To be an effective over the long haul, a leader must be an encourager. Read Proverbs 12:25.

In the rough-and-tumble circumstances of life, members of your team will receive blows that will leave them emotionally battered, drained of their joy and grasping for a reason to hold on let alone do their best. During these times few functions a leader performs are more important than keeping hope alive. Read more »

Christian leaders must filter the counsel of their inner circle through the truth of God’s word. Read Job 24:25.

Job’s loss of family and possessions had him at a very vulnerable time in his life. Job’s friends believed he must have behaved treacherously to have met with such tragedy. At a time when Job most needed the love and encouragement of his friends, he received only their condemnation. Read more »

Every leader will face opposition. This opposition might come in the form of ridicule, resistance, rumor or even a physical way. One of the great tests of leadership is how a leader handles opposition. Read Nehemiah 4:1-23.

Nehemiah has mobilized the people living in Jerusalem and the surrounding communities to rebuild the wall around the city of Jerusalem. With a wall in place around the city, Jerusalem would become a defensible city and potentially a regional political and military powerbase. Even though Judah and the surrounding nations were all subject to Persia, the favor of the king went to those cities most strategic to the wealth and defense of Persia. Up until now Jerusalem did not figure into that picture. The people in the surrounding territory were not eager to chance losing the favor of the king or dividing the wealth with Judah and Jerusalem. Read more »

When everything is going good even an average leader can sustain a team – at least for the short term. When everything seems to be in crisis great leadership is required to hold a project together and maintain forward progress. Read Nehemiah 4:9-23.

The people living in Jerusalem had begun rebuilding the wall under Nehemiah’s leadership. The enthusiasm ran high as the project started but after a few weeks the project had problems that would require great leadership: Read more »

Effective leaders use rewards to bolster motivation and performance. Read Nehemiah 3:1-32.

Rebuilding the walls around the city of Jerusalem was a daunting task. There was over a mile of wall to be built and some of the foundation stones were very large. The Babylonian army had torn down the walls creating tangled and twisted piles of rubble that needed to be unraveled before those stones could be re-used in the wall. There were steep hills on the eastern side of Jerusalem and many of the stones had tumbled into valleys making retrieving the stones for the wall difficult. The people had little or no specialized equipment to lift the stones and the people living in the city were not expert in construction. Read more »