Faithfulness Over Results

Are you focused on proving your worth and controlling results or are you focused on being a faithful steward of what God has given you to manage as a leader? 

Listen to this months episode to be challenged and encouraged about this very real tension Christian leaders face everyday. 

Brandon Wests book 

Transcript

Copy Transcript Copied

0:02

Welcome to the Biblical Leadership at Work podcast. I'm your host, Jason Woodard. You know, as leaders over time, our focus can begin to shift. We step into leadership with good intentions, and we want to serve well. We want to steward what we've been given and we want to honor God in our work. But then the pressure builds. Deadlines, numbers, reviews, expectations, and almost without noticing it, leadership stops being about stewardship and starts becoming about proving, proving competence, proving results, proving that we deserve the role we're in. This shift is subtle, but it's dangerous because once leadership becomes about proving, it changes what we measure, what we chase, and eventually. How we lead. I recently read the following verses and it made me think about this risk that Christian leaders face. It's from one Corinthians four verses one and two. Paul writes, this is how one should regard us as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found faithful. Paul doesn't say effective. He doesn't say impressive, and he doesn't even say successful. He says Faithful. That single word reframes everything. Paul is writing to a church that loved comparison. They compared teachers. They compared personalities. They compared outcomes. Who was more compelling? Who was more gifted? Who people preferred to follow. and instead of defending himself or listing his accomplishments, Paul does something different. He reframes leadership entirely. Don't look at us as owners. Don't look at us as celebrities. Look at us as servants and stewards. Stewards of what Christ has given us to care for and manage, and that distinction matters more than we might realize. An owner measures success by what he gains. A steward measures faithfulness by how well he manages what belongs to someone else. A steward doesn't own the mission. A steward doesn't define success. A steward is accountable for obedience, care, and faithfulness. And once you see leadership that way, you can't unsee it. Here's the tension that every serious leader lives with. You are evaluated by results, but God calls you to faithfulness. You are held accountable for outcomes. You don't fully control. Market shift. Customers change direction. People make decisions you didn't choose. And timing, rarely cooperates. And yet, scripture consistently places the heaviest weight somewhere else, not just on what you produce, but on how you lead, why you lead, and who you are becoming as you lead. That tension is uncomfortable because faithfulness is harder to measure and harder to defend, and harder to explain in a performance driven world. Let me ask you this. When pressure hits, do you ask yourself, how does this make me look? Or who's responsible for this? Or how do I protect my position? Or do you ask yourself, what's mine to own here? What's the faithful response right now? How do I honor God and serve people well in this moment? Do you look for control or do you look for obedience? Do you try to manage perception or do you focus on managing your responsibility? That difference shows up most clearly when things aren't going well. And I've felt this tension as a leader many times. I can think of seasons where the results weren't what we hoped for, where the pressure was real and the questions are coming fast. And in those moments, there's a strong temptation to explain, deflect or point to circumstances to say, well, if this had gone differently or if that person had done their part. But faithfulness often looks like something much quieter. It looks like owning what's yours to own. It looks like telling the truth even when it costs you. In the short term, it looks like staying steady instead of reactive. That kind of leadership doesn't always get immediate applause, but it does build trust and integrity and long-term credibility. These verses confront me personally. There are many things that I don't control and neither do you. I don't control economic conditions. I don't control customer behavior. I don't control how other people respond to leadership, but there are things that I absolutely do control, and so do you. I control my integrity. I control my ownership. I control my tone under pressure. I control whether I tell the truth when it's costly. Faithfulness shows up in very practical ways. It shows up when you make the hard call instead of the popular one. It shows up when you own a miss instead of explaining it away. It shows up when you stay steady, even when quitting would be easier. that kind of leadership. Rarely trends, but it lasts. One of the most clarifying realizations for me has been this one day. I won't give an account for how impressive I looked as a leader. I won't answer how fast we grew. I won't be measured by how visible I was. I won't be judged by how clean the story sounded afterward. I'll give an account for whether I was faithful with what God entrusted to me, and that's sobering, but it's also freeing because it reminds me that while results do matter, they are not ultimate. Faithfulness keeps me grounded when the pressure rises and the metrics start to shout. As I was preparing for this podcast, I kept thinking about a book written by my friend Brandon West titled It's Not Your Business to Succeed. The title alone makes people feel uncomfortable because it cuts straight across how most of us think about leadership. But Brandon's core idea is deeply biblical. Faithfulness is your responsibility. Outcomes belong to God. That does not lower the bar, and it doesn't excuse laziness, and it doesn't minimize excellence. It simply puts leadership back in the right order. You steward what you've been given. You lead with integrity. You do the work in front of you faithfully, especially when the pressure is high and the results aren't yet clear, and then you trust God with what only he controls. That framing has been grounding for me as a leader, and it aligns closely with what Paul is getting at here in one Corinthians four. If this idea resonates with you, I'd encourage you to check out Brandon's book and I'll leave a link to it in the show notes. But here's my challenge for us this month. Identify one leadership responsibility you're carrying right now. One outcome, one decision, or one situation you've been gripping tightly. Something that's been creating pressure. Something that you keep replaying in your mind over and over, something you wish you could control more than you actually can. And ask yourself this question, honestly. Am I trying to control the outcome or am I being faithful with what God has entrusted to me? Then let that question shape how you lead this month. When anxiety rises, be faithful and remember who is sovereign and when the results fluctuate. Be faithful and remember who is sovereign and when the pressure increases. Be faithful and remember who is sovereign. Do the work in front of you with integrity and clarity. Lead the people God has placed in your care. Well tell the truth. Own what's yours? To own and entrust the results to God lead faithfully this month and trust him with the rest. I wanna leave you with these verses one more time. This is how one should regard us as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found faithful. So brothers and sisters, let's be faithful this month.