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The Most Powerful Quality of a Leader

I just came across this short article on The Most Powerful Quality of a Leader by Artie Davis. His premise is simple but very powerful, and makes a difference when employed. Take a read and let me know what you think…is there another powerful quality that deserves the title of “Most”…Monty

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If you have the heart and passion to really have impact with leaders, you must have influence with them. You need to know what it takes to earn the right to speak into their lives. I have found what seems to be the most powerful endearing quality a leader needs in order to influence other leaders…

Belief

That may sound simple, but those you may influence are desperately seeking someone who really believes in them. It doesn’t matter how successful or green they are, all leaders need affirmation. They don’t want someone who just flatters and looks to use them in their own vision, but rather someone who genuinely listens and cares about their heart and vision.

So if you want to be a leader of leaders, you must believe in others; you have to speak the truth and life into them. Listen to their story and their heart without thinking how it can “fit” into your story. Honor their passion by giving them your full attention. Ask questions and listen intently without being distracted by others around you.

I can really speak to this…Honestly, because that was me. I would listen to another leader’s story and passion, but in the back of my mind, I would be thinking, “Hmmm, this doesn’t fit with what I’m doing…who else can I talk with?” It took being treated that way by someone else to open my eyes to my own self-centeredness and pride- that wasn’t fun!

Another leader wants to see, hear, and feel you genuinely care about them, their heart and passion. If they feel you just want to talk about what you are doing, what your vision is, without taking the time to really know them and hear their heart…You will have NO influence with that leader.

This is the challenge…

Love other leaders deeply from the heart; guard their vision by honoring them and believing in them. Genuinely care and love them. Those who can do that are rare gems! That’s why there aren’t many Leaders of Leaders.

Believe in someone the way you want someone to believe in you!

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The Great Antecedent: A.W Tozer

Abstract light

I read and mediated on this Tozer piece this morning…. It comes from his book "The Divine Conquest" I have always said that God is always previous, that He is the first of all moves in life; Tozer ruminates on this as looks at the "unbeginning One." Grab some coffee (Tozer blend ) read, and ask yourself just how large a concept of God do you have, how you experience Him is limited by your concept of Him.

Monty

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The Great Antecedent

For all things God is the great Antecedent. Because He is, we
are and everything else is. He is that "dread, unbeginning One,"
self-caused, self-contained and self-sufficient. Faber saw this when he
wrote his great hymn in celebration of God's eternity.

Thou hast no youth, great God,

An Unbeginning End Thou art;

Thy glory in itself abode,

And still abides in its own tranquil heart:

No age can heap its outward years on Thee:

Dear God! Thou art Thyself Thine own eternity.

Do not skip this as merely another poem. The difference between a
great Christian life and any other kind lies in the quality of our
religious concepts, and the ideas expressed in these six lines can be
like rungs on Jacob's ladder, leading upward to a sounder and more
satisfying idea of God.

We cannot think rightly of God until we begin to think of Him as
always being there, and there first. Joshua had this to learn. He had
been so long the servant of God's servant Moses, and had with such
assurance received God's word at his mouth, that Moses and the God of
Moses had become blended in his thinking, so blended that he could
hardly separate the two thoughts; by association they always appeared
together in his mind. Now Moses is dead, and lest the young Joshua be
struck down with despair, God spoke to assure him, "As I was with Moses,
so I will be with thee." Moses was dead, but the God of Moses still
lived. Nothing had changed and nothing had been lost. Nothing of God
dies when a man of God dies.

"As I was—so I will be." Only God could say this. Only the Eternal
One could stand in the timeless I AM and say, "I was" and "I will be."

Verse

"No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of
your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with; I will never leave
you nor forsake you." Joshua 1:5

Thought

We cannot think rightly of God until we begin to think of Him
as always being there, and there first.

Prayer

Let us think rightly of You, Lord, by realizing that You have
always been there and that You were there first.