Power is one of the most significant and most dangerous gifts available to human beings. Scripture treats it with consistent seriousness — not as something to be avoided, but as something that reveals character more reliably than almost anything else.
The Mistaken Assumption
Power is a tool. In the right hands, it produces good outcomes. The problem with power is not power itself but who holds it. Give good people enough power and they will fix what is wrong. The solution to the misuse of power is better power-holders.
What Scripture Actually Shows
Scripture is far more cautious than this. Saul began as a humble man and was corrupted by the kingship. Solomon’s wisdom did not protect him from the corrupting influence of power and wealth. The disciples argued about who was greatest immediately after Jesus had taught about servant leadership — and Jesus corrected them not by rearranging the power structure but by redefining power entirely (Mark 10:42-45). Power in Scripture is consistently described as a test — one that most people fail, not because they were bad to begin with, but because power exposes and amplifies what is already present, and what is present in fallen human nature is not reliable.
Why This Feels Hard
We want to believe that the right leadership solves the problem. It is easier to believe that the issue is who holds power than to accept that the concentration of power is itself a structural problem regardless of who holds it. But Scripture’s consistent witness is that the test of power is one of the hardest tests there is — and that the solution is not finding the right person to pass it, but building structures that limit how much of it any person can accumulate.
What Faith Looks Like Here
Christians engaging with power — whether they hold it, are subject to it, or are trying to influence it — are called to hold it with open hands, exercise it as service rather than possession, and build in accountability rather than resist it. The leader who seeks no accountability is already failing the test. The one who builds in structures that could remove them is closer to the biblical model of servant leadership than almost anything else the political world produces.