By no means did I have everything figured out by then – far from it. But the leadership lessons the Spirit gave through Scripture have remained true for the last decade. I’m thankful for the Spirit’s guidance in some of these foundational insights that have helped define my philosophy of leadership and ministry. Here are some of the leadership lessons that I discovered from the life of David.

One of my favorite books is Through Gates of Splendor. Everyone knows the big story of their deaths on that beach and the after effects of the Auca Indians coming to know Jesus. But for me, the real value in that book is reading the private journal entries from each of those men, and seeing the depth of their conviction and passion for Jesus and for the lost.

On the 3rd page of the book, Jim Elliot writes in his diary,

“He makes His ministers a flame of fire. Am I ignitable? God deliver me from the dread asbestos of ‘other things.’ Saturate me with the oil of the Spirit that I may be aflame. But flame is transient, often short lived. Canst thou bear this, my soul-short life? Make me thy fuel, Flame of God.“

That last phrase, “Make me thy fuel, Flame of God,” is a poem from Amy Carmichael which talks about dying to self, and God’s grace in our weakness. Jenn got it framed for me this Christmas.

So this sort of conviction, this kind of passion is deep in our hearts as we’re on the plane taking off from Austin last year, holding each other’s hands and sobbing our guts out, because there’s a unique sort of dying to self that happens when you stop calling America, “home.” We are ready to die for the glory of Christ among the unreached. That’s the kind of conviction and vision we have upon leaving, and I’m sure that is what you guys feel as well.

I wish I could tell you that after one year, we’ve had nothing but passionate worship for Jesus and boat loads of people coming to know Christ. That hasn’t been true.

Before you go, everything is theory: you have a massive end goal to see movements among the unreached. And so you build this perception before going, maybe unintentionally, that everything overseas will be these big wins and dramatic moments.

The reality is very different. There is a lot of plodding. A lot of confusion, a lot of sin coming to the top that you didn’t even know you had, a lot of “I don’t know.” All the while you’re learning everything from new like a baby, especially language, and your whole team is also thrashing like they’ve just been thrown in the deep end. They’re looking at you to tell them what to do, like you actually know! There is a lot of guessing, because you really just don’t have enough information or experience to make a decision on your own wisdom.

And that is actually a grace of God.

As I’ve been trying to learn how to be a good leader, I’ve been studying David and Saul in 1 and 2nd Samuel. So I want to give you three comparisons between David and Saul as a framework for some of my own experiences in Thailand.

Listening to the Holy Spirit vs. Depending on your own Wisdom

To me, this is the most obvious difference between David and Saul. Saul seems to be insecure about his authority, his role as King. So he makes decisions based on what will benefit him, or appease his followers.

Saul disobeys God, and God takes His Spirit from him. Everything that Saul does after that point is based on his own wisdom instead of the Spirit’s, and Saul’s jealousy and sin has David fleeing for his life.

1 Samuel 22 is where we can see Saul has completely unraveled. He’s an insecure, jealous, power-drunk leader. Ahimelech the priest has just aided David with bread and by inquiring of the Lord for him, and Saul finds out. He’s basically foaming at the mouth when he confronts Ahimelech.

And Saul said to him, “Why have you conspired against me, you and the son of Jesse, in that you have given him bread and a sword and have inquired of God for him, so that he has risen against me, to lie in wait, as at this day?” Then Ahimelech answered the king, “And who among all your servants is so faithful as David, who is the king’s son-in-law, and captain over your bodyguard, and honored in your house? Is today the first time that I have inquired of God for him? No! Let not the king impute anything to his servant or to all the house of my father, for your servant has known nothing of all this, much or little.” And the king said, “You shall surely die, Ahimelech, you and all your father’s house.” And the king said to the guard who stood about him, “Turn and kill the priests of the LORD, because their hand also is with David, and they knew that he fled and did not disclose it to me.” …And Nob, the city of the priests, he put to the sword; both man and woman, child and infant, ox, donkey and sheep, he put to the sword.

-1 Samuel 22:13-19

Saul’s insecurity, his jealousy, lead him to kill a whole city of innocent people, the servants of God. It all starts from his lack of obedience to God, and his failure to submit to the Spirit.

I used to be super insecure about my role as a leader. I’m on a team with a lot of my closest friends – I grew up with them, and they know how big of an idiot I am. I don’t have way more experience, and for a long time, I didn’t understand that being a leader is a role that God gives to serve the body; it’s NOT some kind of improved value. If you know your identity is in Christ and you are a servant of his, then you won’t be worried about the approval of your teammates. You won’t be concerned with whether they like what you’ve said or not because you’ll be focused on obeying God, who put you in that position.

Being a leader is a role, not a value.

David, in comparison to Saul, often does what seems contrary to the obvious, and also contrary to what his people want him to do. Before making a decision, he inquires of the Lord. This is the key idea.

9 times in 1st and 2nd Samuel it says that David inquires of the LORD. When David inquires, he is specific, and he is obedient. He asks specifically of God, “What do you want me to do? Should we go here? Will we have victory?”

And he is obedient. Every time he inquires, he does exactly what God tells him. He doesn’t do what his men tell him, and he doesn’t do what he might think is best. He does what God tells him to do.

I think the best example of this is in 1st Samuel 30. David and his men have gone to battle but are sent back. While David and his army are gone, the Amalekites raid Ziklag, the city where David’s army left their women and children, and they kidnap everyone.

And when David and his men came to the city, they found it burned with fire, and their wives and sons and daughters taken captive. Then David and the people who were with him raised their voices and wept until they had no more strength to weep. David’s two wives also had been taken captive, Ahinoam of Jezreel and Abigail the widow of Nabal of Carmel. And David was greatly distressed, for the people spoke of stoning him, because all the people were bitter in soul, each for his sons and daughters. But David strengthened himself in the LORD his God.

And David said to Abiathar the priest, the son of Ahimelech, “Bring me the ephod.” So Abiathar brought the ephod to David. And David inquired of the LORD, “Shall I pursue after this band? Shall I overtake them?” He answered him, “Pursue, for you shall surely overtake and shall surely rescue.”

–1 Samuel 30:3-8

This is probably one of the hardest points of David’s leadership. He comes home from battle to see his city ransacked, and all the women and children kidnapped. They are weeping until they have no strength to weep! And his followers want to stone him – they are bitter and desperate.

I don’t know if you’ve experienced this kind of desperation yet in your leadership. I don’t think I have. Everything has failed, and everyone is against you. David is chased from his homeland, the King who he has served wants him dead, he’s lost his family, and his own followers want to kill him. I’m praying I have the response of David when this moment hits – he strengthened himself in the Lord.

Here is where it gets crazy. He inquires of the Lord. Should I pursue? Will I overtake them? And he waits for God’s response.

Think about it — WHAT ELSE IS HE GOING TO DO HERE? Not pursue them?! The people would most definitely stone him at this point. But he doesn’t do what is obvious, he doesn’t do what he feels would be right, he doesn’t do what his people want him to do. In the lowest point of leadership, he looks to the Lord. That is the defining mark of a godly leader. And God gives them victory – they reclaim everything and more.

In every one of the 9 inquiries that David makes of the Lord, he is trying to make a strategic decision. He asks, what should I do? Where do I go? When should I do it? Will I have victory? He takes the specific effort to pause, consult a priest with the ephod, and listen to the Lord. Most of these are urgent battle decisions that need to be made quickly, but David consults the Spirit.

So for you leaders — When you make a decision (What people groups should I go to, and when? Who should I recruit? What is our approach?), you need to ask, have I covered it in prayer first? Do you know what the Spirit’s voice sounds like? Do you have the intimacy of coming into his presence daily?

For us, we came in with a vision to mobilize Thai believers to start movements. We also came in with a strategy, timeline, and plan that was our best shot based on what we knew before we arrived in Thailand. But there’s so much that you won’t know until you arrive. We have learned so much in this last year, and our strategy has been changing and adjusting. We learn, we consult with the Lord, we discuss, and we tweak our strategy. But our vision is always the same – for that, we prayed and fasted and sought the Lord, and the vision is from him. So our strategy and timeline we hold loosely, but our vision we hold tightly.

Whenever there is a strategic decision to make, I need to fight to cover it in prayer before I make a decision. Because chances are, what I think is the best is not right.

So the first mark of a godly leader – listening to and obeying the Holy Spirit. Starting now – learn what the Spirit’s voice sounds like, and get in the habit of submitting every decision to him first.

Humility in Service vs. Pride in Position

We’ve already seen how Saul is insecure about his leadership role. He’s worried about what the people think about him and about David. He’s consumed by jealousy for his position when people start to sing David’s praises.

The women sang to one another as they celebrated,

“Saul has struck down his thousands,
and David his ten thousands.”

And Saul was very angry, and this saying displeased him. He said, “They have ascribed to David ten thousands, and to me they have ascribed thousands, and what more can he have but the kingdom?” And Saul eyed David from that day on.

-1 Samuel 18:7-9; 12-13

Saul was afraid of David because the LORD was with him but had departed from Saul. So Saul removed him from his presence and made him a commander of a thousand.

Saul goes on to make unnecessary decrees and orders that are all based on preserving his own position, as opposed to serving the purposes of God who put him in that position! God wants to use David, but Saul, instead of empowering his best commander, becomes jealous and limits him. It’s about his glory, not God’s.

As a leader, you are there to empower your people to succeed. If one of my guys starts to see 2nd and 3rd generation fruit and the beginnings of a movement, I’m not going to demote him because I want to be the one who gets credit! I’m going to give him all the help I can. Your team members aren’t there as servants to fulfill your vision – you are there as a servant to help them fulfill God’s vision.

A leader exists to be a servant and help others fulfill God’s vision for them.

David knows that He is a primarily servant of God, and his heart is after God’s glory, not his own. He hears from the Lord, and leads his people in obedience to God by serving them.

As a leader, you have to do the gritty stuff that most people don’t like to do. And you have to make hard decisions – and take responsibility for those decisions – which most people don’t like to do either. Making difficult decisions is a large part of how leaders can serve.

Going back to 1st Samuel 30, after the Amalekites have raided Ziklag and kidnapped the families, when God tells David to pursue he takes 600 men in full on pursuit. Remember, they’ve just prepared for war and have traveled 3 days back to Ziklag. They’re really tired.

As they reach a river, 200 of them are too exhausted to continue, but David goes with 400 and overtakes the Amalekites and gain everything back. When he goes back to the two hundred exhausted men, a conflict arises. Let’s see how David deals with this.

Then David came to the two hundred men who had been too exhausted to follow David, and who had been left at the brook Besor. And they went out to meet David and to meet the people who were with him. And when David came near to the people he greeted them. Then all the wicked and worthless fellows among the men who had gone with David said, “Because they did not go with us, we will not give them any of the spoil that we have recovered, except that each man may lead away his wife and children, and depart.” But David said, “You shall not do so, my brothers, with what the LORD has given us. He has preserved us and given into our hand the band that came against us. Who would listen to you in this matter? For as his share is who goes down into the battle, so shall his share be who stays by the baggage. They shall share alike.” And he made it a statute and a rule for Israel from that day forward to this day.

-1 Samuel 30:21-25

With authority and reason, David resolves the conflict swiftly and decisively. And he makes it a statute so that his people know: this is the clear expectation moving forward. And they don’t run into this problem again.

Throughout 1st and 2nd Samuel, we see that David is a servant of God, and he directs his people to obey God. He gives them clear guidance so that they can thrive, and in conflict he’s at the forefront mediating and taking responsibility for his people, shielding them, and protecting them.

Jenn and I are responsible for our people. When there’s hard stuff to do, we need to be first in line. We had to go recently to figure out visa extensions. Which is one of the utmost joys of living in another country. Jenn and I actually didn’t need to go because we were coming back here to renew our visas, but we went anyway so we could figure it out for everyone else. So we have to do the wake up early, dress up, get all the documents, travel out to the immigration office, wait in line for 3 hours, figure out the mess, all that. And of course, we get rejected because we have the wrong paperwork.

I’d much rather be meeting with Thais and sharing than going to the visa office, but I need to do it for my team. I’ve asked them to be here in Thailand, so I’ve got to make a way for them to be here, even if it is tedious and unexciting.

We went to Thailand about 3 months before the team, and I’d recommend that every team leader go 3-6 months early to figure stuff out for your team. There’s a lot of transition, and a lot of logistics. You serve by being the first ones through the wall for your people.

If there’s a conflict in your team, you’re there to mediate. I hate conflict, and I generally avoid it if I can help it. Thai people take it to the next level – if there’s a conversation that they don’t want to have, they just won’t have it. Literally, they will just disappear off the face of the planet and you won’t see them again.

But as a team leader, I can’t do that. I had to learn to embrace the role of shepherd, and do the things that I wasn’t comfortable with doing. I need to mediate conflict and I need to hear people’s stresses and anxieties and problems, and try to shepherd them with the gospel. You serve by entering into difficult conflicts.

You also need to set the boundaries and expectations for your people. Be clear about what you want them to do, how they can thrive. Everything is new and tenuous overseas, but they need a semblance of structure and guidance from you. If something goes wrong — even and especially if it’s not your fault — you take ultimate responsibility for the decisions you make for your people.

So how are you empowering your people to succeed? Are you giving them tracks to run on? Is this vision about your success, your cool stories in your newsletter, or about God receiving glory and your people obeying him well? How are you humbling yourself to serve those that you lead?

Repentant in Sin vs. Hardened Heart

It goes without saying that Saul had a hardened heart. When he confronted Ahimelech about helping David, Ahimelech offered his defense – how was he wrong in helping David when he had done it so many times before? Saul is shown how hypocritical and arbitrary he is being. But instead of admitting his wrong, Saul reacts violently, and “solves” the problem by just killing Ahimelech and all the priests. He had a hardened heart.

As King, David was far from perfect. There’s several times throughout his life when David is about to commit some sin, but God gives him grace and saves him from guilt. But we know of David’s huge moral failure with Bathsheba, resulting in a fractured family and kingdom.

As I was reading 1st and 2nd Samuel, I knew this part was coming. I dreaded coming to this part in 2nd Samuel and reading about David’s sin. Because all throughout his life it’s about God’s favor in his life, and how he is a man after God’s heart! He was chosen by God to bring glory to himself and lead Israel. Why would God allow there to be this huge moral failure in his life?

We all want to be good leaders. We want to be above reproach, with a good reputation. We want our people to trust us and depend on us. We hear those stories of goers who had huge moral failures overseas and are sent back in shame. This is a real fear of mine, that my leadership will be disqualified because of some kind of sinfulness.

The truth is that we are all far from perfect. During our time in Thailand this year, the stresses and frustrations forced sins to the top that I didn’t even know I had.

And I can’t help but think, Jim Elliot’s life didn’t look like this.

One of the hardest points of the last year was actually Christmas Eve. We’re missing our friends and family, we have culture shock. We had just gotten there, no idea what we’re doing, no idea how to communicate, and it’s stupid hot. I’ve gotten sick 3 times in two months, and I was sick on Christmas Eve.

We were in this crowded mall, trying to buy presents for each other, and I hate malls because I’m an introvert. And I’m sick and just so frustrated and stressed, so of course that leads into my frustration turning against the only person it can, which is Jenn.

And we had a bad fight. Like worse than basically any we’ve had in the States. Of course, I don’t even remember what it was about.

And I just want to be done.

I don’t want to engage with Jenn, with Christmas, with Thailand, with myself. I just want to disappear, go find a hotel somewhere, let her do Christmas by herself – that’ll show her. (If you can’t tell, I’m the flight response in conflict.) And I was so close to just bailing, when the Spirit just softly said, “What are you doing? You’re not this kind of man.”

And so I stayed. We talked and apologized and repented and forgave each other. It was God’s grace that He gave us a great Christmas Day. But Christmas Eve was an ugly day, and showed the ugliness of my heart. It was a low point for me.

I’ve had to apologize to my wife so many times this year. But more than that, I’ve had to repent before God. It took David a big shock from Nathan after he committed adultery and murder, but when he realized what he’d done, his response was repentance. “I have sinned against the Lord.”

He pleads with God in Psalm 51, “Have mercy on me, wash away my iniquity, cleanse me from my sin!”

As a leader, as a goer, as a broken person: you will mess up. You will sin. You will lash out. The stress of going overseas is multiplied by the responsibility of leadership. I’ve heard it said that, “cross-cultural ministry is a crucible. It will either chew you up and spit you out, or you will be refined like gold.” Get ready for it!

The stress of going overseas is multiplied by the responsibility of leadership.

Your only response in the face of sin is to have a heart of repentance. Praise be to God that our pleading for mercy has been answered – Jesus has done it for us on the Cross.

My bold prayer after reading 1st and 2nd Samuel – make me a better man and better leader than David. Which is really an outrageous prayer. But it’s possible because of Christ in me. The stress of going overseas is multiplied by the responsibility of leadership. But Jesus gives us grace in the midst of our weakness.

It’s been a hard year, with a lot of forgiveness and a lot of prayer and communication, but one of the things we’re most thankful for is how God has strengthened our marriage.

We know God is making us more like Jesus through sanctification. He’s getting us ready so He can use us more. Being a leader isn’t about being perfect or never being wrong. It’s about owning your mistakes, learning from them, and pushing forward. Being a leader is about constantly growing.

When I began studying the leadership of David and Saul, I thought I’d be finding attributes or character about David that differentiated him from Saul. And that’s partly true: David is humble and after God’s heart. But really, the difference is the grace of God in his life. David also messes up several times, but God delivers him out of grace, and doesn’t remove His Spirit. All of David’s victories and successes are solely because of God’s grace.

It’s been the same for us. As much as this year has been about us being sanctified from our sin, we’ve also enjoyed seeing God work in ways that we had very little to do with.

We have a healthy, thriving team of 9 people (soon to be 13), fluent in Thai, partnerships with local networks, and we’re on track to start our first training groups next Fall. We have a clear strategy moving forward, and God is doing more than we could have hoped.

We’re meeting Thais who want to give their lives to reach their country. Several Thais we know have said, “I want to move to the South to reach Muslims,” one of the most unreached groups in Thailand. Or, I want to share the gospel with those who don’t know, please train me!

We’re seeing God work in ways that we’ve only read about. For several years, we’ve been praying that God would appear to Thai Muslims in dreams and visions. Just a few months ago, Jenn and a teammate were invited to southern Thailand to a Muslim wedding.

At the wedding, Jenn and our teammate are sitting at a table when a lady named Feyda approaches them and just starts chatting up a storm. They talk about hijabs and Thai language and weddings and such. As they start to broach the topic of Islam, Jenn asks – “Have you ever had a dream from God?”

Feyda lights up and says, “Yes, I’ve had 2. In one of them, I’m at a big worship festival, and everyone is dressed in white and worshipping. In the second one, there is a huge snake on top of my chest, oppressing me; I can’t breathe. Then, a shining man in white with a beard comes and takes it away.”

Jenn and our teammate asked, “how does that make you feel?” She motions up and down her arms, like goosebumps. It’s the first story we’ve heard about a dream of Jesus among Thai Muslims, and we know without a doubt that God is at work. We are praying that God would reveal himself through dreams and visions to more and more Muslims.

Even though this year has been messing up and making mistakes, this conviction and vision we have for reaching the lost in Thailand is now ingrained in us deeper than ever. We know God is working. We know all the people groups in Thailand will be around the throne. We continue to be weak people used by God.

I want to end with the Amy Carmichael poem that I talked about at the beginning. This is my prayer for all of you current and future leaders – that God would be our sufficient grace in the midst of our weakness. That you would be leaders that inquire of the Lord and obey, be humble in service, and be repentant when challenges arise.

From prayer that asks that I may be
Sheltered from winds that beat on Thee,
From fearing when I should aspire,
From faltering when I should climb higher
From silken self, O Captain, free
Thy soldier who would follow Thee.

From subtle love of softening things,
From easy choices, weakenings,
(Not thus are spirits fortified,
Not this way went the Crucified)
From all that dims Thy Calvary
O Lamb of God, deliver me.

Give me the love that leads the way,
The faith that nothing can dismay
The hope no disappointments tire,
The passion that will burn like fire;
Let me not sink to be a clod;
Make me Thy fuel, Flame of God

Write the vision, make it plain on tablets, so he may run who reads it.

I was 20 years old at Urbana 2009. A vision cast from a person I didn’t know, have never talked to, and have never met again, changed the course of my life.

I had just gone to Thailand on a short-term trip that opened my eyes to the reality of the unreached. God had started to put on my heart the possibility of serving overseas. As a part of that process, I went to Urbana, Intervarsity’s triennial missions conference for students. A bunch of other friends from our Intervarsity chapter at UT Austin went, including several that ended up on our original team in Thailand.

Between the plenary sessions, there were opportunities to go to different workshops about different topics, whether business as mission, social justice, or different evangelism methods. One workshop that caught my eye was named “Costly Discipleship: Incarnation, Jesus, and The Way of the Cross.”

Most of the workshops had been helpful and informative, but mostly informal and casual. As we sat down, a man in his 30s walked up to the front. He said, “My name is John David Pitts. My wife and I were kicked out of Pakistan 6 weeks ago. We are going back in 4 weeks. In all likelihood we will be thrown into prison or killed.”

“Today, we are going to call you to come and die.”

I could feel the tension in the room rise as our attention was fixed on the speaker. For the next 45 minutes, John simply presented the hard sayings of Jesus and taught on them.

John 15:20 – “Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours.”

Luke 14:26-27 – “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.

Matthew 16:24-25 – “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”

At the end, he concluded by saying, “Following Jesus requires radically high levels of commitment. His final command was to go and make disciples of all the nations.”

Instead of taking questions, he released us to go spend time with God. I went straight to the prayer room and for the next 2 hours surrendered my life to Jesus. I felt the Holy Spirit say, “If you believe the Gospel, you’ll go to the nations.”

I made my commitment to serve overseas long-term on December 30, 2009.

Vision casting is a powerful form of communication that is critical in our pursuit of the Great Commission. Ministry, missions, and movements are really, really difficult. If we don’t have vision to guide us, we won’t have a clear direction and can get distracted by the urgent and needy. If we aren’t reminded of that vision regularly, we can get discouraged or apathetic.

For missions team leaders, casting vision is needed to recruit people to your team, to motivate your team and partners towards the end goal, to encourage people to persevere, to excite people and give them courage for the work, to and many more opportunities. Vision is needed to help yourself to focus on abiding and endure through suffering. John David Pitts casted the vision towards me for radical commitment to following Jesus and making disciples among the unreached, and I’m still pursuing that vision today.

Our definition of a leader is a man or woman that receives vision from God to influence the people of God towards the purposes of God. The vision piece is critical for leaders, because it is what you use to influence those that you lead towards God’s purposes in their lives. If you don’t have a clear vision, then you’re probably not yet a leader.

What is Vision?

A vision is an end goal, an eventual reality that you want to achieve. It should be biblical, faith-driven, and derived from prayer and listening to the Lord.

There’s a lot of articles on vision and mission statements for businesses, organizations, and even churches. The challenge is that there’s often a lot of overlap between vision, mission, calling, and purpose.

For me, vision is why you (or your team or ministry) exist, and mission is what you do to accomplish that vision. Although I think it’s worth writing down a vision statement, I’m not going to focus too much on the specific details of vision statements but talk more about vision in general.

These are some questions you can consider to try and figure out what God’s vision is for your life:

• What has He called you to give your life to?
• Why / For what purpose does you or your team or ministry exist?
• What is the future picture of the world that you desire to make a reality?
• What makes you “pound the table” / keep you up at night? (something that you’re passionately moved by and want to impact)

After considering these questions, if it’s not already derived from Scripture, see what in the Bible aligns with this vision. Bring it to the Lord in prayer, and listen to the Holy Spirit to see what he says about it. 

We’d also encourage you to think big when it comes to vision! Don’t just think about what you can accomplish by yourself. Big vision forces us to hear from God and depend on God. Big vision should require faith, since “without faith it is impossible to please God” (Hebrews 11:6). Big vision should be beyond our capabilities, beyond ourselves, perhaps even beyond our lifetime!

For our team in Thailand, our vision is “To see multiplying churches among all UPGs in Southeast Asia, through mobilizing the church to catalyze CPMs.”

For our Yield Coaching Ministry, our vision is “To advance the Great Commission by developing abiding leaders to catalyze movements among the unreached.”

These are things that are far bigger than ourselves, and things that I would gladly give my life, time, and effort for.

There’s a few examples in Scripture of vision. Obviously there are specific visions through dreams and images that God gives, and those would fall under the general umbrella of what we call ‘vision.’

For Jesus, there are a few strong candidates for what His vision would be. It could be bringing the Kingdom of God (Luke 4:18-19), coming to give eternal life through his sacrifice (John 3:16), or simply embodied in the Great Commission, that there would be disciples from all the nations (Matthew 28:18-20).

For Paul, as a minister to the Gentiles, his vision and ambition given by God was to “preach the gospel, not where Christ has already been named” (Romans 15:20). He would largely fulfill this vision by pioneering the early church and state that “from Jerusalem and all the way around to Illyricum I have fulfilled the ministry of the gospel of Christ” (Romans 15:19).

Lastly, the ultimate vision for all believers is the gathering of all the nations around the throne of Jesus in Revelation 7:9. This is an actual vision given to John of what will happen in the end times, and remains a clear and motivating vision for many of those called to serve in the nations.

After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!

Revelation 7:9

Why is Vision Important?

Habakkuk 2:2 gives a compelling argument that writing down clear vision allows the people of God to run. Proverbs 29:18 gives the opposite side: “Where there is no vision, the people perish” (KJV).

Vision helps you and your team to determine your direction, your ultimate goal, and the purpose for which you exist. From there, every other strategy, objective, plan, and decision should be aligned with that vision. In order for your vision to be helpful, it should be clear, memorable, and inspirational.

If a vision is your ultimate goal, a strategy plan is the steps for how to get there. By creating a strategy plan that flows from your vision, you can make decisions on what to do, and more importantly, what not to do. One way that we’ve heard movement practitioners summarize it is, “Big Vision, Clear Path, Simple Steps.” The clear path is the strategy plan or ministry framework you use to guide you towards that vision. The team or movement leader’s job is to set the vision, give the clear path, and make sure your teammates know the next, simple steps for that day/month/year towards that path and vision.

As a leader, you should be considering the vision, embodying the vision, and communicating the vision constantly. But sometimes if all we give is vision without a clear path and simple steps, it can be initially motivating but people that we lead may not know what to do next. Eventually that motivation will fade if there’s no way to progress towards that goal. That’s why strategy and simple steps of obedience are important.

But without vision to guide your strategy and simple steps, you can simply go from one urgent thing or one opportunity to the next, and not know if you are making any progress towards the end goal God has called you towards. As Paul says about his focus on his apostolic work, “Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it” (1 Corinthians 9:24). If you are willing to sacrifice so much to make disciples and obey God, work and run in such a way to win the prize, to complete the vision!

Sometimes people are confused between determining and casting a vision that helps you focus on your end goal, and casting vision that just seems to be generally motivating for people. These are certainly related! Talking about your specific vision statement and giving focus to it (why we exist, how we can get there, etc.) is vision casting, and motivating people through encouragement and inspiration is also vision casting! You need to do both types of vision casting as a leader.

Once your team is clear about the end vision of why your team exists, you need to consistently help them focus on it and motivate them towards it. We’ve heard it said that vision is a leaky bucket, it needs to be constantly refilled or else it runs out!

Ways to Cast Vision

There are many, many ways to cast vision – these are a few methods that we come back to often. We use these after our end vision is established, and we need to cast vision to motivate and focus those that we lead towards that end vision. 

Our main recommendation is to pay attention when you are praying, reading Scripture, or watching someone casting vision and it moves your heart – use that as a vision cast! Think about what has been effective in motivating you, helping you focus on the vision, inspires you to keep going. Steal those vision casts and make them your own! This also requires that you as a leader should be proactive in receiving vision through prayer, Scripture, reading books, listening to stories, etc.

Here are a few different ways to cast vision:

Through Scripture

If vision is given by God, then God’s Word is the most surefire way to receive vision and deliver vision to others. Look for key passages that align with your team and ministry vision and are motivating towards it!

Vision Casting in Scripture: When God is casting vision or when biblical leaders cast vision in Scripture, many times those vision casts can be a great example to point to. Some examples might be God casting vision to Joshua to take the land of Canaan (Joshua 1), Nehemiah mobilizing the people to rebuild the walls (Nehemiah 2), and Paul’s exhortation to the Romans about his ambition to preach where Christ has not been named (Romans 15).

Promises of God: When you need to cast vision in terms of giving encouragement, the promises of God are a great way to help your team lift their eyes from their current situation and look to the future reality that God has promised He will bring to fruition! In the future we’ll have a post about the promises of God for movement practitioners. Think about what your team is feeling like they’re lacking or having difficulty believing will happen – find the promises of God in Scripture that directly answer those doubts! Read them, surrender your fears and doubts, and receive the faith and courage to believe the promises and persevere until they are fulfilled!

Through Listening Prayer

Prayer is another surefire way that you can receive vision from God to communicate to others. It requires asking and listening to the Lord about what He wants to tell the people you lead.

A Word You’ve Received: As you’re in prayer for your team and ministry, what is God telling you? What Scripture is He highlighting, what promises is He elevating? Listening in prayer and relaying it to your team is a powerful way to cast vision.

Listening Together: Sometimes, the Word I would receive from God was just to seek Him together. I wouldn’t come into a team meeting with a prepared message to share, but would set aside our normal meeting agenda to let the team simply sit and listen to the Lord. We’d then all share what we were hearing and look for the common theme the Holy Spirit was trying to convey to us! This is a great way to include your team in receiving vision directly from the Lord instead of always hearing it through you as the leader. A great example is in Acts 13 when the leaders at Antioch were worshipping, praying, fasting and heard the Holy Spirit set apart Barnabas and Saul, sparking new movements in the region.

Now there were in the church at Antioch prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen a lifelong friend of Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.” Then after fasting and praying they laid their hands on them and sent them off.

Acts 13:1-3

Through Personal Convictions or Stories

Your Own Stories: The personal experiences that are cornerstones in your own journey towards the vision God has given you can also be motivating for others! Share stories of experiences you’ve had that opened your heart to pursuing this vision, that encouraged you that God was moving, that were examples of this vision starting to be a reality. Make sure you tell the story in a way that is encouraging for those that are listening, not just nostalgic for yourself!

Stories of God Working: Stories of miracles, answered prayers, changed lives, and salvations are great vision casts to get people excited about joining in what God is doing in your region or ministry. When you hear stories of God working in other places or in history that make you excited and you start to desire those things in your ministry, take note and share that with others! For example, I tried to hear as many stories of movements happening all around the world to build my own faith that it was possible here in Thailand, especially things that were sparking in the Buddhist world. If they worked for my heart, surely some of them would work for those I was leading! I would tell these stories and ask the question, “Why not us, and why not now?” And that would be the basis of our pleas to God in prayer!

Inspirational People Missions and Their Words:

Reading the biographical stories of great missions leaders throughout history has inspired countless people to follow in their footsteps. These faithful pioneers in our past have many lessons for us to learn. Recounting some of their stories and sharing their quotes are a great way to cast vision. Some of our favorites:

• Jim Elliot – “Canst thou bear this, my soul – short life? In me there dwells the Spirit of the Great Short-Lived, whose zeal for God’s house consumed Him. ‘Make me Thy Fuel, Flame of God.’”
• Hudson Taylor – “If I had a thousand lives, China should have them. No! Not China, but Christ. Can we do too much for Him? Can we do enough for such a precious Saviour?”
• Amy Carmichael – “We will have all eternity to celebrate our victories, but only a few short hours to win them.”

Through Needs and Opportunities

A vision, a future reality, isn’t needed if everything is perfect in your current reality. Your vision is trying to meet a need or answer an opportunity that exists in the world today. Illustrating that need or opportunity and how you want to respond to it can be a compelling way to draw people towards your vision.

Stories About the Need: During our first trip to Thailand, we were struck by the lack of access to the gospel across the country coupled with the spiritual darkness in Buddhism and Animism. Jenn and I met a shop owner who had never even heard the name of Jesus before. We heard testimonies of Thai believers who were miraculously delivered from demonic oppression. These stirred our hearts to want to make a difference, to proclaim Christ where there was no foundation. We relayed these stories to others to see if God would also stir their hearts to join us!

Unique Current Opportunities: As we said earlier, people want to join with what God is doing. Sharing about current opportunities can convey a sense of urgency that is compelling. During our early years in Thailand, a Thai pastor told us , “Thailand is based on 3 pillars – Religion, Country, and Monarchy. Right now all three are shaky and Thai people don’t know where to place their hope. There is a great opportunity for the gospel!”

Statistics and Maps: Sometimes, illustrating the vision through statistics or maps can be powerful forms of vision casting. I’ll always remember at Perspectives when one speaker told us that Americans spend more money on costumes for pets at Halloween than on bringing the gospel to the unreached. Juxtaposing such a trivial category against the core of the Great Commission was a sobering challenge to give sacrificially and in a focused way towards the unreached. Using maps can also be a memorable way to cast vision. The 10/40 Window is a striking combination of a map with a statistic: over 95% of the world’s unreached population lives within the 10/40 window. Simply by drawing a rectangle around that area, we can be reminded and convicted of the great need among the unreached.

Tips for Vision Casting

Directed Towards Your Audience: Always consider your audience when you’re vision casting, especially at that moment in time. Sometimes your best vision casting vignettes will fall flat if it’s not what your audience needs to hear. One illustration is to be a sniper, not a shotgun; you want to cast vision with your target audience in mind, not just throw out whatever cool stories you have. After you share, it’s good to take note of what worked and what didn’t.

Share Out of Your Passion: Good vision casting will affect and pull at your emotions. It may bring you to tears, invoke anger at injustice, feel inspired to do something. You’ve been affected by vision before, and when you cast vision, allow that passion and emotion to come out! Speak with conviction, with anger, with excitement, with joy! Jenn cries often and just says, “Don’t be afraid – I’m a crier.” But those tears highlight the significance of what she’s saying and display the passion she carries.

Cast Vision Often: Take every opportunity to cast vision! Like we said earlier, the vision bucket needs to constantly be refilled. We might take opportunities to cast vision during team meetings, 1-on-1 meetings, ministry trainings, in front of large groups, with supporters, or in recruiting conversations. 

Short and Simple: Vision casts don’t have to be and probably shouldn’t be very long. You aren’t trying to do complicated problem-solving that uses a lot of mind-power, but instead wake up the heart to be motivated to push forward. Sometimes vision casts might be the length of a seminar or longer talk, but most times 5-10 minutes will be plenty!

Practice and Get Feedback: If you’re not a natural communicator, that’s OK! Listen to the Holy Spirit, prepare what you want to say, and practice! Even the best vision casters practice! Try out your vision casts in front of a friend and get feedback.

Make It Your Own: Even if you are “stealing” a vision cast from someone else, don’t feel like you need to copy their style. Again, you don’t have to be a “charismatic” speaker in order to vision cast. Do it your way! If you’ve been impacted by vision, let that conviction and passion come out in a way that feels comfortable to you.

Listen to the Holy Spirit!: We mentioned this above, but it cannot be overstated that listening to the Spirit is the best way to make sure your vision cast impacts those that you are communicating to. He knows what your team needs!

It can feel intimidating to put yourself out there and try to inspire, influence, and encourage others towards great and challenging things the Lord has called you towards. But if He has given us this vision to communicate, we can be confident that He will be the one to give us words and to change the hearts of those we lead. This frees you to boldly cast vision, trusting the Holy Spirit to be the one who convicts hearts through your words.

As we head into 2024, here are our top 5 most read posts of 2023!

1. Why Be Barnabas?
2. 625 Days and Talia’s Story
3. Lessons from Cancer: Suffering Leads to Surrender
4. Team Conflict
5. Lessons from Cancer: Surrender the Self to the Point of Death

We have a lot on deck for next year, including the last few posts for the Be Barnabas series, as well as other posts about personal and team thriving. In 2024, we hope to connect with even more missions leaders to learn from and share lessons with; we’d love to connect with you personally! Please reach out at contact@missionsleaders.com. We hope you have a great Christmas / New Year’s season!

We hope this poem from Amy Carmichael will encourage you to continue in the way of Jesus, even through all of the ups and downs.

Thy Way is Perfect by Amy Carmichael

Long is the way, and very steep the slope;
Strengthen me once again, O God of Hope.

Far, very far, the summit doth appear;
But Thou art near, my God, but Thou art near.

And Thou wilt give me with my daily food,
Powers of endurance, courage, fortitude.

Thy way is perfect; only let that way
Be clear before my feet from day to day.

Thou art my Portion, saith my soul to Thee,
Oh, what a portion is my God to me!