Identifying Good Leadership

We live in what my wife calls "a season of almost right." It's an age where spiritual deception doesn't sound like deception — it sounds credible. It sounds like truth, wisdom, even prophecy. But scratch beneath the surface, and it isn't sound doctrine at all.

That's the danger the church at Corinth faced. False apostles had moved in behind Paul, preaching "another Jesus" and "a different gospel" (2 Corinthians 11:4) — and the church, Paul says, "put up with it."

So the question worth asking is: how do you actually know when you're under good leadership? Here are three indicators, straight out of 2 Corinthians 11.


1. Competence and Knowledge

The apostles who arrived in Corinth after Paul left came in ranking spiritual gifts and comparing credentials — whose seminary, whose pedigree, whose stage presence was more impressive. Paul's response in 2 Corinthians 11:5-6 is pointed: he may be "untrained in speech," he says, but he is not untrained "in knowledge."

Good presentation can never substitute for competence and knowledge. A leader can have the lights, the production, the personality — but if there's no substance underneath it, the word isn't doing its work. As Paul tells Timothy, a "good minister of Jesus Christ" is one who stays nourished in "the words of faith and of good doctrine" (1 Timothy 4:6).

That means a good leader is still consuming the Word themselves — not just serving it up. You can't live off your own cooking. If a leader isn't sitting under someone else's teaching, growing, staying sharp, that's worth noticing.


2. Humility and a Willingness to Serve

Paul made a deliberate choice in Corinth: he worked a job and preached for free, refusing to let money get in the way of the gospel. It cost him status. The "super-apostles" who came in behind him took payment and expected honor. Paul chose to lower himself — the word literally means to reduce in height, to level out — so he could stand alongside the people he was serving rather than above them.

That's the model Jesus gave his disciples directly: "he who is greatest among you, let him be as the younger; and he who governs, as he who serves" (Luke 22:26). Good leadership isn't measured by how leaders are served, but by how willingly they serve — even when it costs them comfort, image, or income.


3. A Willingness to Oppose Spiritual Deceit

This is the point Paul gets most direct about: "such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ. And no wonder! For Satan himself transforms himself into an angel of light" (2 Corinthians 11:13-14). False teachers don't announce themselves as false. They come sounding like the real thing.

A good leader doesn't just avoid preaching error — they're willing to name it when they see it, even when it's unpopular, even when a crowd loves what's being said. And good leadership includes accountability from the inside, too: godly deacons and elders exist not just to support a pastor's vision but to protect the church, holding even their own leader to sound doctrine.


The Real Test

None of this is about style. A leader might not preach the way you'd expect, might not have the polish or the platform of someone else — that's not what matters. What matters is whether they're staying nourished in the Word themselves, whether they're leading by serving rather than being served, and whether they're willing to stand against what sounds right but isn't.

This teaching is adapted from Bishop Eddie Gross's message "Identifying Good Leadership," available in full as an audio message above.