Healthy Leaders

Yesterday I attended the second day of the Wesleyan-Methodist Church of New Zealand’s National Conference, albeit only for the last one-and-a-half seminars.

The latter of these was entitled Dealing with Insecurity in Leadership and was led by Rev. Rex Rigby.

To illustrate the point, he opened by describing Moses as compulsive, Solomon as narcissistic, Saul as paranoid, Samson as co-dependent and Jonah as passive-aggressive.

In a very concise talk, he then outlined seven aspects of what he called “healthy leaders”:

1. Healthy leaders deal with their hurts.

2. Healthy leaders are authentic.

3. Healthy leaders have their own story to tell.

4. Healthy leaders commit to personal growth. (including by being accountable)

5. Healthy leaders look after those around them.

6. Healthy leaders look after themselves and their families.

7. Healthy leaders flourish, and those around them flourish.

He also said that a leader’s first call was to ask God to change him/herself, not others.

Today I was pleased to find that, while he was in town, he was also to speak at my church about Joseph.


I was honoured to be asked to do the reading beforehand, so I guess the fact that the following clip is of me, and not him, could potentially make me narcissistic…

Genesis 37:1-9