Theological Issue #2 Leadership and Authority A leader is someone who is willing to build an ark in the dark.. 1 Are leadership and authority separable? Some thinkers answer "yes." Perhaps leadership is fundamentally about making sense, before it is functionally about influence. Drath and Paulus argue that the old understanding of leadership rested on a set of assumptions about human nature and motivation. The dominance-cum-social-influence view assumes that humans are naturally at rest and that they need a motivation force to get them going. The meaning-making view assumes that people are naturally in motion, always doing something, and that they need, rather than motivation to act, frameworks within which their actions make sense.2 Furthermore, facing the failure of imagination, we need leaders who will sacrifice their personal advancement to inspire the risk and sacrifice necessary to bring change. It's easy to consider such movement in abstract terms. The Gospel leaves no room for abstraction, since Jesus "emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant" and "tented among us." Mark Strom writes that, "Dying and rising with Christ meant status reversal. In Paul's case, he deliberately stepped down in the world. We must not romanticize this choice. He felt the shame of it amongst his peers and potential patrons, yet held it as the mark of his sincerity. Moreover, it played a critical role in the interplay of his life and thought. Tentmaking was critical, even central, to his life and message. "Evangelicalism will not shake its abstraction, idealism and elitism until theologians and clergy are prepared to step down in their worlds. Some might argue that since the world often shows contempt for the pastoral role, then professional ministry is a step back. But that is to ignore the more pertinent set of social realities. Evangelicalism has its own ranks, careers, financial security, marks of prestige, and rewards. Within that world, professional ministry is rank and status."3 We need dreamers and visionaries who are captivated by Christ and who embrace His dream of the coming kingdom, where even the poor are welcome. Frost and Hirsch note that "It is this capacity to articulate a preferred future based on a common moral vision that allows people to dream again.."4 If the ship hit an iceberg, we ought to be asking questions in the wheel-house. We need to scrutinize our leadership models, borrowed largely from modern technological culture.5 To what extent are they biblical? What values do they represent? How do we incorporate the NT perspectives on the ascension gifts of Jesus to His body? The context of leadership is often absent from discussions about leadership. We must understand the peopleness of God's family. Ephesians 4 is relational language and strongly set in the context of caring community. Dee Hock, a well known leadership consultant comments that, "In the deepest sense, distinction between leaders and followers is meaningless. In every moment of life, we are simultaneously leading and following. There is never a time when our knowledge, judgment and wisdom are not more useful and applicable than that of another. There is never a time when the knowledge, judgment and wisdom of another are not more useful and applicable than ours. At any time that "other" may be superior, subordinate, or peer. "6 Our language is problematic. Leader implies follower, neatly separating the people of God into categories like hieros and laos, and attributing the important contribution to those who lead, thus disempowering God's people. The related issue of decision making is likewise critical. We need to develop communal discernment models (see Guder7 on this ), similar to those practiced among the Quakers, remembering Jesus call for an alternative society.8 Finally, we need to talk about authority,9 how it is given and taken and conferred, and how it ought to be exercised. As we move from a foundationalist epistemology to a non-foundationalist perspective, we are going to approach Scripture less rigidly and as the instrumentality of the Spirit.10 We need a hermeneutic that does not look to Enlightenment methods. This shift will profoundly impact other issues around authority, including our approach to decision making. In most faith communities vision comes from the top down because authority is invested in a hierarchy, a contrast to Jesus call for an alternative society. Go to Issue #3: The Context of the Conversation Notes 1 Sweet, Leonard. 2004. Summoned to Lead. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan. 2 Drath, Wilfred and Paulus, Charles. 1994. Making Common Sense. Center for Creative Leadership. 3 Strom, Mark. Reframing Our Conversation with Paul. Downer's Grove, Ill: IVP, 2000. 4 Frost, Michael and Hirsch, Alan. 2003. The Shaping of Things to Come. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Pub. p.209 5 Foundational work on describing the impact of technology on human societies, in particular the church, was done by the French sociologist Jacques Ellul in a series of books. The foremost of these is The Technological Society, and the particular works in relation to the church are The Presence of the Kingdom and The False Presence of the Kingdom. 6 Dee Hock. 2000. The Art of Chaordic Leadership. Leader to Leader, No.15, Winter. p.21. See also Surowiecki and Singer, The Wisdom of Crowds, Random House, 2004 7 See the discussion by Inagrace Dietterich in Guder, Missional Church, "Cultivating Communities of the Holy Spirit," 172ff. 8 The Canadian thinker Marshall McLuhan opined, "The medium is the message." Sadly, the message most church members get is that they have neither the authority nor the call to be ministers of the gospel. 9 We need a new word that is more relational and that includes an ethos of covenant. 10 Franke (The Character of Theology) states that the Spirit-prompted truth of Scripture is authoritative in conjunction with culture and theology.

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• © 2005 Len Hjalmarson.• Last Updated on September 9, 2005