership that champions the next generation.
Join us as we explore how we can not only elevate our own leadership skills but also empower those around us to advance God's mission. This episode is a must-listen for anyone passionate about making a lasting difference in their communities and beyond. Don't forget to subscribe, share your thoughts, or leave a review to help us reach more people.
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you're listening to the world outreach podcast dynamic conversations designed to empower our community to engage unreached people groups everywhere. Today I'm sitting down with bruce hills, former international director for world outreach and who has now stepped back into a previous role that he held as our leadership development director, and we're excited to have him on the podcast today to speak about all issues related to leadership and its advancement and using it as an investment to the gospel to unreached people group. So, bruce, thanks for joining us on the podcast today.
Speaker 2:Thank you, ben. It's great to be here yeah, so you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was raised in a pastor's home, but back then in Australia pastors were very small, so the model that I had was of a single man I mean single as he's married but just one person doing all of the work in the local church. But when I was 11 years old I went to a children's camp and I had a profound experience with the Holy Spirit that basically revolutionized my life. I could not doubt this experience that I had and it was from that moment I felt God had called me to be a pastor, to be a leader. But the only paradigm I knew back then was one pastor who does everything in the local church. And it was only later, as churches began to grow and I began to foster that leadership in my life, I began to see that I need to give intention to the development of my leadership as well.
Speaker 2:So the call came at 11. But when I was 18 years of age, my youth pastor said Bruce, I see you've got a call of God in you, and he was the first external person that really recognized that. And he invited me to be on the youth committee of our local church and after two years he invited me to be the assistant youth leader of the church. Then he left and the leadership of our church invited me to take over the youth group, and that is when I became not just one on a team but the leader of a group of people, and that's how the journey began, Kind of just began there and you've grown, you've done a variety of different leadership roles in different capacities, from Bible schools and churches and to organizations and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:That journey when did you realize how important it was to develop yourself as a leader, but then also that process of developing others as leaders?
Speaker 2:I think it came very quickly. I think when I took over the youth group I was 21 years old, I had just been married and, yes, I was married very young and I realized when I got hold of the youth group I knew how to run a meeting, but I didn. I knew how to run a meeting but I didn't know how to run a group. I didn't know how to lead leaders. I didn't know particularly how to organise things and I think I knew very quickly I need to develop some skills here. So I began to read a lot and I began to talk to other people who were more experienced than me.
Speaker 2:But at the time in my city, because churches were so small back in the 80s in Australia, there was only one other youth pastor in the whole city and he was very instrumental. He generously gave time and spoken to my life and really helped me to know what direction to take to develop my leadership. But probably one of the key points I'd make there was I had to give intentionality to my personal growth, that leaders don't grow by accident. They grow on purpose. They grow because they give intentionality to their growth in whatever context of leadership they're in.
Speaker 1:And I suppose that's a really a secondary lesson from that as well is. I mean, you're seeking out mentors, other people who are involved in that process.
Speaker 1:But, there was an open handedness in this person to mentor you or to help guide you along into your leadership journey that I would say that you now carry as well in your own open handedness towards leadership and wanting to just help other people grow in their leadership. What did you notice kind of in that younger age, being intentional, seeking out some growth points, but maybe just observing other leaders that you might have were looking at and said, oh, I want to be like that or I like that.
Speaker 2:Because at the time, your only model of leadership was what you saw from people's example. There wasn't any intentional discipleship or development of leaders. And I realized very quickly that, okay, I've got good models I can look at, to observe, but I want someone who's challenging me, who's speaking to me, who's inspiring me, who's encouraging me. I had to seek those people out and I'd encourage anyone who's listening to me, no matter what context or level of leadership they're in. Find people who are further down the road, make some time with them, have a list of questions and seek them out, because it can really help you. You may not do what they do, but you can take that and apply the principle of what they do into your own context.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think connected to that is being in relationship with people who you can have personal mentoring that you can sit down and have a conversation with and coffee. But now in today's day and age, there's so many ways to get mentored from afar, right, Reading books, listening to podcasts, watching other leaders interact and stuff. How would you say that has shaped you the different influences of leadership, of leaders, to then define it as your own leadership?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think part of leadership is understanding yourself and the way that God has made you and he's put you in a particular role. Look, I've had different models in the different roles that I've had. When I was a youth pastor, I needed other youth pastors. When I was a Bible college principal, I needed other people in the academic world. When I became a senior pastor, I needed other senior pastors to go to. They will rarely come to you.
Speaker 2:You have to seek those people out, or their books or their recordings, to be able to learn about the deficiencies you have in your leadership and how to work on those as well. So I think again it comes back to that word intentionality, right? Or if you can find someone who's prepared to be a mentor, someone who's prepared to invest their time in you, that is really good as well. But, as I mentioned, they rarely come to you. You normally have to go and seek them out and there's no one person that perfectly embodies what you want to be. But it could be different people in different parts of your leadership. Perhaps someone who is a great mentor as a preacher, someone who's a great mentor as a father, someone who's a great mentor as a father, someone who's a great mentor, as a leader or a team builder. It's finding different voices at different times and I've found over the years and whatever context of leadership I was in, I needed different voices.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I would resonate with that. I mean, I know in my leadership journey different people were key and instrumental in a season, like there's a skill that you needed to grow in or learn and so you could go to them and say, hey, you're really good at this. Could you help me understand, unpack, why you do it that way or what's behind that? And so it's become seasonal. So I mean you've got this broad experience 40 plus years in ministry and leadership. You have been running leadership seminars for World Outreach and others for many years now. What made you kind of shift from just not just doing pastoral ministry and leadership but towards actually I need to develop other leaders. What brought that call about or that desire?
Speaker 2:Again earlier on, the only paradigm I knew of ministry was the local church that I was a part of, but as I began to get a little bit older, I was invited to speak in different countries, invited to speak at seminars and events, and I was exposed to churches that were radically different than mine and I realized that there was a very big world out there, and the more I traveled, the more I saw that a lot of people know how to use a microphone but don't know how to lead people, don't know how to develop people, and it became like a burden for me that here we've got these people who can run great meetings and preach well and have people at an altar and pray for them, but they're not developing them and they can still be quite shallow in their faith.
Speaker 2:I think that's when it began. It began when I began to be exposed to this is not happening anywhere. We need to do something about this to help people, particularly, uh, the 18 to 30 year olds, because what I found more and more in the majority world was that a lot of pastors, their role was their identity, it was their income, it was their authority, and so they didn't develop any younger leaders for fear that they would lose those things or that the allegiance of the people would shift to that younger person. So I met all these young leaders all over the world who had nobody speaking into their life and developing them, and I thought we need to do something about this.
Speaker 1:And so, in response to that, you started doing things. You started doing leadership seminars, leaders of leaders, developing other people and stuff. As you begin to do those things, what have you observed, kind of just in the leadership realm at a broad spectrum? Deficiencies or areas and gaps that are lacking in a lot of people, particularly in the ministry-focused people who are wanting to go into ministry or already in ministry. Yeah, what are they?
Speaker 2:lacking or what's missing?
Speaker 2:Probably first and foremost, there's no discipleship, there's no intentional getting hold of people and discipling or developing leaders.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think another thing would be how to build teams, because no one leader is omnicompetent, no one leader can do everything. We need to be developing teams of people and a lot of people are not taught how to build a team or how to lead or run or develop a team, and I think those two things would be the major deficiencies that I see in the development of leaders. They've got their ministry well cultivated and probably just a slight excursus here is that there's a difference between leadership and ministry and I think most of us are wired for ministry preaching, teaching, counselling, praying, caring, caring, visiting people that's ministry, but that's not leadership. Leadership is the, is the development and the power, empowerment of others to be able to do that. So I think when I started to understand that difference, it really helped me help others in different parts of the world to develop their leadership, not just their ministry. So the biggest deficiencies I think would be a lack of discipleship, a lack of team and a lack of personal development of people's leadership.
Speaker 1:Okay. So I'd like to hone in really on that lack of personal development of leadership. I think in that sense, because I think, yeah, as you said, normally if someone goes to Bible school or they come out of seminary, they've gotten these skills, they they're taught how to preach, they're taught how to, um, you know, minister to people. They might get some basic biblical counseling, they might get other things, but there seems to be a gap between okay, I got these skills, now how do I apply them in a context that's empowering other people, that's building other people up, that's releasing other people to get the work done? What do you think of that gap between the two and your thoughts?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that there's a massive gap in the theological training throughout the world. As you say, we teach them in Bible, we teach them in theology and we teach them about ministry, but we don't teach about leadership. And the majority of leaders who don't make it through to the end is because of their leadership, perhaps their style or perhaps their lack of skill to be able to do that, and I think a lot of churches are limited and capped because the leader doesn't know how to grow other leaders or to grow their own leadership as well. And I would encourage ministry training institutions and theological institutions to develop a practical arm where they teach people the skills of leadership Connected to that.
Speaker 1:I mean, I've heard you say and speak about the practical skills are actually. They're basic really, but they're overlooked because they're so basic it's almost assumed that people do them. But maybe unpack a few of the key ones that you think, like running a meeting, how to work with staff, how to do planning, what other kind of key skills do people kind of lack generally when they come out, Because they have a lot of, as you say, foundation in other areas, but these practicals they have?
Speaker 2:theoretical knowledge? Well, it's basic things like how to disciple people, how to really get hold of a person and draw out all that God has placed inside of them. And it reminds me of that scripture. Jesus said Come, follow me and I will make you fishers of men. Make is a verb, it's a process, make you fishers of men.
Speaker 2:Make is a verb, it's a process and I think a lot of people don't know how to do that based on the model of Jesus. I think that would be one thing how to identify leaders, how to empower leaders, how to delegate, how to plan building teams, how to communicate well, not just speaking, communicating like preaching, but communicating to your teams and communicating to the people that you're leading. I think these basic skills and how to run a meeting, how to lead a board, the board of a church or the elders of a church, that's not really talked about. Conflict resolution, I think would be another one. Listening skills, certainly, delegation, I've mentioned. I think these basic things. Conflict resolution is really important because unless you do that well, it's just going to compound and get worse.
Speaker 1:Practical skills there's a gap. So what are you doing personally to invest in others in this area of developing these skills or trainings of that? And then what should people be thinking about how to assess their own kind of growth rate in these areas? They're two big questions. They are Sorry about that. I think.
Speaker 2:In regard to the first one, we are providing leadership development seminars in different parts of the world that go through all of the basics, all of these basic skills that people need to be an effective Christian leader in the modern world. We go through those things I've just mentioned. That helps to a certain degree, but hearing a speaker once a year doesn't change your life. You need a mentor, you need a model, someone who's speaking into your life, who can show you how to do that. So we're not only doing teaching, but I'm doing mentoring on a personal level with numbers of leaders in different parts of the world, and that is really helping. But I would also encourage people to find your own reading.
Speaker 2:Leaders are readers. Leaders are learners. Leaders are self-feeders. So I think you need to identify books that address deficiencies in your life. For example, when I first joined World Outreach, the mission that we serve in, I had no idea how to raise money none whatsoever. As a pastor, I hated talking about money. I didn't like taking offerings at. As a pastor, I hated talking about money. I didn't like taking offerings at all, and here I was dependent on raising money. So I read every book I could and slowly began to develop a capacity for that. So I would say to anybody who's got a deficiency in their leadership you can grow if you choose to grow and give intentionality to your growth. The second question I forgot.
Speaker 1:Can you just remind me it was a big one Well, identifying those gaps, and then what to kind of do within these skills to grow in them.
Speaker 2:I think it's good to have a really healthy self-awareness of what you're strong at and what you're weak at, and I think it's good to identify those parts of your leadership that you need to grow in in order to become a bigger leader, because as the ministry grows, your leadership will have to grow to be able to sustain the leadership. Just having a really good Sunday service is not enough. You need to have a leadership capacity in there that can sustain the growth of the church. So I think it's recognizing what those gaps are and maybe you need to talk to people who've got ministries twice your size to help you to see them if you can't see them for yourselves, so that you can give time and attention to those things.
Speaker 1:So let me just change gears just slightly. It's in connection to that as a developing leader, leader, what would you advise them to say? Um, when you approach someone who you would like to get mentored from what, what would you say to somebody if you're going to come to you, what would you like them to do in preparation of that?
Speaker 2:I would. I would like them to um to say this is the area of my life that I need help in and I've recognized some strength in you. Would you be, would you be, prepared to to give some time to that? Normally I I always say yes to anybody who wants mentoring. I always say yes, but very few of them ever follow through. I leave it in them. I say, look, if you want to contact, I'm available, I'll be available within a few days. Very few ever follow through and it makes me wonder about whether they really want to grow as a leader. I think that's important just to test whether they really want to, or they're just looking for the quick fix you know, the McDonald's meal rather than a well-cooked, healthy meal.
Speaker 1:That's insane.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they want the fast track. There is no fast track to spiritual development. There is no fast track to become a great leader. It's got to be worked out, worked within the context of your ministry and working on those parts of your life.
Speaker 1:So what would you say is because I totally agree with you there's no fast track. It takes time, it takes intentionality, it takes work. Why is that so important to do and to invest time in? Ah?
Speaker 2:okay. That's a good question. I think part of it is because what God does in us is more important than what God does through us, and what we're learning in the process is infinitely more important than what we discover of him in that process, because our ultimate model of leadership is God. All leadership comes from God, and so I think it's recognizing that God is more concerned about the person that you are becoming than in what you do in leadership. He's more concerned about your development in him. So I think that's why there's no quick fix, because God is concerned about your development, who you are, and the discovery of him.
Speaker 2:I think when I was a younger leader, I was driven by results. I wanted to say I've got a successful ministry. And now I realize that God's measure of success is not how many people are coming to our meetings, but it's our level of faithfulness to Him and what he's entrusted to us. God has a very different measure of success than we humans do, so I think that's part of it is that God is working in you and he gives you this opportunity so that you will grow in Him.
Speaker 1:In one sense, people talk about vertical growth and horizontal growth, and so that's kind of a little bit of that vertical growth by investing in your leadership, you're allowing God to work in you. But as you're leading an organization, you're leading teams, you're leading whatever home group or whatever that God's put you in leadership over. How is investing in your leadership skills built that horizontal?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say growing your leadership skills is indispensable if you want to have an enduring, effective ministry. I think you've got to really work on your skills to be able to become a more effective and efficient leader. It's those skills that really help you to do that, Not just your ministry skill, but your leadership skill over the organization, the ministry that you were leading.
Speaker 1:I mean John Maxwell says everything rises and falls on leadership Other ones rising tides lifts all boats. So, as a leader, as we invest in ourselves and we get better, then our community around us and those that we're working with should also be getting better as well and uplift from that perspective. How have you seen that modeled out, either in your own ministry or in ministries that you've helped or leaders that you've helped?
Speaker 2:Have you seen them intentionally focus on these things, those kind of secondary yeah, I think you can only lead people where you have been yourself and you can only grow in others what has grown inside of you. So I think the fact that you grow as a leader, it automatically creates a vacuum for other leaders to grow too. So I think it's really important that you do grow so that you can take other people along that process and develop others as well. Otherwise, you become a gap, you become a lid. You will stifle the growth that's there if you're not able to develop others.
Speaker 2:Now, I think part of our role as a Christian leader is to recognize what God has placed in the life of another leader and draw it out and help to develop that. Help to recognize what God's put in them and draw that out. I think that's one of my primary roles as a leader is to recognize the people around me, what God has put in them, and draw it out and empower them to fulfill that, and I would hope that they would go further and higher and do greater things than I ever have. And if I can have a role in doing that, then I think I've done my role.
Speaker 1:So that brings up two thoughts, and I'll try and do it in order. But within that, how, as a personal leader, did you grow in your capacity or desire to be open-handed, to be kind of the next level that someone else grows off of? So stand on the shoulders of somebody else, right, be that person that allows others to stand on their shoulders of success. What's God's journey in you in that, to bring about that attitude?
Speaker 2:I think part of it was recognizing in Scripture that God builds His people generationally Moses and Joshua, elijah, elisha, paul and Timothy, jesus and the Twelve. Over and over again, you see a pattern of generations and I think it's recognizing there's different seasons of ministry where, with the gift and the grace that you've got, you can take a particular group of leaders or organization to a certain level, but then somebody else comes along and may develop in a different way because they have a grace to go in a different direction, because there's different generations, different ways of doing things different methodologies.
Speaker 2:The mission's the same, but the way it's packaged, the way it's done can be different as well. I think I began to recognise that and to recognise there are seasons in your life when God calls you to do different things. When I turned 30 and I was still a youth pastor, I was considered to be a dinosaur, you know, at 30. But what I used to do for years, every Saturday night with the youth, I just felt empty. I just felt this is not lighting my fire anymore and I didn't know what it was. Now I recognize it was a change of season and I was in that transition from what I knew into what God had next. And all through my life I've seen that. And so I think, when you recognize that I need to raise up a Joshua, elijah sorry, elisha Timothy to take over and to go forward.
Speaker 1:Great. So that's a perfect transition to my second question what are you looking for as you identify potential leaders to invest?
Speaker 2:I'm looking that they would have, that they have got, as I said before, that intentionality. They want to grow. If they don't want to grow, they will not grow. I'm looking for people who probably share a similar DNA than me ethos of ministry, direction in their life as well and that I have the capacity and grace to be able to help them, or the skills to be able to help them. Like if someone came to me as a missionary and said can you mentor me? I'm probably not the best person because I've got no missionary experience, but if a young pastor came and said, would you be able to mentor me? I can really help them. I think so. So I think it's looking at their heart and the trajectory of their life, what it is that they're looking for, whether I can help them and whether they have a real desire to grow. But, as I said, I will say yes to most people, but very few ever follow through. Why do you think that is?
Speaker 1:I mean besides? I mean you mentioned a little bit like maybe a lack of desire, want a shortcut, but what do you think, particularly in the next generation coming through behind? You know there's some that seem to be willing to pay a cost and others who are not. And what do we need to do to maybe help identify earlier in people leadership skills or to help become cheerleaders earlier on?
Speaker 2:I think part of the reason why people don't want mentors. I think there's a few reasons. So I think one of them is yes, as you identified, very few are willing to pay the price to become a great leader, and to become a great and effective leader, there is a price to pay. That's why my hair is white. There is a price to pay to be a great and effective leader. There is a price to pay. That's why my hair is white.
Speaker 2:There is a price, a price to pay to be a great leader, and some people are just not prepared to do that, or they're looking, as I said before, for the shortcut. They want the position without knowing the process, and they look at your life and they see the product, but they don't see the process. They see what you are and have become, but they haven't seen the walk that you've had to be able to get to that point, and all they want is the result rather than than the process. So I think that's that's part of it as well, and you know, few, very few, are prepared to pay the price, and the other thing is that they're looking for the shortcuts. I think those are the major reasons I've seen why people don't follow through, or they just don't value the investment of time in becoming a great leader. They don't value that. Hey, this is important. I've got to give time to my development as a leader.
Speaker 1:And so, in that I mean we have a lot of people who want to become missionaries or they're in ministry somewhere we have these gaps. We can kind of see shortcomings. We kind of see this need to develop more leaders. We can see a need to develop leaders themselves or our own self as leaders. What have you observed kind of as key gaps that you're observing more from maybe a generational trend? And then what? What's your kind of advice on how to assist people in closing those gaps, or just closing, you know, tools, resources, etc.
Speaker 2:yeah, move that forward. It would depend on the context. Yeah, because it's different. It's different things in different countries.
Speaker 2:But I see that the new generation who are coming through are very good up front, they're really good with the microphone, they're very good at the charisma, the YouTube look, et cetera, but deficient in character, and I think part of the deficiency is no one's speaking about their character.
Speaker 2:They're talking about what they can do before they speak about what they are. And I think we really need to work on people's character and what that means to live a Christ-like, sanctified, holy life before God. Because you can have all the charisma and gifting in the world but without character you'd be like a shooting star. You'll go really well for a while and then you'll just explode and I've seen that over and over, sadly again. So I would encourage anyone who is young, who's going into missionary service or pastoral ministry or leadership in any way, really work on your character and understand what character is and so that all that you do as a leader flows out of what you are, and really work on your relationship with God, not just your public gifting. Work on your relationship, not just the gifting that you have as a speaker, song, leader leader.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, and you alluded to it just before but it's like most of these people that we think are overnight success. They've probably had 20 years of working at it just every day and then it's observed and seen and said they're not flashing a pan, it's not just instantaneous and so it. It is time. Maybe one of the things I've been thinking about just in a leadership context is this concept of hiddenness and how do we serve when we're not being seen and where do you think that sits? And maybe it's a little bit um off track, but like doing and just being faithful without the spotlight, without everything on you in that process.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think part of that is how we measure success. And I think, again, a lot of people measure success by how many likes on their social media or how big their ministry is. But that is not how God measures success. He measures it by our faithfulness and obedience how faithful we are with what he's put in our hands to do and how obedient we are to his voice. So I think we've all got to draw the distinction between how we are perceived and what God knows about us.
Speaker 2:I think also, to me, one of the great definitions of character I heard many years ago is character is what you are unobserved.
Speaker 2:Character is what you are in the dark, because what you are in the dark is what you are unobserved.
Speaker 2:Character is what you are in the dark, because what you are in the dark is what you are. And I think when you realize that that God is seeing you in the hidden place, in the quiet place, and he's searching your heart there, that's important, not just up front when you're using your gift in a public environment, but to really work on yourself in in that private world and when that really struck me when I was a young, young pastor, I was reading about how Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness To be tested, and it was in his private world that he overcame the tempter and temptation, so that when he returned to his public ministry, it says he did so in the power of the Holy Spirit. So I think when God is forming your leadership, he's going to do it in the wilderness, in the hidden place, because he wants you to overcome there, when nobody else is around, so that when you are in public there's just an overflow of the life of god, there's an authenticity, a spiritual integrity, if you like, about your life.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's good as we begin to to wrap up and this conversation, what would? What excites you about what you're seeing of the next generation of leaders coming up?
Speaker 2:a few things. I think one of them is this this generation has a healthy sense of injustice. They really don't like the injustices in their world and a lot of them are concerned about, say, whales, or they're concerned about inequality, or they're concerned about climate change, and all of those things are valid, but the greatest injustice in the world is that someone can live their whole life and never hear about Jesus. So I think if we could channel the latent sense of injustice in the young people and channel it towards God's mission, I think we could change the world.
Speaker 2:Another thing I love about this generation is they believe they can change the world. They can and I think if they were intentionally equipped to mobilize and led well, they really can change the world. They have the education, the technology, they have the resources, the camaraderie to really change the world. And this I'm seeing too in young people all across the world at the moment, like I've never seen in my life a hunger for prayer. There's a real prayerfulness in young people at universities and high schools and youth groups. They they're praying like never before, and I think that's an exciting thing when God is awakening a generation to pray.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I want to ask you to give advice to two different groups. First group is this young, this young leaders that you're just talking about, the justice, the things that they're passionate about, the skills that they have.
Speaker 2:What would advice would you give them now, 18 to 30 years old, I would say work on your character, that who you are is more important than what you do. Live really close to God and know what it means to live near to the heart of God and then pursue what God puts in your heart to do. Whatever that is big or small, be faithful with it, pursue, go after that God-given vision out of those first two. If you can put those first two in priority, then the third one will flow naturally and you'll be sustained.
Speaker 1:And then the second group is that older generation who is in leadership, looking around and saying we need more leaders. What would you advise those?
Speaker 2:I would encourage you to ask God to put the person on your heart that he wants you to get hold of and it may not be the most natural person, and I'm thinking about Samuel, you know, when he first saw Eliab Jesse's son Eliab and he thought, oh, this is God's anointed. But he wasn't, because God searched his heart. We need discerning on who God has chosen to be a leader and who God wants us to get hold of. Jesus spent the whole night in prayer before he chose the final 12 out of the hundreds that were following him to be his disciples.
Speaker 2:I think I would encourage you to ask god who he wants you to get hold of and invest in their life, and don't stay too long. What I mean by that is empower the younger generation to go further and higher than you and champion them. Don't draw your security from your position, but draw your security from who you are in Jesus. And as Jesus at 33 fulfilled his mission and these 11 of the 12 men then changed the world, I think we need to recognize that too. It'll get done through others, and as we empower others, we're exercising the highest form of leadership.
Speaker 1:In just closing, any final words of advice or encouragement, just in general, to the listener, to the church, to what's God doing, leadership-wise, but just in general.
Speaker 2:I think all across the world, there is an increasing awareness and an awakening that God is doing something new, something quite unprecedented and unparalleled. There's a resurgence of prayer at the moment. There is certainly an openness to the Spirit moving in our churches and there's a massive shift toward biblical preaching. People want to know what the Word of God says, they want to be grounded in their faith. So I see those trends in different parts of the world because we know, in a missiological sense, there's breakthroughs now where we've never seen breakthroughs before.
Speaker 2:So god is doing some amazing thing and the western church is lagging behind, and so I think we need we need to cultivate these things. I think that that's important and I would encourage people, I think, just to really hear and listen to what the spirit is saying and to move in alignment with him, you know, with his mission and with his purposes as well. Don't draw your cues from the culture, draw your cues from the kingdom, I think, and the word of God, and don't measure your church against other churches or your ministry against other ministries, but measure it against what God has put in your heart. Yeah, that's good, thank you, bruce.
Speaker 1:Thank you, Bruce, for your leadership, thank you for your open-handedness and your attitude to serve the bigger church beyond yourself, and I know that you have paid the price many times over the years, and at great personal cost, to do this as well. So I just want to honor you in that, and I personally have benefited from your leadership and I'm grateful for that.
Speaker 2:Thank you, ben, it's a pleasure.
Speaker 1:Thank you, audience, for listening today. I hope it was encouraging. I hope you just grabbed a couple things from that. It's just about your own leadership, investing in your time, investing in your character, investing in your relationship with God, keeping our hearts soft and tuned to what the Holy Spirit is doing and leading us in. And let's continue to raise up other leaders. Let's empower more people to be involved in the kingdom of God and to advance his message and his purposes amongst unreached people, groups everywhere. So thanks for tuning in, feel free to like, subscribe, share this with your friends and we'll see you next time. Thanks and God bless.