Visionaries
Pastor Sam Degner
We call them “visionaries,” maybe even “prophets.” These are the people who seem to see what’s coming before it’s here. Search “visionary leaders” on the web and you’ll find Henry Ford mentioned for his ability to look past the current method of production and see something better. You’ll find Steve Jobs, who seemed to know what people were going to want in technology before they knew they wanted it.
About seventy years ago, a man named Arnold Toynbee described where he saw Western civilization headed. He anticipated an era of anxiety and infighting, a fractured society with no agreed-upon foundation for truth or justice. Sound familiar? His words sure seem prophetic today!
But Toynbee wasn’t a prophet—at least not in the sense of someone who reveals actual knowledge about the future, like God’s prophets of old. Neither Jobs nor Ford could truly see beyond their day, either. The future is God’s domain alone.
What makes someone a visionary, then, or a prophet in a secular sense, is not that they know the future. I believe it’s that they understand the present and even the past.
I imagine that Henry Ford knew his industry well; he knew its inefficiencies and found a way to fix them. Steve Jobs must have had a knack for knowing what people wanted. Toynbee was a historian; he studied past civilizations and applied the patterns he discovered to his own age. None of these men could see the future any more than you or I. But their insights into the present and past allowed them to lead with vision.
There are visionaries in the church, too. I’m sure you know some. Perhaps you are one. Some people are good at discerning where communities or congregations are headed. God seems to have given certain believers the gift of being able to imagine the future in a way that can inspire others.
But I think it’s also fair to say that any Christian leader can become more visionary with a little work. No one knows the future. But we can strive to better understand the present and the past.
Christian leaders do well to study their context. I think it starts with getting to know the people around you—people you serve, people you work with, people in your community. That means observing them, sure, but mostly it means engaging with them and listening.
It’s also helpful to consider the past. When I was a parish pastor, I was aware that I was not the first man to fill that precious pulpit. The ministry of my congregation didn’t start when I arrived. The congregation and her individual members had a history. They had stories, and I loved to hear them. It helped me understand who they were now and gave me insight into how to serve them in the future.
I’ll admit that I can’t point to a Bible passage or even a scientific study to prove my theory that visionaries are those who know the past and present well. But I know that when God places us in positions of leadership—or in situations or relationships where we can exert influence—we have been given a gift. As redeemed children of God, we want to use that gift for his glory and the furthering of his kingdom—now and into the future. Being aware of what has been and what is now may help us anticipate what is to come.
We do so in all humility, of course. For every Henry Ford or Steve Jobs, there have been countless unknown others whose vision for the future never materialized. For every spot-on prediction many others missed the mark. So, we trust not in ourselves but in the One “who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty.”
This is how Jesus identifies himself in the Revelation he gave to John (1:8). Later he gave him a vision of a scroll containing information about the future (chapter 5). When John saw that no one could open it, he wept—until his gaze was directed to a Lamb looking as if it had been slain, who alone was worthy to open the scroll. Jesus, slain for us, holds the future in his hands. This vision encourages us as we envision how we can lead and serve in the days to come.