A Deeper Dive into Our Perspectives on

Leadership and Theology

Our Leadership Point of View

Some Christians say leadership principles are deeply secular and inconsistent with a biblical worldview.

WE RESPECTFULLY DISAGREE.

For a fuller discussion of the biblical basis for our approach to leadership:

  • Leadership, at its core, is positive, fruitful influence. It is not titles, authority, or coercive power.

    Jesus has produced more positive, fruitful influence than any person in human history. By that measure, Jesus Christ was the greatest leader of all time.

    Leaders are not magically born with a charismatic or strong personality. Leaders are people who develop an ability to inspire others. They challenge followers to raise the trajectory of their lives—to take ownership of their lives, to commit to a higher purpose, and to pursue a greater vision of what God can do.

    Jesus did all these things. He was the supreme example of personal, authentic, spiritual influence. Jesus commanded his followers’ attention through his personal presence, moral example, and spiritual authority. As Jesus walked, his disciples went with him. As he taught, they learned a new way of life. As he modeled true leadership, he washed their feet. And then he gave his life so they could live.

    Like those first followers, disciples today walk with their leader, Jesus. They are close to him. They learn what he taught. They do what he did. They live as he lived. And they give of their lives for others. This is godly influence. This is true leadership.

  • True spiritual leadership produces powerful results, but not because of coercion or manipulation. The results are due to a love that is sustained by intimacy with God. Some may think evil tyrants or angry drill sergeants typify true leadership. This is false.

    Jesus did not lead like a powerful narcissist who forces his followers to serve his own interests. True leaders do not depend on domination or bullying. They do not coerce their followers to act (except perhaps in moments of extreme danger). True leadership radiates out of self-sacrificing care for others.

    Godly leaders never lead out of an empty spot in their own hearts. They do not use their power or position to address their emotional needs or fill their heart gaps. Instead, they lead out of a well of deep emotional, relational, and spiritual abundance. They gather, prepare, and organize followers to contribute to shared goals.

    This self-sacrifice flows out of intimacy with God. Great Christian leaders can concentrate on enabling their followers to fulfill their callings precisely because they already possess a deep sense of security in the love of God.

    Followers can sense that leaders like this are for them. So they feel safe. They know that in following godly leaders, they do not need to hold back resources for self-protection. They can act in confidence to fulfill their God-given callings. They understand that their leader is making a way for them to join with God in his plan to restore all things.

    Godly leaders do lead toward a missional goal. But as they do so, they also serve their followers. They add value to their lives by giving them a meaningful role in God’s work. Such leaders change the world for the better by leading like Jesus.

  • Since leadership begins with the inner world of the leader, the Bible offers much positive teaching that speaks to godly leadership. It builds a reliable foundation for true, godly leadership by showing how leaders must act out of a well of deep emotional security, relational strength, and spiritual faith in God.

    The Bible tells of successful leaders who followed this prescription and honored God in their work. It also provides many examples of evil, incompetent, insecure, or narcissistic so-called “leaders” who used their status or position to compensate for their own inner voids. Think of King Saul. The lives of failed leaders end in ruin. These are cautionary tales.

    The Bible also provides principles to act on. It describes the viewpoints and behaviors of leaders who did the work—organizing followers for success, inspiring their efforts, structuring their plans, and counting their results. (Think of Moses, Nehemiah, and the apostles in Acts 6.) Jesus repeated honored those (like the ten-talent manager) who successfully accomplished missional results.

  • We ground our understanding of leadership, therefore, in the Bible. And we also learn from other areas of human experience. We believe that what flows out of special revelation (the Bible) and what comes to us from general revelation (experience and research) is all revelation. That is, it all comes from God. All truth is God’s truth.

    When a Christian gets a cancer diagnosis, they usually seek both medical treatment and also fervent prayer. We think this is appropriate. So we oppose any attempt to draw artificial divisions between biblical understanding and healthy human experience. As in medicine, so in leadership: we are both guided by the Bible and also informed by/helped by the experience of human leaders and the research results of careful scholars.

    Because an accurate model of leadership calls for a “both/and” approach, research into leadership at secular business schools, as an example, is relevant to Christian leaders. Of course, we never adopt ideas uncritically. We self-critically learn from leaders in non-Christian arenas. As we do so, we aren’t just borrowing principles of leadership that find their only natural home in business, the military, or the government. We aren’t just applying alien or “secular” ideas willy nilly to the church.

    In fact, much of what has become common practice in business (for example, the emphasis on having a clear mission) comes from Christians who studied the Bible. ‘Mission,’ after all, is a biblical word! If anything, the corporate world learned much about leadership from the Bible. So if business leaders can learn to lead from Jesus and the Bible, certainly church leaders can, too.

    We believe the mindsets and habits of healthy leadership, as revealed in the Bible and confirmed in human experience, are appropriate for the church.

  • We believe in transformational leadership. In this model, leaders do two things: (1) they tenaciously pursue an organization’s mission, and (2) they invest in their people.

    Those who view leadership through the stereotype of a drill sergeant fail to see the second point. They imagine that leaders, like tyrants, are most effective when they exercise force and use power to achieve their goals.

    This stereotype of leadership is false. Tyrants are actually terrible leaders; they produce sub-optimal results. By contrast, great leaders add incredible value to the lives of their followers as they accomplish great results. They actually use the organization’s missional work as a laboratory for building people up.

    In the church, when the people are trained for and deployed in the mission of God, that is when they experience transformational spiritual growth. True spiritual growth cannot be limited to knowledge, but must include actions and character. After all, “knowledge puffs up while love builds up” (I Cor 8:1).

    So true church leaders go beyond motivation and encouragement. Motivational sermons, without behavior guidance, create a short term buzz. Real transformation arises when leaders permanently rewire the ways in which people think, feel, and act.

    Great pastors are not in it for themselves. They sacrifice themselves and their own interests, not only for the mission of God, but also for the well-being of the people. Like Jesus, as they lead, they wash their followers’ feet.

  • Whether any organization is flourishing or floundering, it usually comes back to the presence or absence of one thing: effective leadership. Leaders bear the bulk of responsibility for any organization’s success or failure. They cannot escape this accountability.

    This is principle is true of nations, armies, businesses, and even football teams. (A team of all-pro players, led by an incompetent coach, will never win the Super Bowl.) This principle is also true of local churches. Leadership is the single most important differentiator between effective and ineffective organizations.

    Of course, an organization’s success or failure always involves people other than the leader. Every member of an organization is important and contributes to its success or failure. But the leader sets a direction, organizes the people, inspires action, and cares for everyone along the way. A leader either maximizes or squanders the value of every individual’s contribution.

    Godly leadership, therefore, is absolutely essential for thriving churches. But this does not mean that leadership is the only relevant factor. Fervent prayer, biblical wisdom, spiritual maturity, and effective ministry are essential, too.

    Still, “good,” spiritually-minded churches, with great Bible teaching and lots of prayer, can flounder. This shows that while spiritual vitality is essential, it is not sufficient. Effective leadership is required, too.

    So a dynamic, flourishing church will be led by biblical, prayerful, and spiritual pastors. And also, these pastors will be effective, self-sacrificing leaders who know and practice all the disciplines of effective leadership.

    When pastors decide to truly lead, they alter the trajectory of a church and change the history of the world. When God uses a leader to change a church, its community is transformed. When God uses a church to transform a community, the world is altered forever.

FOR PASTORS
FOR MEMBERS
FOR INVESTORS

Theology: In Detail

  • We believe in the good and great God revealed in the Bible. God is the infinite and personal Creator. He is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-present. God exists from all eternity as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

    God the Father, the first person of the Trinity, is the Source of all things and the perfect model for all true Fatherhood. The Father’s heart is defined most centrally by love. God has many other moral attributes—central among them justice, mercy, holiness, and truth. But like the Father of the Prodigal Son, God the Father is first and foremost full of compassion towards his creatures. God’s posture towards sinners is not first one of anger or condemnation. “God so loved the world that he gave his Son … He did not send his Son into the world to condemn” (Jn 3:16-17).

    Or course, God is also just. So God hates evil. He hates human sin because it damages people, both the sinner and the one sinned against. Sin breaks relationships, both with God and with others. Sin creates and amplifies the mayhem in the world.

    Crucially, when we sin, we disconnect ourselves from God, the Source of life, and we ultimately destroy ourselves. Jn 3:16 rightly translated says, “All who put their trust in Christ will not destroy themselves.” (The Greek middle voice—’perish’ or ‘destroy’—means a person without faith in Christ destroys himself.) God has no interest in destroying us. God wants us to enjoy Life to the fullest.

    Sin is not just rule-breaking. More fundamentally, sin is taking a stance of opposition to God’s reign in our lives. So God does not countenance sin in his presence. God in his justice will punish sin, conquer evil, and destroy death. But while God punishes sin, he does not destroy sinners. He makes a way out of sin’s bondage. “While we were yet sinners, Christ gave his life for us” (Rom 5:8).

  • Jesus Christ is the second person of the Trinity who came to earth in the incarnation. Christ is the prophesied Messiah of the Jews and the perfect Savior of all humanity.

    Jesus is the fully divine Son of God. Though he is one in personhood, he possesses two natures. One is a divine nature. This was clear from his divine titles, divine works, and divine privileges. Most importantly, his deity is confirmed by his resurrection from the dead. Jesus Christ is God of very God.

    Jesus Christ is also fully human. He also possesses a human nature. As a human on earth, he lived in a human body, suffered human limitations, and experienced human emotions. He therefore understands all that we experience by personal acquaintance. As a member of the human race, he can fully represent us before the Father.

    As the incarnate Son of God, Christ’s words taught us about God, his actions revealed God’s plan, and his miracles confirmed his divine mission. But his ministry did not culminate in his teachings. Christ’s work climaxed in his death on the cross for the redemption of the world and in his resurrection from the dead. At the cross, Jesus Christ broke the power of evil, completed the work of redemption, and established his place at the head of the church.

  • The Holy Spirit, third person of the Trinity, lives intimately with believers. As God, the Spirit participated in creating the universe, and he continues to sustain the natural world.

    The Spirit overshadowed Mary so that she became pregnant with the Christ child. The Spirit empowered Christ in his earthly ministry. And at Pentecost, the Spirit fell on the apostles, hovering over them in the form of little flames. This was the same fire that stood above the tabernacle in the Old Testament, representing God’s presence. But now God’s presence rests, not with a building, but with God’s people. Today, the Spirit brings salvation into human lives, heals God’s people of their brokenness, and empowers believers to live fruitful lives.

    Importantly, the Spirit guided the authors of the Bible through the act of inspiration. The Spirit also illuminates the minds of those who read the Bible so that even if they lack formal education, they are able to grasp its core message: that God loves every person, challenges each one to acknowledge God’s reign in their lives, offers to give all who respond in faith the gift of salvation, and sends each one into the world to serve him.

  • Through the Holy Spirit, the Triune God inspired the Bible. The Bible is not just an historical document or a literary masterpiece, though it is those things. God is an author of the Bible, so in the Bible, God is the speaker who communicates his love and will.

    The divine authorship of the Bible, through inspiration, establishes the Bible’s divine authority over us. In practical terms, this means that in everything we think and do, we acknowledge the priority of the Bible’s message. The Bible is not the only source by which we know anything, but it is the supreme source and guide for our beliefs and practices.

    Although the Bible is inspired by the Spirit, it also bears the marks of genuine human authorship. Prophets and apostles wrote the Bible in their humanity, reflecting their personalities, cultures, and historical situations. So the human writers were indeed authors. But because the Spirit guided those writers through inspiration, the result—the Bible—is not merely human opinion about God. It is God’s communication of himself to humanity.

    While we commit to working carefully and respectfully to interpret the Bible in its original meaning, we also have confidence that the Spirit speaks to us through its pages. Because God authored the Bible, we have confidence that it is completely true in what it teaches and powerful in its effects. When the Bible speaks, we acknowledge that God speaks.

  • Every human being is “created in God’s image,” which entails that each human life is of inestimable worth. The value of a human life, even one yet to be born, never depends on social status, physical strength, intellectual knowledge, or any other ability. Everyone matters to God.

    God created us as human beings for a reason—to relate intimately with our Creator (Adam and Eve walked with God in the Garden), to do productive work (Adam and Eve cared for the Garden), and to represent God in the world (Adam named the animals).

    From the beginning, God invited us as humans into this intimate love. God walked with Adam and Eve in the Garden. But by definition, love cannot be coerced. So God does not compel us love him. Instead, he invites us to follow him, and also leaves open the choice not to. Of the millions of decisions any person makes in a lifetime, this is the most important: it is The Choice.

    When we answer The Choice by choosing to put God first, to follow Christ, we receive salvation. Intimacy with God becomes the defining characteristic of our existence. It becomes our identity.

    Identity today is often pegged to a person’s national origin, family connections, race or ethnicity, professional achievement, sexual inclination, or social class. Of course, these factors do describe humans in their diversity. But in the Bible, intimacy with God or alienation from God is any human person’s most fundamental identity marker. We who follow Christ are Christians. We are “in Christ” (II Cor 5:17). We are Christ Ones.

    The Choice (to honor God as our Leader and King or to rebel against God) is presented throughout the Bible: “I have set before you this day life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live!” (Deut 30:19).

    Every one of us therefore confronts these two options: (1) choosing God as King of our lives or (2) anointing our Self as Master of our lives.

  • In the Garden, The Choice is immediately presented to our first parents. They were commanded to choose God as their Leader (symbolized in the Garden by the Tree of Life). This was the path to Life, the fulfillment of God’s purpose in creating them. But they also had it in their power to choose Self their guide for life (signified by the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil).

    Our first parents chose death. They ate the fruit of the forbidden tree (the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil), and thus they disobeyed God. In eating the fruit, they didn’t simply commit an individual sinful act, like stealing $5000. More fundamentally, this act amounted to saying, “We put Self in charge of our lives.”

    This choice broke the intimacy Adam and Eve enjoyed with God. But their sin did much more. Every part of creation became infected with evil. Sin caused a rupture in their love as husband and wife. Sin distorted their work. Sin tore their family apart leading to their son, Cain, murdering his brother, Abel. In the end, the web of corruption expanded out to include everything in society, leading to worldwide judgment.

    Humans tried to overcome the alienation from God by banding together to build a Tower to heaven. But this political project came to nothing. The biblical story summarizes the dismal result: “Every thought of every person was only evil all the time” (Gen 6:6).

    Today this rupture of sin affects every human before birth. At birth, before we become self-aware, we are already separated from God and alienated from others. We are thrust into a whole web of human relationships shaped by moral dysfunction and self-centeredness. As we grow, we experience unhealthy differentiation—the desire to define ourselves over against others and to use others to meet our own needs.

    Even as self-aware adults, we experience an inborn, habitual inclination toward self-centeredness. We feel an urgent desire to prioritize our own survival and status at the expense of others. And the fact of intrapersonal insecurity leads us to an interpersonal posture of fear. We act out this posture by committing acts of aggression against others, which only reinforce our alienation from God and from others.

    Thus every human is thrown into the physical world and grows up in a social world disconnected from God. Every heart is inclined toward making Self the leader for life. This triggers every other human problem we face. We are mired in this mess. We are powerless, in our own strength, overcome either the fundamental problem or the tentacles of its symptoms. Our only hope is God.

  • But God, in his love, has a plan. Since God’s stance is first and foremost a posture of love, not of condemnation, God longs to see us experience renewal, intrapersonally and interpersonally. God wants to restore our hearts, reestablish our human relationships, and (most deeply) reconnect our hearts with himself.

    For us today, the first step we take to access this plan is to respond to God’s loving invitation. This involves repentance—rejecting our former stance of Self as king—and faith—acting in trust to commit ourselves to Christ as King. Every person who puts their trust in Christ receives the gift of salvation.

    Salvation is made possible by the Cross: Christ’s atoning death and his resurrection. (Christ’s death purchases the gift of salvation; our faith is the act of receiving the gift.) When we surrender to Christ by placing our trust in him, we experience the gift of forgiveness for sin. That’s possible because Christ paid our penalty at the cross. When our sin’s guilt is wiped out, the Father restores an intimate relationship with himself. When we open the gift box of salvation, we find the box contains the gift of intimate connection to God.

    After this conversion experience, we begin a growth experience of spiritual transformation. This involves learning the Christian way of life, practicing spiritual disciplines, and discovering our spiritual gifts. This season of apprenticeship to Christ includes the transformation of thinking (mindsets), the building of godly character (habits), and preparation for Kingdom service. It culminates when a believer’s life becomes completely infused with the love of Christ.

    The goal of salvation is not just to buy a ticket to heaven. Having become a Citizen of God’s Kingdom, every believer is commissioned as an Ambassador. So we begin to prepare to live lives of love, generosity, hospitality, and service. God doesn’t expect those who receive salvation to sit around waiting for the Rapture. Instead, the mission of every Christian and every local church is to join God in the redemption of the world. This includes words of truth that share the Gospel of the Kingdom as well as deeds of love that serve our neighbors in Christ’s name.

    When we become Kingdom Citizens (Phil 3:20), we take our first steps toward training as Kingdom Ambassadors (II Cor 5:20). We’re all commanded to play a part in inviting others into Kingdom Citizenship. And we’re all commanded to live our lives as agents of God’s peace in the world. We do this by serving our families, churches, neighborhoods, workplaces, and communities. By doing this missional work, we become a part of the answer to the words of the Lord’s Prayer: “May your will be done on earth … as it is in heaven.”

  • The church is the New Testament community of God’s people on earth. The church is a new, covenantal society. It is formed by love, and it works to shape each member into their full godly potential for service.

    Paul calls the New Testament church a New Humanity. It is composed of diverse people from every gender, ethnic, social, racial, or political background (Eph 2:14-16). When a local church operates as it should, its members become a people who are led by Christ, shaped by love, and dedicated to mission.

    This mission of the church sits in an Old Testament context. The Bible explains in Gen 1-11 that sin has completely damaged the world. In Gen 12:1-3, God launched his plan to restore the world—individuals, families, communities, and nations. God chose Abram and gave him a task: to bless the nations of the earth. This was the beginning of God’s cosmic process of renewal in which all things will be “set back to rights.” God declared that this work of restoring all things will be competed when he brings heaven to earth to establish his Kingdom (Rev 21:1-4).

    Through Abram, God first gave the task of blessing the nations to the Jewish nation. But the People of God in the Old Testament got off mission. Israel was more concerned about receiving and protecting its own blessings than with blessing others. This led to national judgment.

    After the inauguration of the New Testament church at Pentecost, God gave the task of blessing the nations over to the New People of God, the church (see Acts 3:25). Thus it is critical that the People of God today follow God’s plan to bless the nations of the earth by spreading the Gospel—the message of salvation through Christ. Every local church must face the question Israel faced. Will we commit to the mission of God or will we protect our own preferences and privileges?

    Each local church’s answer to this question directly affects whether or not that church will flourish today. American churches that prioritize Christ’s mission are the very churches that flourish. Conversely, the American churches in crisis—the churches on a slippery slope toward death—are the churches that are repeating Israel’s disobedience. Some of these may seem like “good” churches from the outside. But in fact, they’re following their own preferences and enjoying fellowship with one another as they wait for the Age to Come.

  • Someday, God will complete the work he gave the church—his Kingdom-building project on earth. Then Christ will return.

    Christ’s return does not mean the destruction of earth, as some suppose. The New Testament teaches that God will bring heaven to earth, unifying the two. God’s Kingdom reign, which began with Christ’s first coming, will now begin in its fulness. And the people of God will live with the King.

    Until that day, we who are Kingdom Citizens do not wait passively for Christ’s return. We work with energy as Kingdom Ambassadors.

    In the end, God will plant the Tree of Life. This tree, first seen in the Garden of Eden, will produce abundant life. It will symbolize the bearing of much fruit, for it will produce, not just each spring, but in every month of the year (Rev 22:2). God will renew a world of Shalom in which there is no pain, no crying, and no evil, only love, joy, and peace.

    As so shall we be with Christ forever.