Brain Twitch

For the last several decades the western world has been infatuated with leadership. Go to any bookstore and you can find bookshelves full of books on leadership. The western church has the same infatuation. A quick search of the word "leader" in my librarything catalog returned 40 books and I probably have more than that that aren't tagged right or not cataloged yet. Apparently everything would work if we were better leaders.

I read that a survey of pastors showed that a high number of them believed that leadership development was one of their most pressing needs in their churches. I have no doubt that that is what they believe but I wonder if it is truly what they need most.

If you asked me what I would like to have most in my church it would be people who are totally in love with Jesus, who are filled with the Holy Spirit, and have the gift of evangelism. Just a few of them would be far more productive than dozens of new leaders.

Leaders build great institutions. The Holy Spirit builds a movement of God. The picture I see in scripture and down through history is the Holy Spirit on the move and leaders working like mad trying to keep up. When they do manage to catch up you find that they were filled with the Holy Spirit too.

In my tribe we talk about the Holy Spirit but we are cautious about it because so often the focus is on speaking in tongues or prophecy or the like that has ended up causing division instead of growth. But if you look carefully at scripture you see repeated occurrences of the Holy Spirit helping people share Jesus with the world boldly, courageously, and wisely. And that is what my church needs.

So I read the "Strengths Based Leadership" book. Actually there are about 100 pages of explanation followed by a breakdown of the the 34 themes and the four domains they fall into. The book also includes a code that lets you take a strengths assessment.

My top 5 strengths are Ideation, Learner, Strategic, Futuristic, and Intellection. I won't even try to explain them since even the spellchecker goes nuts on two of them. They all fall in the Strategic Thinking domain. I got nothing in the Executing, Influencing, or Relation Building domains which was a bit of a disappointment for me.

Hoping the assessment was screwed up I took the results home to my wife to look over. She says the descriptions fit. Oh well.

Looking back on it I guess it does make some sense. I desperately need to get a few executors around me. People that get things done. The assessment says I also need people who can woo people (influencers) and a lot of relationship builders. I have the last two around me but I need executors.

The last time our benevolence association met I presented an idea that would grow us into something that I think would go along way to addressing needs in our community and getting a lot of people using their gifts. I like the idea but I fear there won't be anyone who will step in and make it happen. Now I know why I think that way, because I'm not an executor.

A few years ago I served on an executive team. I ticked off one of the leaders because I suggested an alternative view on something he was pushing. I felt pretty frustrated at the time and dropped off when the next round of elections came up. Now it makes sense because the only thing I was bringing to the table was strategic thinking and that's not what they were looking for. I think they were looking for more influencers and relationship builders who could take what they were selling and promote it among the constituency.

So I guess it makes sense but I don't know where it leaves me. I'm not sure it fits very well with my situation. I think it would have been helpful if I had a few strengths in another domain or two. My first thought was to work on improving in some of the other areas but that goes completely against the premise of the book. Don't waste time on your weaknesses, develop and use your strengths.

Over the next couple of years I am going to be involved with a Missional Leadership Initiative with Reggie McNeal. It will involve three 3 day meetings each year with involvement in a cohort in the in between times. I got involved in it because I meet once a week with a couple of pastors in the area. They both belong to the denomination that is responsible for the whole thing. Dan, one of my friends I meet with, must be a big shot in his denom because he finagled an invitation for me even though I'm from a different tribe. Thanks again Dan.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to it. I have a lot of interest in the topic as a whole but right now I'm very interested in the spiritual formation component of it. I also think it is good timing for my church. The last 6 months have been the most difficult in the last 11 years and that has led to a lot of head scratching and soul searching. I'm hoping this will help me process some stuff.