Why Leaders Must Lead in Evangelism

A good word for church leaders of all kinds!  Ed Stetzer, in his blog article, entitled, “Evangelism Is A Core Leadership Quality,” writes of this missing priority in so many lives of leaders.  If we would lead, it must be in the direction of the Gospel.  The entire article is found here:

http://www.christianitytoday.com/edstetzer/2014/august/evangelism-is-core-leadership-quality.html

Read the gist of it below:

“If we’re going to talk about the need for an evangelistic engagement and an evangelistic people, we have to be those who engage in evangelism. We have to be those who are sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ.

You can’t lead where you won’t go.

If you want giving people, be a giving leader. If you want a praying people, be a praying pastor. If you want an evangelistic congregation, be a pastor who is evangelistic. Don’t complain about your congregation, if you are not going to be passionate about sharing the truth with others in your own life. In regard to evangelism, you just can’t lead what you would live. You can’t lead them where you won’t go yourself.

We can spend our time trying to get people to believe a certain way, but what happens when another way is presented with more fervor? Instead, we should be passionate about proclaiming the Way, Jesus. He was evangelistic, and He is our example.

As leaders, we are an example to those around us. We should proclaim the truth with the goal that people will believe in and follow Christ. People need to not just hear our perspective on evangelism; they need to see our passion for it.
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Evangelism needs to be a core leadership quality—modeled by pastors and leaders, but engaged in by all God’s people.”