J Oswald Sanders - Spiritual Leadership: A Commitment to Excellence for Every Believer

Spiritual Leadership is the best book Ive read on Christian leadership. I give copies to every key associate.

Charles W. Colson

Chairman, Prison Fellowship

As a young pastor, J. Oswald Sanders book Spiritual Leadership was the first book I read that awakened me to the subject of leadership. It started me on a 30-plus year journey of teaching leadership to pastors and laypeople. No other book has influenced my life the way this one has.

John C. Maxwell

Author, speaker, and founder

the INJOY Group

Spiritual Leadership should be the constant companion of every under-shepherd in the Saviors service. Most helpful is the fact that its emphasis is not on methods, but on character, passion, and godliness. I read it often to regrip the basic perspectives of my task, and have given it to the entire leadership team in our church.

John MacArthur

Pastor-teacher

Grace Community Church

I first read Oswald Sanders Spiritual Leadership as a young woman heading into ministry. It helped to shape my perspective, priorities, and passion and to ground my heart and mind in the timeless truths of Scripture. Anyone who desires to serve the Lord would do well to digest and internalize this classic.

Many Christian workers today are enamored of the latest trends, marketing models, and bestselling books by leadership gurus; they aspire to a sense of greatness and success that exalts human giftedness and rests on shifting sand. By contrast, the kingdom of God will always and only be advanced by humble servants of God who lead out of a clear sense of divine calling, personal integrity, spiritual depth, and dependence on Christmen and women of prayer, full of the Word and wisdom, and anointed with the power of the Spirit. These are the ingredients Sanders urges us to prize and pursue.

Nancy Leigh DeMoss

Author, Host of Revive Our Hearts radio

The accelerated change in both the church and larger society compels the revision of the language of a classic like Spiritual Leadership. The ideas of Oswald Sanders are of too great value to risk losing any of their power to the ever-changing idiom of the present century.

D. James Kennedy, Ph.D.

Author and Senior Minister

Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church

J. Oswald Sanders book Spiritual Leadership came to my hand shortly after it was published and was a great help to me as a young minister. I recommend it highly, not only to pastors and Christian workers, but to all Christians who want to know something about Gods leadership in their own lives.

Warren W. Wiersbe

Author, Conference Speaker

This book proves that a godly attitude lies at the heart of Christian leadership. It does not borrow principles of leadership from the world and apply them to the church, but rather derives principles of leadership directly from the Scriptures. It ought to be read by all of us at least once a year.

Erwin W. Lutzer

Senior Pastor

Moody Memorial Church

Spiritual Leadership by J. Oswald Sanders is a classic among the classics. I read it as a young Christian, later as a leader, and needed whats been taught in this book. I highly recommend it!

Chip Ingram

President, Walk Thru the Bible

Copyright 1967, 1980, 1994, 2007 by The Moody Bible Institute of Chicago.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

All Scripture references, unless otherwise indicated, are from the Holy Bible, New International Version, 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked NEB are taken from the New English Bible with the Apocrypha, 1961, 1970, the Delegates of the Oxford University Press and the Syndics of Cambridge University.

Scripture quotations marked PHILLIPS are taken from The New Testament in Modern English (New York: Macmillan), translated by J. B. Phillips, 1958 J. B. Phillips.

Scripture quotations marked KJV are taken from the King James Version.

Produced for Moody Publishers with the assistance of The Livingstone Corporation. Text updated by Mark Fackler, Ph.D. Study guide by James C. Galvin, Ed.D. and Neil Wilson. www.LivingstoneCorp.com

The use of selected references from various versions of the Bible in this publication does not necessarily imply publisher endorsement of the versions in their entirety.

Cover Design: Brand Navigation, LLCDeAnna Pierce, Terra Petersen, Bill Chiaravalle
(www.brandnavigation.com)

Interior Design: The Livingstone Corporation

ISBN: 0-8024-8227-9

ISBN-13: 978-0-8024-8227-3

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Over the span of forty years, Oswald Sanderss Spiritual Leadership has earned recognition as a classic study of the biblical principles of godly leadership. Originally a series of lectures delivered to leaders of the Overseas Missionary Fellowship, the book has been valued by thousands of readers for its keen insights and godly wisdom. So why the need for a line-by-line revision? Our concern was that the language of the original edition was making it increasingly difficult to appreciate the power of Sanderss ideas. Contemporary Christians who would otherwise benefit greatly from the book might be confused by references to obscure personalities, outdated expressions, and an absence of acknowledgment of more recent developments within the church and culture.

Our purpose, then, was to revise Spiritual Leadership for Christians living in the twenty-first century. We cannot improve on Sanderss insights, but we have attempted to update his writing by examining each sentence for its clarity and relevance to the contemporary reader. Although we have changed the wording extensively, we have remained faithful to the original meaning and intent of each passage. Some of the specific changes are described in the paragraphs below.

First, female leadership has always been a strong, if unsung, part of evangelical missions. In the original edition, almost no mention is made that women participate along with men in leading the world to Christ. Perhaps Sanders meant his references to man, to men, to him, and to his to mean all people without respect to gender. It was common in his era to use masculine pronouns as a generic reference to everybody. But perhaps he did not. In any case, recognizing the role of both men and women in the church of Christ, we have enlarged the language of this second edition to include both, except in those specific parts where Sanders was obviously addressing only one group.

Second, we added notes to the text that identify many of the authorities whom Sanders cites, people now forgotten by most of us. Sanders quotes revivalists, preachers, scholars, and missionaries, often from the British church. He also admired and respected World War II military leaders whose names may or may not still be household words. Whenever possible, endnotes provide biographical information.