Leadership Essentials: Character

What are we observing in many of you and even in ourselves? Overwhelmed with responsibilities? Most of us have multiple responsibilities and even ministries. Others are just significantly overscheduled,

• leaving you frantic;
• running on empty, lacking resilience;
• experiencing emotions are on edge;
• viewing everything as equally important;
• allowing the urgent to focus your attention,
• expecting that you can’t let anyone down, you have to please others where everyone is your boss.

We are living at a pace our souls were never meant to endure. The noise of constant demands, even good ones, drowns out the still, small voice that restores our peace. We rush from one task to another, carrying the weight of others’ expectations, and somewhere along the way, we begin to lose the quiet confidence that comes from simply being with God. Our hearts crave stillness, yet we fill every moment. We’re doing a lot for Him, but not always with Him.

In this hurried state, we begin to confuse motion with progress and activity with purpose. We tell ourselves that faithfulness looks like exhaustion, that saying “yes” to everyone is the same as saying “yes” to God. But Jesus modeled a different rhythm—one of retreat, prayer, and dependence. He withdrew to lonely places to commune with the Father. He rested. He said “no” to good things in order to remain aligned with the best things. The invitation for us is the same: to return to the quiet, where our souls can be restored and our priorities can be reordered.

Perhaps what God is showing us in our weariness is not how much we’ve failed, but how deeply we need Him. The Shepherd still leads us beside still waters—but we must choose to follow Him there. Rest is not laziness; it’s obedience. Surrendering our pace and our pride, we find that His strength is made perfect in our weakness. From that place of abiding, we can serve again—not out of striving or obligation, but from overflow, refreshed by His Spirit and renewed in purpose.

So maybe the Lord is gently asking us to slow down—not to do less for Him, but to be more with Him.

• To trade the illusion of control for the peace of surrender.
• To let His presence reorder our pace, renew our minds, and remind us that fruitfulness is born out of fellowship, not frenzy.
• When we choose stillness, we rediscover that our worth is not measured by what we accomplish, but by who we are in Christ—beloved, called, and enough.

Reflection Question:
What would it look like this week to step back from striving and let God restore your soul—to serve not from exhaustion, but from overflow?

Leader Characteristics

We train future leaders to fulfill their destiny.

GO MICROGreg Ogden