Congregational Life Centre
Our mission is to assist congregations to be more
effective in their ministry
Leadership
for Today
Putting Jesus' Model to Work for You
by Clair Woodbury & Joyce Madsen
Jesus leadership was so effective it changed the world. What kind of leadership did he offer? Would that leadership model be effective in a congregation today? Our answer is YES! This book is for everyone who wants to explore opportunities to become leaders in churchcongregations, and for those who are already leaders and who would like their leadership to become more effective.
This book looks at Jesus' three years of ministry with new eyes. It explores the eight key facets of leadership that made his mission so effective. His leadership was spiritual, visionary, flexible, story-centred, team-based, risking, action-oriented, and authentic. There are stories and more stories, because we Christians are above all story people. It has some specific "how-to-do-it" advice, recognizing that every situation is unique. Above all, it is a prayer for the church, that it become the place of spiritual support and transformation that Jesus intended it to be.
Selling price: $24.95 per copy.
ISBN: 978-0-9688358-5-2.
Publisher and Distributor
Congregational Life Centre
#1405, 5328 Calgary Trail, Edmonton AB T6H 4J8
Phone 780.619-0386
www.congregationallife.com
Contents
1. The New Culture
2. Experiencing God
3. Knowing Where You're Going
4. Initiating Change
5. Communication is Key
6. Multiplying Leadership
7. Overcoming the Fear
8. Making It So
9. Being Authentic
10. The Last Word
Appendix: Six Steps to Success
Sample from the Introduction
Jesus' leadership was so effective it changed the world. What kind of leadership did he offer? Is that a leadership model that could be effective today?
The Synoptic Gospels - Matthew, Mark, and Luke - provide a very good picture of what Jesus did. Insights into why have come through those who have examined what was happening in Palestine during Jesus' lifetime. Archaeology has unearthed new evidence about the Roman occupation and Jewish resistance. Ancient texts like the Gnostic Gospels that were lost but have now been rediscovered are giving us a deeper understanding of the times.
Other insights have come from the new quest for the historical Jesus. Authors like Robert Funk, John Dominic Crossan, and Marcus Borg have gone to great lengths to identify how Jesus' actions were meaningful responses to the challenges of the day. The consensus is that each gospel writer altered the original story slightly, and in doing so provides fresh insight into the challenges facing the young Christian community at the time they were writing.
When we consider what we are learning from the new scholarship about Jesus and his times, we recognize that it was rooted in the past, the present and the future. We can discern eight facets to his leadership style. It was:
spiritual,
visionary,
flexible,
story-based,
team-based,
courageous,
action oriented,
and authentic.
In this book, we will explore these eight facets of Jesus' leadership, but in this introduction we want to briefly define them.
We do not pretend that these account totally for Jesus' ability to attract followers and build the movement that has resulted in the Christian church, but they are the characteristics that we the authors feel are needed by leaders in the church today.
Jesus' leadership was three dimensional in time. He was anchored in the past, able to clearly point out the basis for his actions in the Hebrew scriptures. He had a powerful and passionate vision of the future he called the Kingdom of God. A better translation today might be "God's New Community." It was a future when God's way of treating all people with compassion, equality, justice, and care would be reflected in the way we deal with each other. At the same time Jesus was able to deal head on with the current issues of his day. "Is it proper to pay tribute to Caesar or not?" he was asked. "Show me a denarius. Whose picture and name are on it?" he answered. "Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar. Give to God what is God's" (Luke 20:22-25).
Jesus' ministry was profoundly spiritual. It began with a transforming experience of the presence of God. There is no doubt that people felt a deep sense of the presence of God when they were with Jesus. That is a gift that saints like Francis of Assisi learned from Jesus, and one that is a key to leadership in the church today. Many people want to experience the presence of God in their lives in ways that give them meaning and a sense of worth.
Jesus had a powerful vision of a new society in which people are cherished for who they are, not just for what they can do, and where the love that wants the best for everyone is the law of the land. In Jesus' vision people's needs take precedence over political domination, economic exploitation, and religious legitimization of these structures. It is a vision that has inspired people for 2,000 years and continues to be a driving force behind much social reform today.
Jesus was a flexible initiator. He was a master at adapting his ministry to the challenge of the moment. He was able to address large crowds, and then in a flash be totally present to a woman who touched his robe. There were major shifts as his ministry took new directions.
Jesus had a gift for communication. He talked about digging around fig trees, planting seeds, harvesting grapes, and building watch-towers in those vineyards - experiences all his listeners would be familiar with. He used poetry to communicate. The cadence built into the Beatitudes makes them easily memorable. He used parables to catch people by surprise. By challenging many of the established practices of the day he was able to reveal God's way of looking at the world.
Jesus put time and effort into developing a leadership team for the future. It is quite amazing that the rag-tag collection of people Jesus gathered from fishing villages and rural Galilee eventually worked together to change the world, but they did.
Jesus risked everything when he took his movement to Jerusalem, the centre of Temple power. A current television program shows us each week what it takes to overcome the fear factor. Facing down the opposition in Jesus' day was, however, much riskier than bungee jumping or balloon flying. Mahatma Gandhi is a towering twentieth-century figure who knew the importance of overcoming one's fear in order to resist injustice. Nelson Mandela is a contemporary example of someone who was not afraid to resist injustice. He put his years of imprisonment behind him in order to lead his country into a new social order - transforming fear into forgiveness. The Mothers of the Disappeared risked a great deal to bring about political change in Argentina. It took courage for Betty Williams and Mairead Corrigan to lead a peace movement dedicated to ending the violence in Northern Ireland, for which they received the Nobel Prize in 1976.
We admire the fact that Jesus was a man of action, taking his leadership on the road and walking to Jerusalem, knowing every step brought him closer to confrontation.
Jesus is still an incredibly attractive figure 2000 years later because his leadership was authentic. "He walked the talk" as we would say it today. The collection of his teachings we call the Sermon on the Mount stresses authentic prayer, authentic relationships, and authentic giving - a life where motives and actions are one.
This is Jesus' leadership model. It is an exciting one. Paul picked up on it, and the result was the church's explosion across the Roman Empire and beyond. From our experience and research, we know that this model is basic to the leadership style of those who are making a difference in their community.
We live in a new culture. The starting point for the church being able to speak to that culture is an experience of God. It is that contact with God that gives the church the courage to articulate a vision of where God is calling it to go. This is a journey in which those in the church must do five things: initiate new forms of ministry, learn new languages, multiply leadership, overcome fear, and act on convictions. All this must be done authentically.
In this book we invite you to come with us on a journey as, in the next chapters, we explore Jesus' leadership style. Jesus was authentic, adaptable, spiritual, a communicator, a team builder, courageous, an initiator and first and foremost a visionary. We want to use one of Jesus' powerful tools in doing so, namely stories. We will share stories of people who are demonstrating the Jesus kind of leadership today.