I've discussed the distinction between "leadership" and "discipleship" before. They are two disciplines/functions that have so much interplay that they are often blended together, which can be hazardous at times.
In a recent discussion about cross-cultural leadership/discipleship issues within the context of global missions, Keith Anderson reiterated how much a healthy understanding of the relationship and distinctions between L&D is to the deployment of healthy practices - particularly with church planting.
Before referencing some outstanding scholarship that has been produced recently around cross-cultural leadership dynamics (GLOBE project), he highlighted how the sequencing and confusion of these 2 practices can play out in church planting contexts...
(1) You can focus on leadership principles alone. You must wrestle with effectively transmitting the principles in ways that are transferrable to that culture, of course. (something Enrique Fernandez succinctly captures in his teaching on Leadership Extrapolation) The hazard is that you can create dynamic organizational structures and learning systems that fail to draw people to Christ, transform the world or truly touch the Kingdom agenda of God. Certainly, followers will be created ("disciples"?), but not necessarily growing towards Christ and by Him.
(2) You can focus on discipleship. This is most commonly the practice in church-planting, and logically so. You send a team, proclaim the Gospel, teach people to read, pray and go share the story of Christ, rinse-lather-repeat. A by-product of this is certainly that "leaders" are generated as the recipient of the Gospel who turns and shares with others inherits leadership responsibilities and influence over them. This is the primary commissioning of Christ-followers and is the ground floor for reaching new people groups. However, the practices of initially seeding disciples are not effective at cultivating healthy leadership that is sustainable, replicable, and developmental in nature.
(3) You can disciple with a plan for intentional follow-up and leadership development. This is (as you've guessed) the recommended approach. In this you lead off fundamentally, but have the discipline and commitment to follow it up with continued learning, investment and equipping so that indigent leaders can be supported in their generational work of living out our shared Commission in their locale.
I've certainly seen these principles validated - in Haiti, Honduras, Argentina, Mexico, Ireland and the US. Myopic emphasis on just L or D creates an organizational anemia that hinders the Body and creates cyclical resource expenditure by congregations that fail to accumulate for net progression. There is incredible opportunity, however, when a healthy outlook is achieved that allows for seasons, stages and a metamorphosis-based approach.
The principles are not just a function of scale - it works down to the ministry team, small group and similar level. As a leader, are you differentiating between the functional purpose of development efforts - to disciple, to infuse with leadership to further the cause of Kingdom advancement, additional discipleship to provide the depth from which to lead spiritually even further, etc? Have you seen hazards from L&D being confused, or a lack of any intentional plan to develop along either tracks?
Yesterday this guy was preaching about the "power of words" and their value to build up and encourage fellow believers. He even addressed the concept of taking "risk" to encounter conflict or get your hands dirty by wading into the water of a situation for the sake of another person. For many of us, the mental picture turned to unpleasant individuals in our lives or situations we know are so messy we'll likely get a headache in the process.
Then, this morning a CNN report briefly mentions a South African lady who voluntarily waded into the waters of Afghanistan to help disabled people and was ruthlessly assassinated by the Taliban for proclaiming the Gospel. Martyred in the year 2008 in a region occupied by the world's most powerful and "Christian" nation.
On the scale or risks we can take, I think we should remember that 98% of us will never truly experience the cost of discipleship, price of following and depth of risk a majority frontier Christians have for centuries.
Let us therefore....Go.
Leadership Summit 2008 was excellent. The faculty delivered a series of powerful punches that struck me and thousands of other leaders in a number of ways...some of which I'm still unpacking. One resounding theme across the speakers was courageous, uninhibited, relentless, risky, consuming pursuit in faith of the things God put before them. Whether a pastor pursuing laser-focus on the mission, a teacher to stand against the wind of educational demise in urban areas, a business-woman diving into a holy discontent for prison recidivism trends or a lawyer selling the farm to address injustice across the globe - each story contained brilliant brushstrokes of radical risk in commitment. Jeopardy was a given, failure a real possibility but quitting, safety and partial investment ruled out.These themes were heard like a punch in the gut. The Bible commands followers of Christ to not quench the Spirit (1 Thess 5:19). It's a passage that has always troubled me. So many times we talk about desiring to hear God's voice, see His leading, know His will - but this passage suggests we would intentionally douse the flame of God's consuming presence. Surely not! How crazy! It makes you feel like Peter, so confidently guffawing when Jesus suggested someone would betray him (Judas) and one who loved Him would even deny Him (Pete) multiple times. Surely we would never push God away, right?
Yet, I confess, it is my most perpetual act of disobedience. I want closeness with God, but at the depth I'm comfortable swimming, at the pace I can still steer, at a temperature I can control.
This fear is well founded. Indeed, the Bible even attests to the nature of God dramatically, using terms like a "consuming fire." It's the same problem the Rich Young Ruler had with Jesus...the utter and complete consumption of being God desires. There's a terrifying reality of truly being consumed by God as you draw near to Him and He begins to fully invade your life and take you places only He is adequate to sustain. There's a tipping point of the soul that I so often pull back from.
I'm guilty of teaching instead of leading, of offering instead of exhorting, of dabbling instead of diving, praying silently instead of intervening intercessently, hinting at hope instead of proclaiming incredibly good news, being content with status quo or slightly "better" practice instead of running into frontiers where God has called me to...of pouring water onto the very flame of the Spirit of God to subdue it back to a controlled burn...running at a pace I can endure and sustain without overly depleting my own reserve rather than
abandoning myself in His race...reducing His message to tolerable bites for concern of how I'll be perceived or what doorways it might thrust me through...James 5:16 says confession is healing. Next comes obedience in response.
How are you quenching the Spirit? In what ways do you pander God by minimizing calls He has in your life? How are you dialing down the intensity and vibrancy of God's movement in and through you?
The past few weeks have been precious as my life groups have shared and listened to stories crafted by God. It truly is a form of spiritual discipline and worship to intentionally recall and testify to the work of God in our lives. It’s His story He’s written, and I marvel at how intimately involved He’s been in bringing us each to the place we are today. To think that the Almighty God – the God of Job, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob – is intimately involved in forming us, preparing us and using us! Wow.
I was meeting with a friend today and he was sharing a heart burden for the lack of testifying about God’s ongoing work in our lives as a general deficit in churches everywhere. He made the comment:
The local church should be either irresistible or utterly repulsive to everyone who encounters it. Irresistible because the stories of life change and God’s working are intoxicatingly rich. Utterly repulsive because the culture requires you to be drawn into a consuming relationship with God or spit out.
Pretty strong language! “Irresistible” or “Repulsive.” A Christian life of things you do/don’t do, say/don’t say, and attend is pretty lifeless. A Christian walk that’s full of looking for God and testifying to His work in and through us is pretty darn exhilarating! Is your walk in Christ irresistible or repulsive to a nonbeliever today?
I never grow tired of hearing us share our stories. The word “remember” occurs over 230 times in Scripture, “testify” 52 times, “witness” over 100 times. It’s a sweet aroma, pleasing and good to God when we give glory to His name through the stories of His handiwork. It’s important to reflect. It’s even more critical to be intentionally aware in the present – how is God leading, changing, forming, growing, preparing, disciplining or using you today? At work – in that tough situation, with that unique set of coworkers, with that project? At school – with that professor, student group? At home – with those relationships and situations? In the quietness of your heart and study…what is the Spirit of God doing? Testify to it!
Worship doesn’t require music or talent. It requires perspective that recognizes the glory of God and reflects it back to Him. Let us continue worshiping God this week and join together often to share the latest chapters of His handiwork!
Stores are a worship art, a spiritual discipline and a component of discipleship. Jesus conveyed life-changing truths through parables (fiction) - just imagine what He can convey through the LIVE story of people He's inhabiting!
Here are the 2 main teaching sessions from the 08 Advance Round Table event this past weekend:
Audio Recording of Session One - the Strategic Inflection Point of Change and Redefining Risk Within Our CommunityAudio Recording of Session Two - Avoiding False Dichotomies & the Art of Asking and Raising Spiritually Qualified Leaders
For the GP leaders who experienced the Advance Round Table this past weekend, here are your favorite "Mike Drawings." In a previous life I called this my future competitive sport: whiteboarding!
Still to come: the false dichotomy trap and some spiritual growth continuum diagrams!
In response to the Janitor comments from the previous post...I am repeatedly convicted of how, as a bypass to dealing with the deep mysteries of simple truths in the Gospel, we throw ourselves into drawing complex systems of more "understandable" rules. The truth is so simple it profoundly frustrates us - so we'd rather arrive at the same conclusion via a 40 year wilderness modeled process of well-defined steps.
I once wrote a paper on how the Holy Spirit is free to use it's power in the lives of believers practically to the glory of the Father. A fairly simple theological premise. The title of my paper? "A Paradigm of Pneumatological Pragmatism." That's an oxymoron title about being practical!
Many thanks to the Burkholder Post-Karmic Stream for the recent posting on Rube Goldberg. To approach life like a Rube is to take a long, complex route to a simple end. Isn't that what people have always done with the love and law of God? How many steps can we walk on the Sabbath, and what is 'work' exactly? Who's my 'neighbor' again? How many times must I forgive? Jesus sure frustrates the A-type personalities when He boiled 650 legal code statements into "love God, love people. Period."
I've learned and relearned this principle at least 26 dozen times, it feels. It started at a young age.
When I was 12 I was fascinated with physics and practical sciences. I was terribly intrigued by the seemingly limitless energy of magnets - they never drain! Surely there must be something to be done with this energy. Plus, the whole power of sunlight as a force (photovoltaic inertia). So, being a verbose and altogether odd kid, I spent 6 weeks one summer writing a "fun research paper" on the subject. The conclusion was a paper with very cool diagrams called "Vehicular Propulsion from the Harnessing of Electromagnetic Repulsion & Photovoltaic Inertia." That means making your car run by the push effect of magnets and concentrated light beams - but I liked the cooler words. In my concluded state I was convinced I had just stumbled upon the secret key to the next industrial revolution - "The Age of Electromagnetism," the ultimate green solution to societies' needs!
I took my research paper to an industrial engineer at our church who was some uppity-up with a major oil (Kyle would say "Energy") firm. He read it and smiled. Sitting on the edge of my seat in anticipation I figured he didn't get the full implication of my thesis. He then went, "This is great work, Mike. Very elegant way of connecting the dots and making something of electromagnetism. What you just discovered round aboutly and very comlexly is the original, most simple engine ever invented: the solenoid motor. About 200 years ago it really rocked the world and is now a key component of just about every vehicle and propulsion system in the world." My heart sank.
I had just reinvented the wheel, with the Rube Goldberg style of non-simplicity. Somehow we make the "Way of the Annointed One that is Jesus" a life journey of reinventing the wheel of truth shadows. We celebrate discovering a beautiful truth and mystery that has been lying in plain view for millenia, previously discovered, lost, rediscovered, lost and now sought again.
I was at a conference last week where there was a lot of talk about the purpose of the church, the purpose of small groups, the purpose of Christian community. Discipleship is obviously a key to these spheres. One of the pastor-speakers said it this way:
Jesus started out simply 'Come, and follow me.' No lengthy doctrinal presentation, series of classes and then a pass/fail exercise - but an invitation to come and see what life in the Kingdom was all about. Along the way more and more was revealed. 3.5 years later Jesus was talking about "eating my flesh/body" and "drinking my blood" as a mysterious and rich word picture for living in Christ. We need to help take people from "come and follow" to "eat my flesh, drink my blood" spiriutally. That's discipleship - taking them from wherever they are at to truly experiencing Christ as bread and wine, as flesh and blood of their life...but understanding whatever step they are in that process and meeting them there.
The internet has rocked the way the world communicates. First we had antique-feeling dial-up to access our Juno/AOL/Netscape email. Then faster connections made email a common thing. Then chat rooms replaced coffee shop social gathering. Faster connections and familiarity gave way to instant messaging. Now it's crazy to not have 2-5 email addresses, a personal homepage, a profile on "social networks" (facebook, myspace, etc.), to share pictures and videos via the web and to communicate into the void of humanity with things like Blogs, Vlogs, Twitter or whatever comes next.
The question is always: does the medium or mode of communication get the job done. Is it truly improving our progress towards relational or general goals, or is it just adding more "stuff" we do? It's the same question we have to wrestle with as Christian leaders: do the programs and things we spend time, money, hours and mental energy on truly fulfill the commission of the Church (big C)? If not...why are we doing it?
So, my "bluzzle." It's a new term I'm copyrighting. That and it's root form, Bloguzzle. Combining "Blog" + "Puzzle." Blogs are a puzzle to me. Sometimes blogs start grassroot movements across normal borders - triggering daily "hits," countless "comments," and facilitating a dynamic discussion of ideas without the hindrances of time and location. Others become little more than a person talking to themselves, letting faint echoes register as conversation.
Which brings me to the Bloguzzle of this particular site. To date there have been about 1,400 "hits" or visits to this site. People from over 14 countries and more than 10 states have perused the content. Pretty cool, right? Sure, it sounds good. But, there are really about 5-10 people who frequently touch base and see what's happening. Yet, while there are 1,400 visits, less than 50 "comments" have been made. More than a dozen major postings, but little actual conversation. The cyber crickets are beginning to drowned out even the delusional echoes so common to blog sites.
The Bloguzzle begs a question: is a "blog" and this particular expression of a blog effective for our purpose of pursuing discipleship? Does the content truly help you in our joint cause? Does the format truly facilitate helpful exchanges of ideas? Is this addressing a need effectively...or, is it a worthwhile experiment that has failed to have results justifying its continuation?
In the Love & Respect marriage study we're doing right now at Grace Point, Dr. Eggerichs describes how "crazy" it would be for a person to stand at a wall flipping a switch up and down endlessly when the lights are obviously not coming on. He describes the lunacy of that scenario as an illustration of the craziness we often times live out in relationships and efforts - doing the same thing over and over expecting results that are obviously not coming. Is this bloguzzle a sign of the wrong light switch or just some other issue?
YOU are the litmus papers of this lab study. Pink or blue? Good or bad? Valuable or just "okay"? Let me know.
Paul says in Hebrews to loosen yourself from the "sins that so easily ensnare you" so that we can run more fully and freely towards Christ. Sometimes it's not just "sin" we have to loosen ourselves from, but less than effective investments of time and energy. It's a healthy leadership practice: to periodically run inventory on how you're stewarding the time God has given you for the purpose and life He calls you to.
Thanks,
Mike
"Upon this rock I will build my church." - Jesus
Two thousand years ago the great triune God of the Hebrews took on flesh, pouring out Himself to become a suffering Servant that He might redeem the world unto Himself. He brought the "Kingdom of God" into direct contact and conflict with the earthly power structures and offered abundant life under his "easy yoke" of transformational love. Delighting in the victorious underdog par excellence, the Son of Man implemented one last daring gesture after conquering death and sin - He chose to manifest Himself through the ages through the lowliest of people, to build His Church upon the "rock" of common, fragile, broken people. In our weakness, He is strong - His work is done by grace, not be works, and none of us can boast otherwise!
As brothers and sisters in Christ, we at Grace Point have the privilege of having front row seats on some incredible Kingdom advancements for our region. Radically transformed life stories are written nearly daily around us, and we are witnesses to exchanged lives to the glory of God. It is certainly not our strength or wit that has facilitated this, but the active Word and Spirit of God working through, around and often times despite us. As leaders in this great gathering of Christ-followers, we have a profound responsibility to be diligent in our application of our gifts, our stewardship of Kingdom resources and the ongoing need for discipleship, spiritual formation and people being clearly directed to follow Jesus.
The Great Commission is overly referred to and under-applied to its full extent. Dallas Willard aptly noted that it has unintentionally fallen victim to the "Great Ommision" in that the Church often forgets to embrace the entire charge. Making disciples doesn't stop at baptism - but begins! Teaching or leading disciples in the Way of Jesus is the real imperative. So how does discipleship start, what forms does it take, what are Biblical principles or values we must hold on to, how do we lead effectively in something so critical as spiritual growth? These are real questions that require real dialogue. The values and principles of Scripture are steadfast, yet the forms and expressions have great diversity. We need healthy dialogue that wrestles with needs, ideas, barriers, truth, experiences and concepts - in "love which binds them all together in perfect unity" as Paul said to the believers in Colosse.
This is a forum of "grace." We as leaders must put as a chief aim our individual love and devotion to Jesus Christ, and from such aim open ourselves up to honest dialogue, correction, encouragement and growth. Ideas will be shared - good, radical, ancient, tried, dangerous, unformed, amazing, insightful and everything in-between - in a context of trust as we seek to burn away the chaffe and get down to the real heart of Discipleship for our present context. As iron sharpening iron, so we will seek to sharpen each other as co-laborers in the cause of leadership.
Share your ideas, ask questions, pray for wisdom from God who is the Author of all truth, and let's partner on this journey in faith together.
Come and follow, as we seek to be more fully made into fishers of men by the great Teacher...
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