Category Archives: leadership

Blog post about how to lead yourself and others

controlled power

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I meet with a group of pastors and leaders who are really intentional about developing one another.  We meet one time a month, read books, pray debate and discuss.  It is so helpful to have some high caliber leaders speaking into my life.  I am eternally grateful to these men who spend the time to do this with one another.

A few weeks ago I had a major insight into great leadership traits.  We were talking about gentleness in leadership.  At first gentleness sounds a little weak and conjures up images of some dude getting walked all over in the office, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Gentleness is really about self-control. It is about using the power that you have in a controlled way.   Many leaders could tear someone to shreds with just a few words.  But sometimes restraining your power can have an even greater affect.

I was thinking back to a time when my Pastor (who passed away in September) asked me to have lunch with him one day.  This was a while ago so the details are a little fuzzy, but essentially I had screwed up.  Instead of letting me knowing it and laying into me he restrained the power he had, guiding me through a series of questions that helped me realize I had screwed up.

I appreciated this for a few reasons.  First, It kept our relationship strong and in tact.  Instead of being disciplined and running away with my tail between my legs, we engaged in a thoughtful dialogue on whatever it was I messed up on.  Second, it gave me a model on how to handle conflict and staff issues.  But the main thing I noticed is that the entire encounter was gentle.  There was a sense that power was controlled for the greater good.

I got to thinking about the encounters that Jesus had with his disciples and even the religious elite of the day.  He modeled gentleness in his humility but also in his encounters with others.  God with flesh on could have quite a bit of power, but even from the moment of temptation in the dessert he withheld his power.  Which brings me to this point; the greatest power you can possess is the ability to not exercise it.  Maybe power is found in restraint and self control rather than blatant exercises of power.

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avoiding an arab spring

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There is a really good reason why the “Arab Spring” happened.  It has less to do with politics and more to do with leadership.  Actually, It has everything to do with us as well.  The “Arab Spring” was a backlash against authoritarian leadership.  For years Mubarak and Gaddafi have been leading their people from their positions of power rather than their persuasion abilities.  One of the hardest and most rewarding leadership challenges is leading people when they have the freedom not to follow.  This kind of leadership happens everywhere from governments to churches to organizations and local communities.

The problem with the leaders in the Arab world is that they have been ruling rather than leading, they have been using their positions to dictate that their will be done.  In governments legitimacy is king. You cannot hold your position for long without the people perceiving you as the actual leader.  Some leaders of nations have taken their positions by force, but their countrymen and women do not perceive them as the actual leader, thus the revolution spawns.  If you have to hold onto your position by force, chances are, you are not the legitimate leader.

This is a huge leadership issue.  Who is legitimate?  Who leads with persuasion rather than position?  This leadership principle transcends time and the leadership of just nations.  The issue of legitimacy is relevant in communities, work places and even homes.  Do you lead out of your title or do you lead out of your ability to inspire and walk with people?  Do people follow you because if they don’t there might be consequences, or do they follow you because of a level of trust that has been built up over time?  You can avoid an “Arab Spring” by leading out of your core values and integrity.

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shoulder standers

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I ran on the cross-country team in high school.  I did it originally because it was an easy way to get credits for graduation.   At practice we ran off campus a lot and I had some friends who would get picked up, they would get ice cream or food then, they would get dropped off and run the last quarter mile back to school.   I naturally thought this was amazing.  After about a week of being on the team and running with the slackers at practice we had our first meet.

When the gun went off for the race, something happened in my head.  I was like a horse chomping at the bit to catch every person who was in front of me.  After that race, my coach would never let me go back to the slacker group again.  I ended up coming in 8th place for my school and 5th place for the race.  I steadily took running more seriously and began being a contender in the races.  That was my junior year.

During my senior year, I took running a lot more seriously and I was consistently in the top 5 of our team.  Our team had a group of about 10 runners who got really close.  There were only three seniors on the team and we were advancing well in our brackets.  We even got to CIF prelims, but we were a few minutes shy of advancing to the next rounds of CIF.  Although we won nothing it was great to be a part of a team where individual performance mattered but in the end it was a team effort.  It has been ten years since then but I look back at those days remembering the joy of being on that team.

So today I was sitting in my tax-guys office and he showed me a picture.  The picture was of that team that went to CIF.  A much skinnier version of me was in that picture.  He said, “do you know that the cross-country team has been major contenders for CIF almost every single year since you graduated?”  I didn’t know that.  He said that whenever the coach talks about why his team is so successful he points back to this group of ten outrageously committed guys who paved the way for the team to be where they are at now.

Needless to say, at my tax appointment today I was floored.  I didn’t realize that what I had done was a part of something bigger.  I always just thought that I ran for me.  It turns out I was wrong.  I ran quickly to motivate the people behind me to run fast, and they motivated the group behind them to train even harder and run very fast.  We were part of a team that created a winning culture.

I heard someone say one time, “why follow and look at someone’s back when you can lead and see so much more.”  I think this is a massively flawed way of looking at leadership.  If you are leading someone, and they only see your back, you are keeping them in the dark.  I think the proper posture for leadership is allowing your followers to stand on your shoulders and see further than you.

In a letter to a friend, Isaac Newton said, “If I have seen a little further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.”  I love this quote because it reminds me that each one of us is a giant in our own way.  People are standing on our shoulders peering into the distance.  But we are only in that posture because of the giants who have influenced us.

So today, who are the giants who have paved your way?  Who are you allowing to stand on your shoulders to see even greater things?

 

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women in ministry

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No matter where you go to church or for how long, there is one issue that will continually come up.  Everyone has a strong opinion one-way or the other.  Before I flush this idea out, I’d encourage you to read and pray on this verse.

Psalm 121:1-2, “I lift up my eyes to the mountains- where does my help come from?”

The word help here can be best defined as, “the assistance that one of strength offers.”  In this passage, God is our help.  When you think about God this way it is incredibly comforting to know that God will help us in times of need and that he offers tremendous strength.  This is not the only the only place where this same word, helper is used in scripture.  In Genesis 2:18 The LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.”  The same word that is used to describe God’s help to us is the same way that it is used in the relationship that women have to men.  This offers tremendous dignity to women in scripture.

There are really well meaning people in the church who think of women as subordinate to men.  To be fair there is a lot of precedence for this position.  John Calvin wrote, “The woman deserves her origin from the man, she is therefore inferior in rank.”  St. Augustine concluded that women do not possess the image of God because of their inferiorranking.  The early church fathers position has become the predominant position through out history.  Although, I am bold enough to disagree with Calvin and Augustine on these points.   Many people say women are subordinate because of the passage in Genesis, but if that were true then wouldn’t God be subordinate because of the passage in Psalms?  I believe that the picture painted in scripture is one of dignity and equality to men

I would argue that the Bible is actually one of the most feminists and liberating of the sacred texts pertaining to the issues of women.  In Romans 16, Paul says to greet Junias among others, “who are outstanding among the apostles’.”  In the same chapter Paul calls Phoebe a deacon of the church.  This is giving tremendous leadership to women!

One of the most damning verses to my argument says this: “A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet.”  (1 Timothy  2:11-12) We take this verse to be a rule in scripture, however if this were a rule in scripture then there would be a contradiction in scripture because Priscilla and Aquila, were responsible for instructing Apollos in the way of Jesus more fully. (Acts 18: 18,26)  So then we need to look at this Timothy passage in a way that does the most justice to this passage.  We must examine the cultural context surrounding women who taught verses women who Paul instructed not to teach.  Some of it was simply cultural.  All authority to make decisions presided in a man; therefore women had no cultural authority.  Some times it was to stop the spread of bad doctrine

Where Timothy was a pastor there were many people spreading false doctrine to the easiest targets they could find. Usually uneducated women stayed at home in the daytime and were most vulnerable to bad doctrine. This is very well documented and it cannot go without notice that in a society where women were denied an education, Paul said something amazing here.  He said, “let them learn,” as opposed to the society in which they lived.  Paul calling women to learn was huge!

I think Paul knew that the church is over 50% female and that half of the church needs to be released for ministry.  So here is my question for the men reading this blog?  Would you allow yourself to learn the word of God from women?  Would you encourage, train and release women for ministry in your setting?

For the ladies reading this entry, will you support the sisters who genuinely feel called by God into ministry?  Would you go to a church where the senior pastor was female?  Would you step out and lead if you feel called?

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leadership lessons from steve jobs

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I’m not sure if many people know that I’m a huge nerd.  I follow the tech industry pretty closely, I even monitor new cell phones that are coming out on every carrier.  I was playing poker with the guys one night when I realized my geekness, I rattled off the make and model number of some guy’s cell phone.  Wow, I’m a geek but I just love new and innovated technology.

I also love leadership.  When technology and leadership got married they birthed Steve Jobs, the CEO and Co-Founder of Apple.  This man is totally intriguing.  I thought I’d share some leadership principles that I have learned from the man who wears the black turtleneck.

Failure is an option:

How many times do we look at times when we fail and never pick it back up again?  Mr. Jobs was ousted from the company he started in the 80’s and he started a new company called NeXT.  NeXT was at the forefront of technology and products, but the company was never really successful.  Jobs re-wrote the playbook on cooperate structure.  The company developed some amazing computers with some great software.  But they failed.  Ultimately their great product was too expensive and the company suffered.  The company was purchased by another failing company (Apple) to make one of the most amazing technology companies in the world.  NeXT was used as the foundations for what many of us now use on our computers.  Apple was resurrected as a company by an apparent failure called NeXT.

Stick to what your good at:

One day I read a transcript of a conference call that Apple had with its shareholders.  Questions that consumers have all the time is, why don’t you make _______?  Apple’s response was really simple.  “Because we can’t be the best in the world at it.”  Apple said that every product they make can fit on a coffee table and yet they have much larger profits than tech companies that try to do everything.  The huge leadership lesson here is to say, “no” to stuff that you can’t be the best in the world at.

Your internal barometer needs to be spot on:

One of the things that I love about Steve Jobs is his tenacity and his internal barometer.  Apple doesn’t market-test products.  They don’t get consumers in a room, let them have hands on play-date with their product and gauge their response.  They simply come out with a product because they love it.  It doesn’t matter to apple if everyone doesn’t love it, Steve Jobs and the Apple employees have to love the product.  If you don’t love what you’re doing, why would anyone else?

These are just three leadership lessons I’ve learned from Mr. Jobs (There are more to come).  All of these lessons in leadership can be universally applied, so I guess my question is why aren’t more churches applying leadership lessons from the tech world?

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