How can ministry leaders avoid landmines in ministry and continue to thrive through long years of pouring themselves out for serving others? Most know that spiritual flourishing can only happen as they live wholeheartedly for Christ, but leaders can easily be sabotaged by functional idols—unconscious commitments that result in an endless cycle of sinful, self-defeating behaviors. In The Spiritually Healthy Leader: Finding Freedom from Self-Sabotage, Dave Wiedis, the Founder of ServingLeaders Ministries, exposes the root causes of decline in spiritual health and offers the path to deep life transformation, freedom in Christ, and deliverance from self-destructive choices.
Based on many years of experience counseling Christian leaders, Wiedis understands the pressures of ministry and wisely guides leaders to depend on Christ. Wiedis helps pastors, counselors, and teachers uncover what is functionally most important to them, understand how these core commitments, or “ruling passions,” can hijack their lives, marriages, and ministries, and gently guides them to grow in their passion for God.
Q: Briefly introduce us to yourself and your work with ServingLeaders Ministries. How did your work lead you to write The Spiritually Healthy Leader?
Over many years I have witnessed the devastation that results from a lack of pastoral care for ministry leaders. I created ServingLeaders Ministries to provide many services to ministry leaders and the wider church, including counseling, training workshops, pastoral cohorts, staff assessments, and retreats. We also provide relational mediation services when there are relational ruptures in churches, families, and businesses.
Over the last eighteen years, I have counseled many ministry leaders who struggle with self-sabotage—acting against their own interests, the interests of those they love, and their relationship with God. I wanted to understand why they (and we all) struggle with behavior that is antithetical to the calling of God on our lives and keeps us from cultivating greater intimacy with God. I wrote the book to provide a personal guide for anyone who seeks to understand their ongoing personal battles and provide a clear path to healing that ends in self-sabotage.
Q: What do our passions reveal about what we value? How is our spiritual health connected to our passions?
Jesus taught us the profound truth, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21 ESV). We develop passions for what is most important to us.
Many believers gauge their spiritual health by superficial signs: consistent prayer, Bible reading, church involvement, or theological knowledge. These are all good things, but they don’t necessarily reflect the true condition of the heart. After years of counseling ministry leaders, reflecting on Scripture, and examining my own weaknesses and sinful tendencies, I’ve come to believe that our spiritual health is accurately measured by answering two questions: What are you most passionate about? What are your ultimate commitments? The answers to these questions will have a huge impact on one’s life, ministry, and relationships and will ultimately reveal the idols of our heart, or what I refer to as our “ruling passions.”
Q: What is a ruling passion and how do we identify them?
A ruling passion is what we most ardently pursue above all other things. It is a deep, sometimes unconscious desire that governs our decisions, shapes our responses, and fuels our pursuits. Ruling passions are distinct from interests or even enthusiasm because they define our ultimate commitments in life and are foundational “meta-narratives” for our lives.
If you ask most Christians what they are most passionate about, they will say their relationship with God, obeying him, or their commitment to the gospel. However, there is a great disparity between what we claim and the reality of what we love. When we peel back the layers of our heart, we find we are often ultimately committed to being loved, successful, unique, safe, in control, or receiving affirmation, respect, or acceptance.
These desires aren’t inherently wrong. In fact, they reflect the God-given longings and desires of the human heart that reside deep in our souls. These longings—for protection, peace, security, intimacy, purpose, happiness, and impact—point to the way God has wired us to find him, the One we worship and who satisfies our souls. But when these desires become ultimate—more important than obeying or loving God and others—they become functional idols and will inform and control the decisions we make, the way we relate to others, and the way we live our lives. Our ruling passions will inevitably interfere with our relational intimacy with God and sabotage our lives.
In The Spiritually Healthy Leader, I challenge readers to do the deep, internal work of identifying their ruling passions and responding in a godly, biblical manner to live under the lordship of Christ in every area of life.
Q: Could you share some biblical examples of leaders who struggled with a ruling passion? What can we learn from their stories? By contrast, what can we learn from Paul’s better example?
Peter was one of the apostles who was closest to Jesus. He had one of the most remarkable spiritual resumes of all time: an eyewitness when Jesus performed miracles, present on the Mount of Transfiguration, the first to identify Christ as Messiah, and courageously preached on the day of Pentecost when over three thousand people came to salvation. Most important, in Acts 10 Peter has a vision in which God told him to never discriminate against Gentile believers.
But what happens when Peter is given the task to love the Gentile believers in the Galatian churches and to bring unity between them and the Jewish believers? He blows it because he has the ultimate commitment or ruling passion of self-protection. Galatians 2:11–14 tells us that he was embarrassed to be seen with the Gentiles and withdrew from them out of fear of the Jews from whom he wanted to garner respect! This is astounding because this is the apostle Peter, not a new convert!
In contrast, the apostle Paul had a ruling passion for the supremacy of Christ alone. He says, “for me to live is Christ, to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21) and he lived that out.
Q: You write, “The degree to which we are not aware of our motivations is the degree to which we can be dangerous to others.” Can you explain what you mean by this?
As a driving motivation of our hearts, we will act consistent with our ruling passions, and they will permeate most, if not all aspects of our lives. As fallen, sinful beings, we are masterful at manipulating others. If my ruling passion is to gain affirmation, I’ll manipulate others to affirm me. Think about how dangerous that would be if, as a counselor, I unconsciously manipulate my clients to affirm me. When I do that, I’m serving myself, and not my client. I would be acting in mybest interest and not my client’s. That means I may avoid asking certain questions or exploring areas of their lives that would be in their best interest. That is dangerous.
Q: How do our ruling passions impact those around us?
Our ruling passions will inevitably hurt those around us, especially those closest to us. Peter’s ruling passion for self-protection hurt the Gentile believers in his church and created dissension. Peter’s ruling passion influenced Barnabas to engage in the same behavior.
If I have a ruling passion to never be rejected, that will permeate my life and I’ll build a wall around myself so that others, particularly those closest to me, will be shut out.
If my ruling passion is to be in control, I’ll try to take charge of most of the situations I’m in. This can make me critical, conniving, or dominating. No one wants to be around someone like that!
Q: How can a ruling passion sabotage our ministries? Are there warning signs to watch for?
Key questions to ask are: What am I willing to do to fulfill my ruling passions? and Am I willing to cross moral boundaries, hurt, manipulate, or use other people to get my ruling passions fulfilled? If you find yourself slipping into this behavior, it is a big warning sign.
For example, if I have a ruling passion to be respected, appreciated, and valued, if I am not respected or appreciated in my marriage the way I long to be, and I am willing to cross boundaries to have these fulfilled, perhaps I will have an affair or operate out of impure motives and manipulation to get the respect I long for.
Q: In your book you say “You can’t fully serve God and make your own goals or agenda an ultimate priority at the same time. These two goals are mutually exclusive.” Can you unpack that?
If Jesus is fully Lord of my life, then my obedience to him can’t be conditional. If my ruling passion is anything other than the supremacy and lordship of Christ in my life, then he is not fully Lord. For example, if my ruling passion is to be safe and comfortable, what happens when God calls me to go into situations that are unsafe or uncomfortable? My ruling passion, not what he calls me to do, will dictate my actions.
Q: Why did you include a section in the book about processing emotions? How does that relate to healing? How can leaders process their emotions in godly, healthy ways?
Emotions are largely misunderstood in the evangelical world, and many do not have a sound biblical theology of emotions. In fact, many Christians seem to have an allergic reaction to even acknowledging negative feelings and they believe they are sinning if they feel angry, sad, or anxious. Being able to process emotions in a godly, healthy way helps us to cultivate intimacy with God, heal from difficult, painful wounds, and engage in deep repentance.
When we have been traumatized, hurt, or sinned against, it is appropriate to feel the painful impact of what has happened to us. To do otherwise is to deny an essential aspect of being human. We were not designed to act as if our wounds never happened, nor should we superficially recite Scripture as an incantation to bypass or erase our pain. Most of our ruling passions arise from intensely painful or pleasurable experiences. A vital part of being spiritually healthy is to wisely tend to our wounds and to process the experiences that gave rise to our wounds. We do that by both viewing our experiences through the lens of God’s sovereignty and by processing our emotions in a way that honors God and understands the impact of the gospel in our lives.
Q: How can God redeem our passions? Why do you emphasize viewing our past wounds, pain, and even traumas through a biblical lens?
God is a God of redemption. He can take the worst parts of ourselves—the ugly, foolish, and sinful choices we have made and the past abuses that we have suffered—and redeem them. We can come to God and ask him to transform the desires of our hearts and renew us in the gospel. I lay out a clear path in the book. Briefly, we need to:
- Identify our ruling passions and honestly confess them to the Lord.
- Ask for God’s help to reorder our desires so that Christ is our supreme ruling passion.
- Pursue healing of the wounds from the painful experiences out of which our ruling passions arose. This means that we can’t ignore the past but must go back to those wounds and experiences to process them through a biblical lens. We need to see God’s sovereign hand in our life and emotionally process what has happened.
- Fully understand our stories and the redemptive arc of our lives. In the book, I provide a personal plan for transformation that includes a detailed set of questions that help readers understand their stories, the context in which their ruling passions arose, and how they can impact their lives. Counselors and pastors can use this as a model for helping clients and congregants understand their stories.
Q: What advice would you give to leaders who feel stuck in cycles of self-sabotage?
I would encourage leaders to come honestly before the Lord, identify exactly what they’re longing for, and understand that God is the only one who can satisfy their souls. It is vitally important to understand that you’re not alone and that help is available. Don’t isolate yourself but turn to good friends, counselors and others who come alongside you.
That’s the reason why ServingLeaders Ministries exists.
The Spiritually Healthy Leader
Most ministry leaders don’t usually implode from outside pressures; rather, they are most often incapacitated from their inner struggles. Dave Wiedis, the Founder of ServingLeaders Ministries, helps pastors, counselors, and teachers uncover what is functionally most important to them, understand how their core commitments or “ruling passions” can hijack their lives, marriages, and ministries, and gently guides them to grow in their passion for God.
