Pattern of Headship and Tailship in Leadership

UV 2842/10000Pattern of Headship and Tailship in Leadership
And the LORD shall make thee the head, and not the tail; and thou shalt be above only, and thou shalt not be beneath; if that thou hearken unto the commandments of the LORD thy God, which I command thee this day, to observe and to do them:
Deuteronomy 28 v 13
The key words and phrases in this uni-verse are:the head, the tail, above ..not beneath. The key actionable words or verbs are “ make, to observe, to do”. In a co-related verse in concordance to this verse, it is written that “ the ancient and honourable will be the head and the prophet that tells lies will be the tail.” The Lord promises leadership or headship to those who believe Him, study and delight in His word and obey Him in the world. The connection between belief in God, diligence in study and preparation and actions leads to leadership. Belief in God distinguishes the wise from the fool, the leader from the follower, the sighted or the visionary from the short sighted or blind.
Stephen Covey wrote about Principle-centered leadership and it was widely acclaimed. But, in the light of this uni-verse, if a person is not principle-centered or Word-centered, he or she cannot be classified as a head or leader. Even a prophet or a man of God who lies is considered only a tail or a follower at the fag end of the totem pole of leadership. Principles that we need to follow in life flow from the Word of God. There is no other earthly or heavenly source. Power, authority, influence, wisdom and security flows from these godly principles extracted like gold from its ore. For the past several years, day after day, I have attempted to extract these godly principles of life and leadership and share it with the world and my readers.
If we pay attention to what God says, we will have no tension. He will guide us precisely on the paths we have to take. He will not lead us down a path of red herrings as the enemy of our souls does right from the beginning of time. Once we hear or read what God says, we need to study, analyse, understand it. Once we understand it, we need to apply it or commit it to our hearts to obey or do it. Mere ‘head knowledge’ or theoretical and unapplied knowledge does not make one a leader. Leadership requires a transfer from head to heart- a distance of about twelve inches. These twelve inches make all the difference to our lives and to the lives of those who follow us. The uni-verse promises headship or leadership to the ones who faithfully follow this process all their lives. I was anguished to hear that some of the top leaders in the modern world whom I greatly admired have been exposed on some failings and flaws in their leadership pattern. This again underlines the need for godly leaders and leaders of this world to be trained equally in using or leveraging on their strengths and overcoming weaknesses, threats and temptations. There are some qualities of the tail in all of us. Only the kangaroo’s tail is strong enough to support it when it stands and propel it in motion. We need to turn our weaknesses using the grace of the Lord to strengthen our tails or in other words- turn the leaderhip potential destroying power of weaknesses into a source of strength. It is possible when we carefully observe and do the cautions and precautions and counsel of the Lord contained in His word. Scripture is written on this binary pattern: “cling to what is good, let go of what is evil.” It implies that we should cling to what is held up as good in the Word and let go of what is evil as held up in the word.
Prateep V Philip