A strong vision for the future gives hope. Read Isaiah 4:2-6.

It has been said that without a vision the people will perish. Isaiah had previously given messages to the residents of Judah concerning their wickedness and rebellion against God leaving them little hope. Because of their wickedness Judah and Jerusalem would suffer God’s discipline. The people desperately needed to hear that there was also a vision for the future that brought hope following the judgment. Isaiah 4 illustrates an extraordinary vision of the future of the Jewish people after a time of hardship.

Most of our leadership days contain victories and challenges. We praise God for the victories but on most days these are not victories that cause us to celebrate in an extraordinary way. It is the same with our challenges. We pray continually and consistently that God will give us wisdom to handle the challenges and that the challenges will not consume us or the people on our team but these are not the challenges that put a knot in our stomach or that put us on our face before the Lord totally dependent on His power to change the situation. But, every once in a while, the Lord favors every leader with the opportunity for the great victory or the overwhelming challenge that will require complete faith in God and use of everything we have learned as a leader, and revelation from God that we have not learned. Read 1 Samuel 17:1-58.

“These are the nations the Lord left to test all those Israelites who had not experienced any of the wars in Canaan (He did this only to teach warfare to the descendants of the Israelites who had not had previous battle experience)…They were left to test the Israelites to see whether they would obey the Lord’s commands which He had given their forefathers through Moses” (Judges 3:1-4). God desires the success of His people and will give the necessary resources to win and even teach, train and test His people. God also provides the leaders and leadership needed to help His people succeed. Effective leaders find a way to help their team win. Read Judges 3:1-33.

Othniel, the son of Caleb’s younger brother Kenaz, found his people surrounded by enemies from Mesopotamia. God put His Spirit on Othniel and he stepped forward, led the armies of Israel and prevailed. This victory led to 40 years of peace until the leader died.

Joshua continued to lead the people way into his old age. One of his great leadership skills was exhortation. Read Joshua 23:1-24:33.

Joshua’s farewell to the leaders was filled with passion exhorting the leaders to “Be very strong; be careful to obey all that is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, without turning aside to the right or to the left. Do not associate with these nations that remain among you; do not invoke the names of their gods or swear by them. You must not serve them or bow down to them. But you are to hold fast to the Lord your God as you have until now.”

One of my personal heroes of the Bible has very little written about him but a lot said about him because of his actions. Read Numbers 13:26-33 and Joshua 14:6-14.

Caleb was one of the spies sent into the land of Canaan before Israel’s planned invasion. When the spies returned, they told Moses that “the people who live there are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large. We even saw descendents of Anak there” (Numbers 13:28). “Then Caleb … said ‘We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it’” (Numbers 13:30). I love that Caleb did not disagree with the facts given by the other spies, there were cities and giants in the land. Caleb didn’t minimize the obstacles, but neither did he minimize the resources available to overcome the obstacles.