I read often about church leaders needing to cast vision. Many experts name this as the most important thing a leader does. All I can say to that is.

No.

That is not what we see in Scripture. Moses’ didn’t cast the vision. The burning bush did. The early church didn’t cast the vision, they were slow to understand where the whole thing was going (outside Jerusalem and Judaism).

The Spirit has to cast the vision. We have to catch the vision together. Leaders lead the way in listening and learning how to catch what the Spirit is casting. You can bet that if we do the casting, what we cast will be worldly, flawed, sinful, with the seeds of its own failure baked right in.

Dear church leader, please stop casting vision and be content to listen to what the Spirit is whispering. Train everyone around you to listen too and together discern where the Holy Wind is blowing and which way to position the sails of your community.

When the Spirit breaks the kingdom into our present, there are three basic markers that always show up. They don’t show up fully and they usually don’t last all that long. Our way of doing things has a way of reasserting itself and pushing the kingdom back. But on the whole, the kingdom advances with each wave as the Holy Spirit takes our world for Jesus. I think it’s helpful to think of these three marks when asking if what we’re up to looks more like the kingdom of Jesus or more like the world (that’s a question church leaders need to ask regularly and much more often than we typically do):

1. Unity – Specifically unity across all the ways we divide people up: age, gender, race, ethnicity, socio-economic status, orientation, physical/mental ability, theology/dogmas, all that. The world separates us into ever smaller categories pushing us further apart. The Spirit draws us in toward each other and breaks down all those barriers. Where the Spirit is at work and the kingdom is coming in, we see a noticeable increase in unity.
2. Freedom – “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” Religion can be so restrictive when it’s representing the world and not the kingdom. When the Spirit blows in, those shackles start falling off. This especially means people within the community find/are given freedom to do what the Spirit lays on their hearts. Some times this creates conflicts and then new communities are formed or people have to move to places where they can fully express the freedom the Spirit gives them. Leaders who are following the Spirit bless these moves and do all they can to foster and protect those freedoms. Leaders too concerned with control or the success of their own projects trample these freedoms and let the world right back in. Still, where the Spirit is at work and the kingdom is coming in, we see a noticeable increase in freedom.
3. Equality – Whenever the kingdom of God breaks in, there is a leveling of all hierarchies. The way the world divides us is often the way the world orders us too, so those same undone categories show up here. Women get to fully lead in the kingdom. Young people get to fully lead in the kingdom. Poor people get to fully lead in the kingdom. Anyone we would call a ‘minority’ in the U.S. (e.g., race, ethnicity, orientation, ability) gets to fully lead in the kingdom. And those who lead under the Spirit’s move are filled with a humility (yes, this is a gift and charism of the Spirit) and begin to really understand what Jesus meant by washing feet in John 13 and talking about leaders being servants. In bringing in the kingdom, the Spirit brings a new mode of authority and at the same time condemns all worldly forms of power (which are always coercive, violent, divisive, and destructive). The equality the Spirit brings gives life. The power of the world deals death. Where the Spirit is at work and the kingdom is coming in, we see a noticeable increase in equality.

If we see unity, freedom, and equality growing in our communities of faith, the Spirit is at work and the kingdom is coming in. Where these markers are lacking, something is wrong and needs to be corrected. We should take these as primary indicators of the spiritual health of our communities and leaders. If we will commit to these markers and ask the Spirit to grow them in us and among us, we will experience more of the Spirit and more of the kingdom. If we will add these to the signs and wonders we are looking for and desire to see manifested, the Spirit will bring them and all the rest will follow.