UNLEASHING POTENTIAL IN STORYCENTRIC COMMUNITIES

The Abiding Life Stream

The last few days we’ve been talking about the New Life.  Yesterday we heard John’s story.  Now we’re moving on to the second stream of Spiritual Leadership: the Abiding Life. What exactly do we mean when we talk about the Abiding Life?  Basically our main idea is this: Both the receiving of the sacraments (baptism and communion) and human intuition can be means by which believers experience intimacy with God; however, both sacrament and intuition can potentially lead to idolatry. Neither is a guarantor of being a disciple of Jesus Christ. Ultimately God is the initiator, and we are respondents, not the other way around.  We are in this journey of an abiding life with God.

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John Newton’s Story

I’d like to introduce you to John.  I’ve never met John personally, though I have benefitted from his influence. Perhaps his story will influence you as well. John’s life is a great example of one who embraced the New Life in Christ. This New Life was not something that was not just born overnight, but, rather, involved a complicated journey.  This journey that spanned several decades brought him to the place of being able to touch many people through the gift of music.

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The New Life Stream

This is part of a blog series on Spiritual Leadership.   October 15, 1974. As an elementary student I went to the Good News Club after school, and through the story of the Wordless Book, I prayed and invited Jesus into my heart.  Today I celebrate 40 years of being a follower of Jesus. July 27, 1972.  I was a teenager on a destructive path.  On this day Jesus radically changed my life. April 6, 2000.  I was a college student that thought he knew everything.  I was a philosophy major, after all.  But then someone shared Jesus with me and I surrendered my life to the One who is THE way, the truth, and the life.  My life would never be the same after this day. Like these situations above, how many of you have a specific date that you mark on your calendars that draws the line in the sand from when you crossed from your old life to your new life in Christ? On the other hand, how many of you are like me?  That is, you can’t really pinpoint an exact date but you know in your heart of hearts that you’ve embraced Jesus as your Lord and Savior?

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Of Bullock Carts and the Tension in Spiritual Leadership

Spiritual Leadership Tell me, what is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of spiritual growth or discipleship?  A solitary individual meditating or praying?  People who are always ready to tell others about who God is and what He has done?  The woman who reaches out to her neighbors in their time of need?  People gathered together doing service on behalf of their church?  Healings, miracles, and speaking in tongues?  Administering the sacraments? When we talk about Spiritual Leadership we talk about something that addresses both the leader’s personal spiritual development as well as his or her role in the spiritual development of others. Those “streams” we’ve been talking about are different images of what a healthy spiritual life looks like.  They also give definition to Jesus’ command to “make disciples,” the emphasis being to lead others to “Follow me, as I follow Christ.”

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Spiritual Traditions: Living in the In-Between and Our Common Story

The Old Testament is rich with stories about a God who chooses a people for Himself and pursues relationship with them. Intertwined in these stories is the promise of an Anointed One who would come and make all things new, both for the present age and the age to come.  There is about a 400-year gap between the Old Testament and the New Testament.  In that gap there seems to be silence, but we have to wonder if there wasn’t a certain anticipation. We have to wonder if within those pages of history in the in-between, as the Israelites were rebuilding their lives again following a time of a captivity and exile, they weren’t also solidifying their faith, holding that promise closely.

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Four Years, Eight Modules. What is Freedom to Lead International doing that is really so unique? 

Spiritual Leadership This post is part of a series on Spiritual Leadership. When FTL went into South Asia for the first time in 2010 we knew we were committing to a specific group of church and ministry leaders for the long haul.  And they were committing to us.  Although our initial commitment was a four-year program that would feature eight leadership development modules and one-on-one mentoring, we really didn’t know just how much God would stretch and mold and use us for His purposes.  We heard the calling and had the vision.  We even had what we thought was a clear strategy for Phase 1 of this ministry.  We set out to make a dent on the world.  But I don’t think any of us really expected the impact it would have, both on our lives personally and in the way we look at Christ-centered leadership.

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The Coming Social Tsunami

Brendan Eich, co-founder and CEO of open source company Mozilla, was forced to resign this week after it came to light that he made a $1000 personal donation to the 2008 campaign seeking to ban same-sex marriage in California. Eich’s resignation was prompted after OkCupid, an online dating service, encouraged thousands of its customers to boycott Mozilla’s Firefox web browser.

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Hollywood’s Noah

This month Hollywood is releasing a movie loosely based on the story of Noah. Muslims are complaining because it isn’t true to the Koran. Christians are complaining because it isn’t true to the biblical text.  And other people are complaining because they wish it wasn’t Russell Crowe who was cast as the leading role.  Fair enough. But let’s keep our minds open just a tad. Open enough to encourage dialogue instead of dismissing the movie altogether just because we think it’s just another Hollywood attempt that completely gets the facts wrong. There is power in storycentric communication– even when it is Hollywood’s version.

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The Power of Storytelling

Rick Sessoms In 1984, my family and I were sent to Indonesia as missionaries. My assignment was to teach in a seminary. Since I was the “new kid in town” I got to teach the courses no one else wanted – one of which was preaching. At least it was a course I thought I knew something about. I taught preaching in the school while listening to Indonesians preaching in the local church. Their sermons were a lot like ones I’d heard and given in the States. Good stuff. Important stuff. Truth intended to change how people think, how people feel, and how people act. Solid biblical truth presented in three points and a poem. Trouble was, it wasn’t changing anybody. But I noticed a different style of communication whenever I attended Indonesian social events. When community leaders or even the government wanted to relay important information to their people, they used drama. They used songs. They used stories. For example, as the sun was going down, they would often bring out an old bed-sheet and hang it between two poles. Then they would use a light behind the sheet and little leather puppets. As the sun would go down, the stories would come to life. The people would sit and watch and laugh and listen – and learn for hours. Puppets and songs and stories impacted people in a way that the three-point sermons I heard in church and taught in the seminary did not.  They reached beyond heads into

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Telling the Story: The Great Commission to Oral Learners

Who are Oral Learners?
Statistics conservatively suggest that more than 70% of all people in the world today – more than 2 of every 3 – are “oral learners.” “Oral learners” is not a familiar term. When I use it, some people look at me and say, “Do you mean ‘moral learners?”

No, “oral learners.” A simple dictionary definition of an oral learner is one that relies upon spoken rather than written communication. Before writing was invented, everyone lived by spoken communication. They read nothing, took no notes, never looked anything up. For those with papers due this week, that sounds like a pretty sweet deal.

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Impact of Leadership Development Experiences in a Transnational Organization

Abstract This study evaluated the impact of five alternative types of leadership development practices on ratings of leaders within a transnational organization. Impact was assessed with 360-degree ratings of leadership behaviors.  Results showed that self and superior ratings of leadership behaviors were higher for leaders who had completed at least one form of leadership development while follower ratings were higher only for those leaders who had completed a developmental job assignment.  Practical and theoretical implications raise questions about the usefulness of leadership development programs.

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Mentoring For Kingdom Potential

The predominant image of leaders in Jesus’ time – not very different from our own time – was that they were egocentric, oppressive, and in charge. Perhaps this is why Jesus never used the word “leader” when referring to his disciples. It seems that the conventional leadership values in his time were not those Jesus wanted to transfer to the future leaders of the church.

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My Journey Toward Understanding Leadership Development

Ordering a search of “leadership development” from Google currently yields 29 million menu options. Both for-profit and not-for-profit organizations invest billions of dollars each year on strategies intended to develop leaders. The pervasive need for better leaders in all spheres of private and public life teases our appetite for solutions.

But has all our investment of time, energy, and money paid off? What is the “return on investment (ROI)” for developing leaders? Do our efforts to develop leaders really work?  And if so, what kind of leadership development works?

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Are You a Responsible Listener?

The most powerful communication tool at your disposal is not speaking but listening. You’ll communicate well when you listen well. The reverse plays out often, and most of us have experienced it. You meet someone at a conference. As you are reading the person’s name badge, you engage him in friendly conversation: “Hello, Fred what do you do?”  Five minutes later Fred has not stopped for a breath! You are wondering how you can escape without being rude. This person has demonstrated no interest in you at all. You feel trapped and develop a desperate need to leave him to get out of the conversation. If he had engaged with you in return – showing interest through dialogue instead of monologue – you would have a different opinion of him entirely.  In fact, if he had built rapport with you, then you would probably still be engaged in an interesting discussion. Responsible Listening A key to effective communication is listening to the other person. Of course, if you want to listen to the other person, you have to give them opportunity to speak. This why our module on Communicating for Impact recommends the following:

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Six Ways to Help Others Hear You

Your listeners’ learning styles can play a big role in how well they keep up with and understand what you have to say. People have different learning styles, which means we have different ways we learn best. In a formal class, one’s student ability will be enhanced while another student’s potential will be diminished if the teacher presents all the lessons in a single learning style. Similar things can happen when we speak to people. For example, a young man I know has a kinesthetic learning style. Essentially this means that he learns best by doing. He has great difficulty with chalk and talk teachers and finds their lessons difficult to deal with. In contrast, he is in his element when learning is “hands on.” He also needs to be convinced that what he is asked to do is relevant. In other words, he needs to understand the “why” before effective learning can take place. Why are Learning Styles Important for Responsible Speaking?

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Mistakes That Cause One-Sided Conversations

Paul, a member of the IT group, cornered his boss in a ‘conversation’ at the coffee station. Because the boss could not easily escape, Paul was taking the opportunity to overwhelm him with information. Of course Paul was not getting anywhere with his insensitive, one-sided communication style that ignored his listener’s needs. I hope that I’m not as tactless as Paul with his boss, but I confess that sometimes I have been just as ineffective when it comes to communicating with others. Christ-centered leaders are committed to enabling others to achieve their full potential. And central to this focus is responsible speaking. It is vital for us to communicate ideas, objectives, and methods effectively to others. This is important because our listeners need to be able respond appropriately in order to achieve their full potential. Most leaders are all able to talk well, but this does not guarantee that real communication is taking place.

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Are You an Engaging Speaker or “Mogadon Man”?

In the mid 80′s, while fibre optics was still the new and immature technology I attended a telecommunications conference. Compared to today this was the technological stone-age. After almost 25 years two presentations at that conference stand out in my mind to this day. One was delivered by a Japanese technologist. Unfortunately his English was indistinct and in an auditorium sadly impossible to follow. I am sure his topic was interesting but he was just so much hard work that, along with the rest of the audience, my brain shut down for 40 minutes as frustration and boredom set in. Having said that, his English was far better than my Japanese, so good for him for having a go.

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Insights on Power, Character, and the Ministry

Colin Buckland The Lost Art of Integrity A few years ago some colleagues and I hosted a series of one-day conferences for Christian leaders at a well-known London conference centre. The first two were a great success. A list of well-known speakers and a topical subject seemed to be the winning formula. Around 1,500 leaders attended each conference. The third was at the same place with the same formula, except for one change – the subject. We had decided, as conference organisers, that one of the most pressing needs among leaders was the development of integrity. We set the topic and posted the invitations, but when the day came, only 150 delegates attended. When we went on to hold a fourth conference on another topical subject, however, there was a huge turn out. Integrity seems to be a thorny subject for leaders!

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A Story of Ultimate Demotion

Upward Mobility In recent times, many have become familiar with the phrase upward mobility. The term has found its way around the world into everyday corporate cultures. But don’t think for a minute that upward mobility is a new concept. Interest in personal advancement dates back to the garden days of Adam and Eve. Questioning the concept of upward mobility causes a kind of inner turmoil that most people do not handle well. The mere mention of words like demotion, decreasing, and losing set off alarm signals in their minds. “Not me! Please! Let’s change the subject.  Let’s talk about promotion, increasing, and winning. Then you’ll have my full support. Then you’ll get my vote.” If you take a deep look within, you may find – as I have – that upward mobility has a hold on you in ways you aren’t even aware of.

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What is Virtuous Leadership?

Those who really deserve praise are the people who, while human enough to enjoy power nevertheless pay more attention to justice than they are compelled to do by their situation.                                                                                                -Thucydides

Dwayne (fictitious name) recently retired after twenty-five years as president of a U.S. company. During his tenure, the business had doubled its customer base and added four new buildings to its physical plant. His leadership was widely considered successful. When Dwayne announced his retirement, the board announced that they would name one of the newly-constructed buildings in his honor. Dwayne was well-known and respected in his network.  His forty-seven-year marriage to Sarah was exemplary. He demonstrated discipline and modesty in his personal finances. During the last ten years of his presidency, Dwayne had been invited to serve on several boards of other organizations; he was generally respected by other senior executives. In contrast, Dwayne’s employees observed a different kind of leader.

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A Leadership Model for the Suffering Church

Sebastian (fictitious name) met us soon after the border officials had checked all our necessary papers and approved us for entry. For several days, Sebastian led us on a whirlwind tour of the church in mainland China. He told us stories about untold suffering. Along the way, Sebastian recounted his own personal journey as a Christian leader. Born into a Christian family in 1928, Sebastian’s father served as pastor of several churches. Sebastian followed in his father’s footsteps and became a noted church leader in southern China. As his leadership role became more prominent over the years, Sebastian faced increasing scrutiny from the Mao system. Unwilling to compromise his commitment to lead an “unregistered” church, he was arrested and served hard labor for twenty-three years in a communist prison camp. He was finally released when he was sixty-seven years old.  Sebastian was faithful to his leadership calling.  With a sense of satisfaction, he said, “Although I permanently lost my position and my personal influence, the church in China today is flourishing.” Sebastian’s story exemplifies leadership in the suffering church that may call for biblical alternatives to popular western leadership models.

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