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These co-hosts wanted to discuss two back-to-back chapters in my book Shepherd Leadership where I talk about the balance between leading confidently and leading humbly. Most of us are wired to lean toward one of these poles, but godly leaders are learning how to find the healthy tension between them.
In this part of our conversation, we talked about leaders who haven’t learned to add confidence to their humility.
I’ll be sharing more clips from this Leading From Alignment interview soon, so please stay tuned. Shepherd Leadership: The Metrics That Really Matter is available in print or ebook, and in audiobook through either Audible or Apple.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
In my book Shepherd Leadership, I take two chapters to dive deep into the healthy tension that is helpful for leaders. This is an important tension to maintain our effectiveness as leaders.
As I said in this interview, every leader should take the proactive steps to make sure that our healthy leadership confidence doesn’t cross the line and become unhealthy leadership hubris. Keep healthy friends around you, enlist the help of a wise mentor, pray that searching prayer from Psalm 139, and pick up a copy of Shepherd Leadership.
I have a special offer just for pastors (and for those who love their pastor). For just $12 I will send you an autographed copy of my book and a download link to get the audiobook of Shepherd Leadership free of charge. All you need to do is complete this form and I’ll have the materials right out to you.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
Imagine if 700 years before you were born there was a prophecy given about you (Matthew 3:3). Or if on the day of your birth your father said, “And you, my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for Him” (Luke 1:76).
This was John the Baptist.
With these kinds of announcements and the stamp of approval from God Himself, it’s really quite astounding how humble John remained:
“After me comes One Who is more powerful than I, Whose sandals I am not worthy to carry” (Matthew 3:11).
“[Jesus] must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30).
The confidence that he was God’s man for the hour gave John boldness to speak truth to religious leaders, wealthy people, and Roman soldiers (Matthew 3:7-12; Luke 3:7-20). Yet his humility was almost his undoing.
John preached boldly, fulfilling the prophecies that were made about him. But when Jesus came to him to be baptized, John’s humility caused him to defer initially. Then Jesus reminded him that His baptism was necessary “to fulfill all righteousness. Then John consented” (Matthew 3:13-15).
Whether I am lacking confidence to speak or lead boldly, or lacking humility to let someone else take the lead, I need to return to the Word of God—just as John did. Both his confidence and his humility were balanced by words spoken over him by God. So it must be for you and me too.
Confidence without humility or humility without confidence can trip me up and cause me to miss out on all that God needs me to do. So my daily prayer must be: Holy Spirit, may I be sensitive to every correction and adjustment You need to make in me. Illuminate the Scriptures that I need to apply to my life that will keep me in a healthy, balanced place.
I wrote about this tension between confidence and humility in my book Shepherd Leadership. This was also a topic of conversation in two interviews I did, which you can find here and here. Healthy leaders need the proper balance of confidence and humility to keep their leadership in a place that God can use powerfully.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
I had a great time on the Ailbe Podcast with Rusty Rabon.
Usually leaders want their lives and their organizations to be tension-free. But I’m advocating that healthy shepherd leaders actually embrace the tension.
God has wired us all uniquely, but I’ve found that many leaders are slightly unbalanced in their wiring. That is, most of us are naturally more confident or naturally more humble. God made you that way on purpose, but confident leaders are allowing the Holy Spirit to temper their confidence with humility, and humble leaders are allowing the Holy Spirit to bolster their humility with confidence.
The seed thought for this concept that figures prominently in my book Shepherd Leadership was one that I’ve been wrestling with for over a decade. If you’re interested, you can check out this post.
I’ll be sharing more clips from this interview soon, so please stay tuned. Shepherd Leadership: The Metrics That Really Matter is now available in print or ebook, and in audiobook through either Audible or Apple.
Listen to the podcast of this post by clicking on the player below, and you can also subscribe on Apple, Spotify, or Audible.
I had a great time on the Thriving In Ministry podcast with Kyle Willis and Dace Clifton.
When I was trying to explain to my friends why I was writing Shepherd Leadership: The Metrics That Really Matter, I found that many were quite intrigued by the idea of the confident humility—or the humble confidence—that Jesus so perfectly demonstrated for us.
Almost every leader I’ve met tends to be naturally wired as either a confident leader or a humble leader. Our effectiveness as a shepherd leader comes in allowing the Holy Spirit to help us maintain a healthy tension between those two poles. Jesus did this perfectly, and we are to follow His example.
I have two chapters in my book discussing this tension. Here’s how I introduce the topic in the chapter “A confident leader’s attitude adjustment:
God has created each of us uniquely—implanted with the temperament, talents, and personality He wanted each of us to have. God made you on purpose, and He made you for a purpose. But that being said, shepherd leaders are almost never perfectly balanced. If you’ve ever taken a temperaments assessment or any other kind of personality test, you know that you had some attributes that were more prominent than others. God never gives us weaknesses, but our areas of strength can become a self-imposed weakness if we rely on our strength instead of on our Strength Giver.
Leaders tend toward two poles: confidence or humility. God made us this way on purpose. But to be the best shepherd leader, we each must allow the Holy Spirit to help us learn to lead in a more balanced way. If we lean too much toward confidence, we can come across as arrogant and even tyrannical. But if we lean too much toward humility, we can appear to be weak, indecisive, and unsure of our leadership direction. None of us will be perfect in this at every single moment, but with the proper attitude adjustments, we can learn to more consistently stay at the balanced point of being humbly confident or confidently humble.
I’ll be sharing more clips from this interview soon, so please stay tuned. Shepherd Leadership: The Metrics That Really Matter is now available in print or ebook, and in audiobook through either Audible or Apple.
I had a great time on the Leading From Alignment podcast with Jim Wiegand and John Opalewski. 
Craig T. Owens 