The Effect of Spiritual Leadership on the Spiritual Growth of Youth

Benny Hutahayan

Administration Science Faculty, Brawijaya University, Malang, Indonesia

Keywords: Leadership, Spiritual, Growth, Youth.

Abstract: The development of the increasingly rapid digital era today has affected the spiritual life of humans, especially

youth. The life of Christian youth should be a life characterized by growth or development. When young

people go into the process of maturity, especially their spiritual growth, they need a leader with a spiritual

soul that will become a role model and a guide to his life. So that over time and the times, the existence of

leaders are always needed in human life, and has always been an exciting topic to discuss. This spiritual

leadership is highly expected in a church leader. This is because church leaders have a big role as a driver and

the driver of the spiritual growth of Christian youth in the church. This study aims to determine the effect of

spiritual leadership on the spiritual growth of youth. The sample in this study was GBKP Cililitan youth, East

Jakarta, which numbered 130 people. The analytical method used is regression analysis. Spiritual leadership

has a positive influence on the spiritual growth of young GBKP Cililitan. The spiritual growth of youth will

increase if accompanied by good spiritual leadership.

1 INTRODUCTION

The development of the increasingly rapid digital era

today has affected the spiritual life of humans.

Especially the spiritual life of Indonesian youth,

which is currently very worrying, where the rampant

cases of juvenile delinquency such as drug abuse,

extramarital pregnancy, youth brawls, drunkenness

are a few examples of youth social problems faced by

the Indonesian people today.

Christian youth is no exception also contributing

to cases of social problems. The young man's spiritual

life needs to be changed drastically through a real

action from all parties, not just the youth but parents

and the church. When young people go into the

process of maturity, especially their spiritual growth,

they need a leader with a spiritual soul that will

become a role model and a guide to his life. So that

over time and the times, the existence of leaders is

always needed in human life. Gordon Thomas states

that in every aspect of human life always requires a

leader. The state has a leader, the company has a

leader, a group organization has a leader, so does the

church also has a leader.

Leadership is simply referred to as influence,

where there is influence so leadership is there. A

leader will be more perfect if equipped with a spiritual

soul in him. Spiritual leadership means leadership

that is under the influence of God and God's power.

Spiritual leadership is an attitude, and the behaviors

and values that exist in a leader so that they are able

to motivate themselves and others.

In this study it is suspected that spiritual

leadership factors will affect the spiritual life of the

youth. This research was conducted on the young

Protestant Batak Karo Church (GBKP) Cililitan.

Youth GBKP is an integral part of the body of the

church with all its existence as an important

institution in fostering church youth in addition to

small children's institutions, maternal institutions and

fathers' institutions. The role of the youth as the

successor to God's work that is very central in the

future is the reason why this paper was made to

understand how the GBKP youth can grow spiritually

by examining the spiritual leadership of the pastor

and his instructor.

2 LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Spiritual Leadership

Spiritual leadership can be interpreted as leadership

under the influence of God and the power of God.

Sanders defines spiritual leadership as the ability to

influence others not with attractive personalities, but

with a spirit-filled person. Something of spirit nature

is difficult to understand, and of course humans must

Hutahayan, B.

The Effect of Spiritual Leadership on the Spiritual Growth of Youth.

DOI: 10.5220/0008435006570661

In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Inclusive Business in the Changing World (ICIB 2019), pages 657-661

ISBN: 978-989-758-408-4

657

obey and be responsible for what God gives to leaders

who function to lead others by emulating responsible

spiritual leadership.

Louis W. Fry defines spiritual leadership as follows:

“The values, attitudes, and behaviors required to

intrinsically motivate one’s self and others in order to

have a sense of spiritual survival through calling and

membership i.e., they experience meaning in their

lives, have a sense of making a difference, and feel

understood and appreciated”.

Spiritual leadership aims to motivate and inspire

through the creation of a vision and culture based on

altruistic values to produce workers who have

organizational commitment and productivity.

Spiritual leadership variables can be measured by

dimensions and indicators that refer to and adopt from

Louis W. Fry's book. Dimensions of Leader Values,

Attitudes, and Behaviors are measures of spiritual

leadership that can be seen through the following

indicators; Vision, Hope and Altruistic Value.

Dimensions of Spiritual Welfare are measures of

spiritual leadership that can be seen through the

following indicators; Feelings Appreciated and

Understood. Dimensions of Organizational

Outcomes can be seen through Organizational

Outcomes.

2.2 Youth Spiritual Growth

The word growth means a condition that is growing

or developing. The spiritual word means relating to

the spirit. Spiritual growth begins with the existence

of spiritual formation. The word "Spiritual

Formation" in English is "Spiritual Formation";

which comes from the word "spiritual" (spiritual),

meaning things related to religion / spirituality while

"formation" (formation) which means is an action that

can give shape to something. So literally, the term

Spiritual Formation is defined as the action taken to

give shape to spirituality and growth.

Spiritual Life God's people must grow, because

that is God's will for His people (Col. 2: 6-7, I Pet. 2:

1-5, etc.). Strength and power (dynamic & power) to

grow come from God (Romans 1: 16-17).

According to Tomatala Yakob, the basis of the

spiritual life of Jesus Christ is reconciling God with

humans through His death (1: 21,22), releasing from

the power of sin, entering into the kingdom of God,

having the redemption of Christ (1: 13-14; 2: 13 -15),

giving part of His work to those who believe (2:20; 3:

1a).

Spiritual growth is a process of growth from a

pure baby to spiritual maturity characterized by

characters that are increasingly similar to the

character of Christ. Spiritual growth is also

characterized by an increase in closer relationships

with God, so that he knows him better. Spiritual

growth will last a lifetime, and according to the

teachings of the Bible, where someone who has

believed in the Lord Jesus, should not stop only at the

level of trust, but must grow older, toward perfection

in Christ.

In the Big Indonesian Dictionary, youth are young

men; teenagers; cadets. But even so youth not only

focuses on men but also includes attitudes and

behavior of women. According to Richardson and

Raines, Youth is a time when many young people

decide their way of life and make important decisions

in their lives. Mary Go Setiawan categorizes young

people from 18 to 24 years.

GBKP Cililitan has a categorical partnership for

youth called PERMATA GBKP. The youth who

joined the PERMATA GBKP Cililitan was a young

man aged 18 years until he married / married.

Based on the explanation of several figures above,

it can be concluded that youth is a group of people

who have a passion and passion that is burning and

proactive in developing their abilities or potential, so

that they begin to experience many changes both

physically, mentally, socially, emotionally, and

spiritually. Because youth are in the process of

development towards self-discovery and maturity.

Youth is a wonderful time to serve, time to work

and produce works for God. Humans can and have the

capacity to be relied upon in service in the midst of

the church and society. The presence of youth in the

church is not to be served but to serve, not to be loved

but to love, not to be pityed but to feel sorry. Youth

services are not just worshiped every week, choir or

vocal group, but young people want to serve, because

that is what God wants from young people in today's

youth. Youth is not a barrier for us to participate in

ministry, taking responsibility for the calling of three

churches, namely fellowship, witnessing and serving.

The Apostle Paul said, "Let no one consider you

inferior because you are young." (1 Tim. 4: 12a).

If traced in the Bible, it can be seen the way God uses

young people to speak the truth. Yusuf, who was used

by God through his evil and ironic goals from his

brothers in his youth, was the first person used by God

to become the leader of the nation even outside of his

own people.

When the Israelites entered the promised land,

Joshua was the one who had to lead them easily. The

twelve disciples of Jesus were young people. They are

mostly fishermen, not great figures, but are used to

preach the gospel. even Jesus himself lived for 33

years in the world, Jesus did a ministry task that was

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hard at his young age.

Young people are given energy, talent, and ability not

to satisfy their passions (2 Timothy 2:22), but on the

contrary, to be "an example for believers, in your

words, in your behavior, in your love, in your loyalty

and in your holiness "(1 Timothy 4:12).

Youth need to find God's vision for their lives

because that vision will direct them to the purpose of

life that glorifies God! They need to have a vision of

who God is and the future that is in His hands for

them. They also need to have sensitivity about what

God's call (purpose) is for them.

Based on these explanations, it can be concluded

that the spiritual growth of youth is a process of

growing youth towards spiritual maturity

characterized by characters that are increasingly

similar to the character of Christ.

Dimensions and Indicators of Youth Spiritual

Growth refer to and adopt from Ellyazer Pada’s and

Muliadi Firmanto’s research. Based on the lattice of

the instrument, a research instrument in the form of a

questionnaire will be designed. The process

dimension is a measure of the development of

spiritual growth which can be seen through the

following indicators: Repentance, Change and Adult.

Dimensions of Holiness can be seen through the

following indicators such as Mind, Word and Action.

Dimensions of Serving is a measure of spiritual

growth that can be seen through the willingness to

help prepare something that is needed by the

congregation and fellow human beings, which is

characterized by the following indicators such as

commitment and time.

2.3 GBKP Cililitan

The first gospel message to the Karo area was the

touch of God's hand to convey the message of

Salvation to the Karo community. The presence of the

first Evangelist in the Karo area was divided into two

periods by the DGI Research and Study Institute. The

initial period began in 1890-1906. The second period

was called the Planting and Cultivation period,

starting in 1906-1940.

Structurally, the church has an arrangement that

includes all members of the church and special

servants at its level and has a body of workers as a

small group unit, which is tasked with regulating

services in its area. The following levels are in the

Protestant Batak Karo Church are Moderamen,

Classification, Church or Shelter.

PERMATA GBKP is one of the categorical

fellowships for the GBKP Youth. The presence of

PERMATA GBKP in the middle of the GBKP is a

sign of God's loyalty to the continuity of His church

in the midst of this world. PERMATA GBKP is also

a present and future congregation that always has to

prepare itself and try to understand the call to witness,

fellowship and serve from God for each of them so

that they manifest God's will in the midst of the

church, family, society, nation and country. In its

services, PERMATA GBKP has several forms of

work programs including: a. Guidance Fields, such as

Bible Studies (PA), Bible Studies, Choir Training,

and others.; b. Field of consolidation, such as

Christian Leadership Cadre Training (LK3)

PERMATA GBKP, Deliberation / Session / Meeting,

Procurement of Data Center GEM Information

Center GBKP, and others.; c. Field of Participation,

such as Sports Week, Celebration - Church Holidays,

PERMATA Go Green, Social Action, and others.; d.

Finance, such as Routine Subsidies, Membership

Contributions for PERMATA GBKP, Financial

Sessions / Report-Rabel Preparation and Monitoring

of Funds Flow / Financial Flow PERMATA.

3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1 Framework

Based on the study of the theory above, the

framework is "Spiritual Leadership (X) influences the

spiritual growth of youth (Y)". Based on this

framework, researchers devised a paradigm thinking

"The spiritual leadership of the GBKP Cililitan

church has an influence on spiritual growth for young

church people."

3.2 Method

The research method used in this study is a

quantitative method. Measurement of variables using

research instruments in the form of questionnaires, so

that quantitative data obtained that are numerical in

nature. Thus, the process of data analysis can be done

with a quantitative approach by applying one method

of statistical analysis, namely regression analysis.

3.3 Hypothesis

Based on the framework, the following hypothesis is

proposed:

Hypothesis 0: Allegedly spiritual leadership does

not affect the spiritual growth of church youth.

Hypothesis 1: Allegedly spiritual leadership

influences the spiritual growth of church youth.

The Effect of Spiritual Leadership on the Spiritual Growth of Youth

659

3.4 Data Collection

The location of this study is the Church of GBKP

Cililitan. The GBKP Cililitan Church is located on Jl.

Mayjen Sutoyo No. 6, RT.1 / RW.8, Cililitan,

Kramatjati, East Jakarta City, Jakarta Special Capital

Region. Data collection is carried out in February

2019.

3.5 Sample

The population of this study was the youth in the

Church of GBKP Cililitan. The youth in question is a

member of PERMATA GBKP Cililitan. The sample

is a portion of the population, where the sample

consists of as many members selected from the

population. The sampling technique used in this study

was a nonprobability sampling technique in the form

of saturated sampling. Saturated sampling technique

was chosen because all members of the population

were eligible to be selected and used as research

samples. The sample unit in this study was the youth

of GBKP Cililitan. The number of samples taken was

130 people.

4 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The responses from the questionnaire and regression

analysis were analyzed using SPSS version 22.0. A

simple regression analysis was used with the

following model:

𝑌 = 𝛽

+ 𝛽

𝑋 + 𝜀 (1)

With Y is a dependent variable, in this study is the

spiritual growth of youth, and X is spiritual

leadership. The hypotized model of this study was

tested using simple regression analysis with SPSS

version 22.0. The results are shown in Table 1.

Table 1: Simple regression analysis result.

Unstandardized

Variable

coefficient

Sig.

24.3

5.079

4.79

0.00

0.28

Constant

Spiritual

0.56

0.080

7.06

0.00

Leadership

From the results of simple regression analysis it

can be concluded that spiritual leadership has a

significant effect on spiritual growth. The regression

model formed is:

𝑌 = 24.372 + 0.565𝑋 (2)

This model explains that without any influence of

spiritual leadership, the spriritual growth of youth in

GBKP Cililitan would be 24.372, and with the

influence of spiritual leadership, each increase in

spiritual leadership, will increase the spiritual growth

of GBKP CIlilitan youth by 0.565. This shows that

there is a significant positive relationship between

spiritual leadership to the spiritual growth of youth in

GBKP Cililitan.

Model (2) produces an R2 value of 0.280. The

ability of spiritual leadership variable in explaining

the diversity of the spiritual growth variables is

28.0%, while the remaining 72.0% is explained by

other variables not included in the model.

5 CONCLUSIONS

This study aimed to determine the effect of spiritual

leadership on the spiritual growth of youth. The

sample in this study was GBKP Cililitan youth, East

Jakarta. The analytical method used is a simple

regression analysis. Spiritual leadership has a positive

influence on the spiritual growth of young GBKP

Cililitan. The spiritual growth of youth will increase

if accompanied by good spiritual leadership.

The R2 value of this model can be said to be quite

low. This can be caused by the influence of other

variables on spiritual growth that are not included in

this research model. This can be a suggestion for

further research to add other independent variables..

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