The Jethro Paradigm of Leadership

UV 1356/10,000 The Jethro Paradigm of Leadership
Moreover thou shalt provide out of all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness; and place such over them, to be rulers of thousands, and rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens
Exodus 18 v 21
Leadership, it is said, is a combination of strategy and character. If one has to do without one, it is strategy and not character. Jethro, could be called the real father of management and the concept of godly leadership. Jethro was not a Jew but a Midianite. Yet he feared God. Leadership and wisdom is not the preserve of any one individual or nation. It can come from strange or unexpected quarters. Jethro observed that his son-in-law Moses was wearing himself and the people down by bearing the entire responsibility of hearing their grievances and trying to resolve it. He advised Moses to select men whom Moses should train and teach in applying the law and God’s word. He asked him to choose able men who fear God as fearing God would keep them humble, wise and not become arrogant. Fearing God implied that they would accept the counsel of God received through Moses. Fearing God implied that they acknowledged God Himself as their ultimate leader. They should also be men of integrity, just men who loved the truth and lived the truth, men who hated covetousness and therefore, would be contented and not take bribes or falsely favour one against the other. Ability is subordinated to character. Character comes before competence in the leadership paradigm. Jethro does not major on ability. He takes it as a given, a starting point or assumption. He did not give any place to strategy. Leadership to him was a combination of relationship between God and leader, between leader and followers and of ability and character. In short, Jethro’s leadership paradigm was a combination of relationship, ability and character.

Only persons with such leadership qualities ought to be given responsibility and authority over others. Moses was taught the principle of delegation by Jethro. Moses was to be left free to commune with God, hear from Him and convey it to the leaders appointed over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens. Only the very difficult or great matters were to be brought to Moses while the layers of leaders below would deal with all other matters according to the gravity or importance of the issue. The Hebrew race was used in Egypt to build pyramids but the pyramid became the metaphor for the spiritual bureaucracy to be set up by Moses and his consultant Jethro. Moses should be given credit for listening to his father in law’s wise advice. Jesus reversed the hierarchical pyramid and went right to the bottom of the pyramid to become the servant of all. He discipled just twelve apostles and ministered to hundreds and thousands. His teachings and example transformed the lives of the apostles and touched the lives of thousands. The latter then taught thousands and that multiplied into millions and even billions through history.

Instead of a pyramid structure today, we should have an core inner circle of leader’s protégées. They in turn would have an outer circle whom they influence and that circle of people would influence a larger circle. We can think and pray globally and influence globally. Each person’s span of direct impact cannot extend beyond ten to twelve persons whom one can invest his or her life into. But the core principles of leadership remains the same from the time of Jethro: ability or competence to assume responsibility and to lead, loving and living the Word, fear of God, avoiding covetousness or greed and lust, humility and integrity, receiving wisdom and counsel from the Lord. A period of training, mentoring or discipleship should precede a life of ministry. The person mentoring should be someone who has a direct connect with God, a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus, who is consistent in his or her walk with God. A person should not be pitchforked into leading thousands but go through phases of leading tens, fifties, hundreds and finally, thousands.

Prateep V Philip