David's mighty men did not start out mighty. Here is what marked them, and what to build in the people you train.

Scripture has a name for the kind of leaders God raised up around a man like David: mighty men. Not because they were flawless. Most of them came out of caves, debt, and distress before David ever met them. But something in them was being shaped into strength, and Scripture takes the time to describe exactly what marked them.

If you are training leaders, this is worth slowing down for. These are not modern leadership traits. They are ancient ones, and they still describe exactly what to look for and what to build in the people God gives you to train.

Men Who Strengthen Themselves With Their Pastor

These also are the chief of the mighty men whom David had, who strengthened themselves with him in his kingdom, and with all Israel, to make him king, according to the word of the LORD concerning Israel. I Chronicles 11:10; see also II Samuel 23:8-39, I Chronicles 11:10-47, II Timothy 2:1-5

Before David's mighty men were mighty, they made a choice: they strengthened themselves with him. Not against him, not around him, not in competition with him. With him. Second Samuel 23 and 1 Chronicles 11 both record long lists of these men and the specific battles where their courage stood out: individual names, individual stories, remembered because they stood with David rather than apart from him.

This is the first mark of a leader worth training: they align themselves with the vision God has given their pastor or leader, instead of building something separate from it. That does not mean blind loyalty. It means a settled decision to add their strength to what God is already building, rather than starting over on their own.

Men Willing to Be Helpers

Now these are they that came to David to Ziklag, while he yet kept himself close because of Saul the son of Kish: and they were among the mighty men, helpers of the war. I Chronicles 12:1

Notice these men came to David during his hardest season, while he was hiding from Saul, not during his coronation. Scripture calls them helpers of the war, not commanders of the war. They were willing to serve in whatever role was needed, even before there was any glory attached to it.

Watch for this in the people you train. The ones worth investing in are usually not chasing a title. They are the ones willing to show up and help before anyone is watching or applauding, in seasons when the outcome is still uncertain.

Men Worthy of the Battle

And of the Gadites there separated themselves unto David into the hold to the wilderness men of might, and men of war fit for the battle, that could handle shield and buckler, whose faces were like the faces of lions, and were as swift as the roes upon the mountains. I Chronicles 12:8

These men were tested before David ever relied on them. They had already proven, in the wilderness, that they could handle real conflict. Training a leader is not only about giving information. It is about giving them real assignments, real pressure, and watching whether they hold up under it, the same way Jesus tested the twelve after He trained them.

Do not be afraid to let the people you are developing face something difficult. That is often the only way to know whether they are ready for the next battle, and it is often the very thing that makes them ready.

Men Willing to Pay the Price

Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier. II Timothy 2:3-4

Paul does not promise Timothy an easy road. He tells him to endure hardness, and to keep himself from being entangled in lesser things that would pull his focus away from the calling God had placed on him.

Every leader worth training will eventually face a cost, financial, relational, or physical. Some will lose comfort. Some will lose relationships that cannot survive their obedience. Be honest with the people you train about this instead of hiding it from them. A leader who has counted the cost ahead of time will not be shattered when the cost finally comes due.

Men of Compassion

For every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God... Who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way; for that he himself also is compassed with infirmity. Hebrews 5:1-4

This is the mark that keeps everything else from turning hard. A leader can be loyal, willing, tested, and willing to pay the price, and still lack the one thing that makes leadership actually look like Jesus: compassion. The writer of Hebrews reminds us the priest could have compassion on the ignorant and those out of the way precisely because he knew his own weakness.

The strongest leaders I have trained were never the ones who forgot where they came from. They were the ones who remembered their own failures well enough to be patient with someone else's. Train people in strength, but never let them lose their compassion along the way. Without it, strength curdles into harshness.

Where We End Up

Five marks, and not one of them describes a finished product. Every mighty man in David's company started somewhere ordinary, in debt, in distress, discontented, hiding in a cave. God did not wait for perfect men to build His mighty men. He took ordinary men who were willing, and He shaped them over time, alongside a leader willing to invest in them.

That is the whole heart behind this series. You are not waiting to find leaders who arrive finished. You are asking God for men and women He has already begun to touch, watching for them, walking closely enough for them to catch what cannot be taught, leading them at a pace they can sustain, and shaping them, patiently, into people worthy of the battle God has for them.

Start this week. Ask God for one. And when you find them, do not just teach them. Walk with them.

This has been a five-part series on raising up leaders in ministry. If it has been helpful, subscribe to Ministry by Mercy for more from Austin's pen.

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