Leadership is a popular topic for many pundits. There is a plethora of books and articles available on the subject.

In my study, the pedestrian view is that leadership is the process of helping others to achieve success in life. Success is generally defined in terms of doing one's will according to one's ways. Security, wealth, independence, and self-sufficiency are extolled. These attributes are manifested tangibly in relationships, health, careers, influence, fame, and finances. In other words, the metrics for determining if one is successful are tangible.

But given life’s temporality, are tangible metrics the measure of success?

Consider Jesus, an obscure carpenter turned itinerate teacher and philosopher. When he died in his early thirties, he was penniless, homeless, jobless, rejected by religious leaders, rejected by political leaders, abandoned by his followers, convicted as a criminal, and gleefully executed by his enemies. Before Jesus’ execution, the governor offered to pardon Jesus but his opponents pressured the governor to pardon instead an insurrectionist and murderer.

Was Jesus a success?

Clearly, Jesus was not a success according to the conventional definition based on tangible metrics. But if you know Jesus as your Savior and Lord, you know that he was the greatest success who ever lived because God has a different definition of success and uses different metrics.

The common definition of success is man centered—doing man's will according to man's ways—and is measured by tangible metrics. God's definition of success is God centered—doing God's will according to God's ways—and is measured by intangible metrics. God's metric for defining and measuring success is obedience and alignment with himself. Jesus sought to live in this reality. Hence, he made statements like the one above in John 4:34.

Jesus' purpose in life was simple—to do the will of God according to the ways of God. His virtues were not human oriented, but rather his virtues were God oriented. Some of his virtues were humility, service, selflessness, obedience, and sacrifice. Jesus' only agenda in every decision in life was to do the will of God according to the ways of God. Jesus' success was manifested by leading people into obedience to the will and ways of God. He accomplished this by healing others, walking in his career calling, transforming those given to him by the Father, disdaining personal fame and desiring God's fame, and viewing money as simply a tool to obey the Father. This is real success. This is real leadership.

Here is your business tip. Leadership that transforms is not defined in terms of tangible metrics based on man's will and ways. This type of leadership will, at best, have only temporal success. Real leadership is about eternal success. It is about modeling and guiding others into living to do the will of God according to the ways of God in every area of life. The only true metric of success is obedience to and alignment with God. Any human-centered definition of success will, in the end, fail. Genuine leaders produce transformation in people and organizations because they facilitate alignment with the will and ways of God, which produces God-centered success both now and into eternity.