LEADERSHIP CAPSULE
Committed to raising, mentoring and equipping leaders to ultimately fulfill the Great Commission.

Saturday, December 10, 2016

TITLE : LEADERSHIP IS STEWARDSHIP 6

Luke 16 :1-2 " ....there was a rich man who had a steward, and charges were brought to him that this man was wasting his resources. And he called him and said to him. 'What is this that I hear about you? Give account of your stewardship, for you can no longer be steward"  Emphasis added mine

UNDERSTANDING & MANAGING RESOURCES

Stewardship means to hold in trust, to keep, or to have responsibility for the resources of another for the purpose of profit or increase.
Stewardship is the practice of systematic and proportional management of resources based on the conviction that these resources are entrusted to you by God to be used for his service. A steward must understand that he is not an owner, he is only a manager of the resources committed to his care. These resources are to be effectively used, managed and coordinated by the steward for the accomplishment of the master's purpose.

Effective leaders learn to identify and coordinate all the resources needed to fulfill their purpose. A leader needs to be a faithful steward of the resources entrusted to him. It is essential for those who aspire to be leaders to learn how to manage and coordinate their resources first. If you can't be a good manager of your own resources, what else can you be trusted with?

Stewardship involves our whole lives - our life, time, giftings, talents, money, energy, possession. Leaders treat all these as a resource God has entrusted to them to serve others and to ultimately fulfill their purpose. Be faithful over what is given to you now, and you will be entrusted with more later on.

In essence, stewardship is the effective management of resources toward a worthy objective. As a steward you must understand that God is the source of all your resources. All that you have is a gift from God. God is the owner of everything I have, none belongs to me. Until God is in control of my life I am out of control. There is nothing you have that is truly yours. It takes revelation to get that.

Most of us at some time in our lives have wished that we had more resources - giftings, talents, grace, treasury, time than we actually have. We have envied another person's resources, neglecting the resources entrusted to us. This attitude is detrimental to stewardship and a stumbling block to releasing our God- given gifts and potential.

God's view of measuring success and failure is very different from ours. He define success in terms of stewardship - what you do with the resources entrusted to you. He is more concerned with what we do with what we have, than with how much we have. Your success as a leader is not determined by your giftedness but by your faithfulness to the resources entrusted to you. Its not determined by what you have or don't have but by what you do with what you have. Effective stewards are those who have learned to understand, and manage their resource. One of the greatest problems plaguing the present church is not the lack of resources but the lack of use of resources. We abuse the resource we fail to use or under use.

God gives you resources so you can accomplish what He created you to do on earth. He gives them to you to live on, not for and serve others. Whenever a resource becomes more important than the purpose for which God gave it, you have crossed the line between using it and abusing it.

God has given us diversity of resources so we can accomplish what He intended us to do. In the next episode I'll help you identify these resources so you can become a better steward.
Ephesians 4:7 says "but unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of gift of Christ". We may not have the same measure of resources, some might have received more than others, but the truth is that everyone had received grace. There is no graceless member.

Beloved, are you using your resources for the purpose to bless and enrich others?

Confession: in the name of Jesus, I acknowledge my  God- given resources for the purpose of blessing others and to the glory of God. Amen.

To be continued...........