By Matt Proctor
July 1, 1898. Cuba. Spanish-American War. At the bottom of San Juan Hill, Lt. Col. Teddy Roosevelt straps on his boots and leads his Rough Riders regiment up the hill under fierce Spanish gunfire and on to victory. For his courage, he is posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor in 2001.
June 6, 1944. Normandy, France. World War II. Sitting in a troop transport ship, Brig. Gen. Teddy Roosevelt Jr. prepares to attack the most heavily fortified coast in history. Surely he is thinking of his father. President Roosevelt had instilled in his four boys a passion for life, a sense of duty, and a willingness to lead.
That”s why Teddy Roosevelt Jr. requested to lead the D-Day invasion. At first, his superiors denied his request: “You”re 57 years old. No other general is going ashore with the first wave of troops.”
But he insisted, “It will steady the men to know I”m with them.” So Teddy Jr. strapped on his boots and led the charge up the beach under fierce German gunfire and on to victory. For his courage, he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor posthumously, just like his father.
The legacy of each generation is the leadership of the next.
No Success Without a Successor
Simply put, the greatest gift each generation of leaders can leave is another qualified company of leaders. No matter how impressive your accomplishments, you have only “built to last” if you have prepared those who will continue the work when you are gone. As my high school track coach told my 4-by-800 relay team, “Races are won or lost at the passing of the baton.” There simply is no success without a successor. Journalist Walter Lippman once wrote, “The final test of a leader is that he leaves behind in other men the conviction and will to carry on.”
President Roosevelt understood this. Not only did he show the way up the hill in that “crowded hour,” he also shaped the man in the next generation””his own son””who would show the way up the beach in one of history”s decisive battles.
The apostle Paul understood this. Who knows how many pairs of sandals Paul wore out planting churches all over the Roman Empire, but he knew his ministry was not complete until he had raised up the next generation of church leaders.
It”s no accident his last letter is 2 Timothy. The aged apostle writes the epistle from a prison cell. You might think, Yeah, so? Paul was, like, always in prison. (He was what we would call a “repeat offender.”) But Paul knows this is his last imprisonment (2 Timothy 4:6). His death is imminent, and tragically it appears all his work has been for naught. In 2 Timothy 1:15, he writes, “Everyone in the province of Asia has deserted me.”
So he picks up his pen to write young Timothy, challenging him to take the baton of leadership and run well. This student of Paul”s must carry forward his teacher”s work. As Joshua followed Moses, as Elisha followed Elijah, so Timothy must follow Paul. In 2 Timothy 2:2, the apostle writes, “The things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable men who will also be qualified to teach others.” Paul is saying, “Take the torch of gospel ministry I have handed to you and hand it to others””who, by the way, should also be able to hand it to others.”
In other words, the legacy of each generation is the leadership of the next.
Who”s Your Timothy?
So here”s the burden of this article: we the church must constantly call young (and not-so-young) men and women to consider vocational kingdom leadership.
Solar power is a renewable resource””no matter how much you use there”s always more. Christian leaders, however, are not. It is possible to deplete the supply faster than it is replenished. This means individual congregations must not be consumers only, but also producers of full-time Christian leaders.
When was the last time your church sent someone into ministry? In the last 10 years, have you raised up at least as many vocational Christian leaders as you have had on staff?
The fact is, the church is not called to supply ministers and missionaries at a replacement rate, but a growth rate. The need is not just to keep the current ranks of kingdom leaders filled, but to increase their tribe.
In Matthew 9:37, 38, Jesus said, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” It”s a case of lost and found: because the world is lost, more evangelistic leaders must be found.
So who is your Timothy? Who are you encouraging as a potential vocational Christian laborer? Who will be your legacy? Here are some simple suggestions for becoming more intentional about passing the baton.
“¢ See yourself as a kingdom recruiter. Everyone can do this. A megachurch minister can cast from the pulpit a vision of a tidal wave of students from his church rolling out into ministry. A smaller church minister can seize this as a way of multiplying his church”s influence. God uses elders, youth sponsors, and Sunday school teachers to raise up some of his greatest servants. So take personal initiative.
Bill Beadle was a tractor-driving, overall-wearing good ol” boy. This church elder would say with a grin and a wink, “I”m just an old Iowa farmer, so forgive my grammar. I may say “˜isn”t” when it should be “˜ain”t.”” But after he led a young man in his community to Christ, Bill challenged him to consider full-time ministry. That young man”s name was Seth Wilson, who went on to become the founding academic dean of Ozark Christian College.
“¢ Plant seed-thoughts in the minds of promising leaders. These potential harvest workers might be young people or midcareer people. They might be the brightest students in the youth group, because God”s mission in the world needs the best leaders. Or they might be the “C” students, because God has a habit of choosing unlikely folks to make a big difference (1 Corinthians 1:27). Wherever you find them, plant the idea that God might be calling them to ministry.
Eighty-year-old D. P. Shaffer was still preaching in Conneautville, Pennsylvania, when he heard a first-grader quote a large portion of John 14 in front of the congregation. After the service, D. P. patted the boy”s head and said, “You are going to make a good preacher someday.” That little boy”s name was Bob Russell, who never forgot those words and went on to lead Southeast Christian Church in Louisville, Kentucky, to great growth.
“¢ Support their ministry studies. Leaders must be prepared. Just as the Army has West Point, the church has Bible colleges and seminaries. We as taxpayers underwrite a West Point cadet”s education because we are beneficiaries of his eventual leadership, and it”s fitting that the church supports ministry training schools since she benefits from the leaders they equip.
But it”s also a wonderful encouragement when a congregation helps underwrite a particular student”s education. Wayne Smith once led a young man in the U.S. Army to the Lord and wrote faithfully to him during his enlistment, asking him to consider ministry when he was finished. When he was discharged, he discovered Wayne had already enrolled him at Cincinnati Bible Seminary and paid for his first year”s tuition! That young man”s name was Joe Wright, who went on to a long and fruitful ministry at Central Christian Church in Wichita, Kansas.
“¢ Involve them in ministry now. Take these prospective kingdom workers on mission trips. Give them a leadership role at church. Take them with you on a calling visit. Help them prepare a lesson or sermon. A taste of ministry may whet their appetite for full-time service.
When Christian school principal Larry Leathermon saw preaching potential in a skinny, smart-alecky seventh-grader, he assigned him a topic to preach in the school chapel. That junior higher may be the only person in church history to preach his first sermon on the subject of “Jesus: A High Priest in the Order of Melchizedek”! But that eight-minute, very forgettable sermon lit in his heart a passion to preach that still burns today. That young man was me.
How Immense the Circle
Giving time and energy to raising up a next-generation leader can be difficult. But the investment is worth it! To know you have influenced someone who will go on to influence scores, hundreds, maybe thousands for Christians””that is a great reward.
Someday, I imagine we will meet on the streets of Heaven those whom we personally brought to faith. But what if God allows us to also meet those who inhabit eternity because of the Christian leaders we helped raise? Can you hear the conversations? “Oh, thank you for sending the preacher who brought me the message of Christ.” How great that joy will be!
For 35 years, Henrietta Mears taught the college Sunday school class at the large First Presbyterian Church in Hollywood, California. Five feet 4 inches tall, thickset, with “Coke-bottle” glasses and a deep love for Christ, this passionate woman sent more than 400 young men and women into Christian service. Among those she guided were eventual U.S. Senate Chaplain Richard Halverson, Young Life founder Jim Rayburn, Campus Crusade for Christ founder Bill Bright, and even a young, largely unknown evangelist named Billy Graham.
President Roosevelt raised up a leader for the decisive battle of the 20th century, but Henrietta Mears raised up heroes for the spiritual conflict of the ages. Indeed, the Lord has used her “Timothies” to literally reach millions of people with the gospel. Referring to her students a few years before she died, she said this:
When I get old and decrepit, I”m going to draw myself up to a television and hear my voice speak around the world. It”s just wonderful to think that what we speak and do are translated some way, in a most mystical and marvelous way, to other individuals and they in turn spread it out and out and out until the circle is so immense that we haven”t any idea.1
This unlikely Sunday school teacher passed the baton to a world-changing generation of Christian leaders. With God”s help, you too can leave behind the gift of godly leaders taking the gospel around the globe. Ask the Lord to give you a Timothy. Who knows how immense the circle might someday be?
It”s a legacy worth leaving.
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1Marcus Brotherton, “Teacher”: The Henrietta Mears Story (Ventura: Regal Books, 2006), 145.
Matt Proctor serves as president of Ozark Christian College, Joplin, Missouri.
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