Motivation: Know who you’re trying to please. Leaders, you need to settle the issue of motivation. You can’t please everybody. Just about the time you get one person happy, you’ll tick someone else off. Jesus lived for an audience of One. His whole purpose was to please his heavenly Father. Jesus says this in John 5 and 6; “I do not seek My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me” (John 5:30). “I have come down from heaven, not to do My will, but the will of Him who sent Me” (John 6:38). In other words, Jesus said, “The only one I am trying to please is the One who sent Me.”
Jesus wasn’t trying to win a popularity contest; he just wanted to please God.
That’s a lesson we have to learn as leaders. You’ve got to learn not to care about the opinions of others. You’ve got to focus on God’s opinion of what you’re doing. As a leader you should not pay attention to those who cheer you, for they will make you think you are better than you really are, or those who jeer you, for they will make you think you are not as good as you really are. Either one will sidetrack you.
A mentor of mine told me one time, “Don’t try to please every one, for the moment you do, you will please no one.” Who are you trying to please? Because I am a man of faith, I believe the first person we should try to please is God. We were created to bring glory to Him. I think secondly, we ought to try to please ourselves, not in a hedonistic way, but in a self-respecting way. At the end of the day, do I respect myself? Have I stood for and lived out the values that I hold true? Have I held fast to the vision that I believe God has given me, though some are questioning?
At the end of the day I am most satisfied when I can honestly say, “Today, I held fast to my faith, to my values, and to my vision.”
