Robert Clinton - The Making of a Leader: Recognizing the Lessons and Stages of Leadership Development

After reading this book, I can recognize Gods fingerprint in my past, His hand in my present, and the direction He is pointing to for my future.

GARY LAU , executive director, New Hope Christian CollegeHawaii

A paradigm buster! The Making of a Leader turned my understanding of Christian leadership upside down. I have reread and referred to this book again and again over the years. I especially like how this new edition contains updated research and new resources to explore in deeper and more transformational ways. A classic just got better!

DR. PAUL G. LEAVENWORTH , executive director, The Convergence Group

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The Making of a Leader, Second Edition: Recognizing the Lessons and Stages of Leadership Development

Copyright 1988, 2012 by J. Robert Clinton. All rights reserved.

A NavPress resource published in alliance with Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.

NAVPRESS and the NAVPRESS logo are registered trademarks of NavPress, The Navigators, Colorado Springs, CO. TYNDALE is a registered trademark of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. Absence of in connection with marks of NavPress or other parties does not indicate an absence of registration of those marks.

Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version, NIV. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. Scripture quotations marked GNT are taken from the Good News Translation in Todays English Version, Second Edition, copyright 1992 by American Bible Society. Used by permission. Scripture verses marked NEB are taken from The New English Bible, copyright 1970, Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press. Scripture quotations marked KJV are taken from the Holy Bible, King James Version. Other Scripture quotations used come from The New Testament: An Expanded Translation by Kenneth S. Wuest, Eerdmans, 1961.

Some of the anecdotal illustrations in this book are true to life and are included with the permission of the persons involved. All other illustrations are composites of real situations, and any resemblance to people living or dead is coincidental.

Clinton, J. Robert.

The making of a leader : recognizing the lessons and stages of leadership development / J. Robert Clinton. [Rev. ed.].

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and indexes.

ISBN 978-1-61291-075-8

1. Christian leadership. I. Title.

BV652.1.C56 2012

253.2 dc23

2012016756

Build: 2021-04-21 22:30:58 EPUB 3.0

Leadership is a topic high on many agendas today, whether in politics, business, or the church.

In part, this is because of a perceived leadership vacuum. In his leadership essays, John Gardner pointed out that at the time the United States was formed, the population stood at around 3 million. That 3 million produced at least six leaders of world class: Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Franklin, Madison, and Hamilton. Todays American population of 240 million might be expected to produce eighty times as many world-class leaders. But, asks Gardner, Where are they?

At a convention of the National Association of Evangelicals, college president George Brushaber spoke of a missing generation of younger leaders ready to take the places of the senior postWorld War II group of evangelical pioneers.

My own travels and observations have led me to believe this is a worldwide phenomenon. Yet I am encouraged to believe there is a new group of younger men and women, roughly forty and under, emerging into leadership around the world.

In response to both the lack of and the new wave of leaders, there is an urgent need for the cultivation of godly and spiritual leadership.

There are a number of responses to this challenge. The Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization has called several conferences for emerging younger leaders. My own ministry, Leighton Ford Ministries, is focused upon identifying, developing, and networking these younger people. A number of graduate schools are focusing some specific programs on leadership development. One is the School of Intercultural Studies at Fuller Theological Seminary, where Dr. Bobby Clinton taught. It is out of his experience in teaching that his important book The Making of a Leader developed.

I believe we can make either of two opposite mistakes in viewing leadership emergence. One is to attach a mystique to leadership that says in effect, God calls leaders. Leaders are born. There is nothing we can do about it. The opposite is to say, Leaders are made. With the right techniques, we can produce them.

It is always true that God gives leadership to His church and His kingdom: Promotion cometh neither from the east, nor from the west, nor from the south. But God... putteth down one, and setteth up another, said the psalmist (Psalm 75:6-7, KJV ).

But it is also true that there are processes that God uses to produce His leaders. A study of Scripture shows the stages of development in a Moses, a David, or a Paul.

It is the strength of Dr. Clintons work that he takes seriously both parts of this process. He sets forth clearly that leadership is a God-given call and gift. Out of his own study of Scripture, life, and leadership, he has identified some of those common experiences that God uses to grow leaders.

I know of no other book that so carefully and thoroughly outlines the stages of leadership development from the early inner growth of the leader through the crises and challenges that mature a persons ministry and life.

The principles set forth will be of help both to younger people who sense that God is calling them to leadership and to senior people who have increasing responsibility to encourage the development of new leadership in their churches and organizations.

I warmly commend this book and pray that it will help to produce a new generation of pioneers for the gospel.

L EIGHTON F ORD , president

Leighton Ford Ministries

What does it mean to be a leader? What does it take to become the leader God wants you to be? What are the processes, the cost, and the result?

For six years I have been researching and teaching the answers to these questions at Fuller Theological Seminarys School of World Mission in Pasadena, California. My students and I have shared the excitement of applying new concepts to our lives and seeing ourselves as emerging leaders whom God is developing. In this book I hope to capture the dynamics of these ideas and provide biblical insights into the patterns and processes God uses to develop a leader.

This is a book about spiritual dynamics. Effective spiritual ministry flows out of being, and God is concerned with our being. He is forming it. The patterns and processes He uses to shape us are worthwhile subjects for leadership study. Those who study patterns and processes, and use insights from them in life and ministry, will be better prepared leaders.