Developing Biblically Principled Leaders for the 21st Century

Robert W. Bruton
Regent University

It is not surprising that in many third world countries and in the Central and Eastern European countries that are struggling with the residual effects of 50 years of communist domination, the paradigm of leadership that has been internalized by the vast majority of leaders in virtually every facet of society is very authoritarian. That, coupled with a minimal understanding of free market principles by the current generation of senior leaders is making it extremely difficult for many of these countries to make substantial economic and social gains now that they must compete in the global economy. The rising generation of leaders has a much better grasp of free market principles, but they too will internalize the authoritarian leadership model, with all of its moral, ethical and functional weaknesses, unless they are given an alternative. The objective of these 16 seminar modules is three fold: first, to present a program to train English speaking, indigenous, Christian teachers in Biblical principles of leadership so that they are empowered to begin to use them in their own leadership practices and to present this alternative leadership paradigm to the rising leaders of their own nation. The second objective is t o encourage leaders to explore both scripture and scholarly leadership literature to facilitate leadership development. The third objective is to expose leaders to Biblical leadership principles from the history of Christianity as well as from contemporary scholarly work in leadership, where some principles that are consistent with the Biblical model can also be found.