Honoring Leadership

To succeed as a leader, you must honor. Honor those who have gone ahead of you. Honor those who have paved the way for you. Honor those who have taken a chance on you. Honor those that are older. Honor those that are younger. An honoring leader is a maturing leader.

Honor is a huge bullet point under the subject of leadership, but I want to share just one way to honor that I’ve recently learned and practiced.

Over the past few years, God has graced me with opportunities to speak to and serve with some of my biggest role-models. And one huge way I’ve learned to honor them is to simply take their advice. That’s it, take their advice. Simple, right? Wrong. Believe it or not, it’s not the easiest thing to take advice from someone else. Especially when it has to do with your passion, your calling, your gift or talent.

When I think of taking advice, I think of the book of Luke, chapter 5. Some of the first disciples were about to be called. Jesus advises Simon Peter, an experienced fisherman, to go out for a catch. What Peter tried explaining to Jesus was that they already tried catching fish the night before and failed. They were done, cleaning up shop, most likely disappointed and discouraged by their lack of fish. And here comes Jesus:

4) When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Now go out where it is deeper, and let down your nets to catch some fish.” 5) “Master,” Simon replied, “we worked hard all last night and didn’t catch a thing. But if you say so, I’ll let the nets down again.” 

“Oh right, like it’s that easy, Jesus. Really? Just go out a little deeper and we’ll somehow magically catch fish. Right.” That’s probably what I would’ve said. But Peter was a little more gracious with his words than I would have been and therein lies my example. Peter took His advice, “But if you say so…” It was hard advice to take, but he took it nonetheless and in so doing experienced a great pay-off: they caught a lot of fish.

There’s obviously a lot of discrepancies in my comparison, but the general idea is there. Peter humbled himself, took the advice of someone who knew a little more than him and experienced great reward. Fishing was Peter’s passion. It’s what he did for a living, it’s what he was good at. This wasn’t advice that was easy to take and apply for Peter. There was some major pride-swallowing going on here. Here’s another way to look at it:

You know those people that always have an answer for everything? You throw out some knowledge or wisdom, perhaps unsolicited, and they’ve either already done that or don’t want to because of this, that and the other. What do you do with people like that? You stop giving them advice. You start mentoring someone else, giving your wisdom to someone who’ll actually receive it and apply it. Your relationship with them is hindered because of their non-receptive attitude.

Don’t be that non-receptive person. Don’t be that person who has an answer for everything. It might be the very thing that you’re great at, but take the advice. Maybe you know without a doubt that their advice is terrible. Try it anyway, you never know. Be humble, be receptive, be “mentor-able.” Honor those who have paved the way, who have gone before, who have put in more hours than you and take their advice. In so doing, you’ll reap great reward. I know Peter did!

Thanks for reading!