Leadership Lessons from Joshua: Loyal Follower & Humble Servant

He did as Moses directed and learned from his strong leader. We begin leading by being good followers. How can we be effective leaders if we do not learn and follow our leaders first? And no matter how long we lead, we still need to be learning from others and submitting to leadership God places over us. The same principle applies to teaching the Bible. We cannot be the kind of teachers God uses if we are not willing to sit in on a Bible study first. I am continually reminded that the more I learn in Scripture, the more I still don’t know. I, too, need to be IN a Bible study setting where I am not the teacher.

Secondly, Joshua was also a humble servant. Look in Exodus 24:13 and Exodus 33:11 to see how he served Moses as his assistant and the guard of the “tent of meeting”. Joshua didn’t choose to be Moses’ assistant, God chose him.

Look back at Numbers 27:15-21. This passage occurs about the time Moses is going to die and he commissions Joshua to take over as leader. We never see Joshua seeking to climb a ladder of success or pursue a path in leadership; he served Moses because that was his assignment from God. That is what sustained him in hard times.

Today people plan and scheme their way to the “top” and we applaud them for being hard workers, ambitious, industrious. We too can be vulnerable to this type of problem. Perhaps we start out serving at God’s appointment, but then we begin to push forward trying to break down doors God has not opened. We definitely want larger territories to serve Him, but we do not need to get ahead of Him to “make it happen”. If we continually have to break down doors to serve, speak, write, lead, whatever we love doing in ministry, maybe we need to get on our knees and ask God to clarify our calling.  Jeff Iorg has written a great book called Is God Calling Me. I highly recommend all leaders to read it.

An unknown author once said, “Don’t expect God to make you a lighthouse somewhere else, if you can’t be a candle where you are.” We need to be a humble servant where God has is right now and watch to see where He leads next.

Whoever is faithful in very little is also faithful in much, and whoever is unrighteous in very little is also unrighteous in much. (Luke 16:10 HCSB) God will honor our faithfulness as we serve Christ humbly day by day. Even with success Joshua didn’t ever have an inflated ego. And he always gave God the credit.  Check out these verses as examples: Joshua 3:5, 4:23, 23:3-4, 24:17-18.  Even at the end of his life, he only took his land allotment after he’d handed out all the rest to the other tribes! (Joshua 19)

Let’s follow Joshua’s loyalty as a follower and humility as a servant to pattern our own leadership character.  Watch for more lessons from Joshua! 

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