Is humble ambition a paradox?

Posted on by
2

In my chronological reading through the Bible, I’ve arrived at the book of Nehemiah—a remarkable study of leadership. Many others have preached, blogged and written on the leadership principles gleaned from this case study. Nevertheless, I’m going to attempt to draw out some fresh points. As you will recall, Nehemiah was a cupbearer to King Artaxerxes, the Persian King. In spite of his status as a Jewish exile, he earned a position as part of the bodyguard protecting the ruler of one of the world’s two greatest powers at the time.

From the very first moment we meet Nehemiah, we sense a calling. As he serves the king in Persia, the news reaches him that Jerusalem is still lying in ruins after almost a century. It wrecks him. He weeps, he mourns and he prays day and night—for four months. Nehemiah doesn’t just pray with objectivity; he prays himself into the solution: “let Your servant prosper this day, I pray, and grant him mercy in the sight of this man,” the king (Nehemiah 1:11).

In other words, Nehemiah does something Moses and Gideon would never have dared. While they said, “send somebody else,” Nehemiah says, “send me.” God honours his request, and it starts him on a promotion path. First King Artaxerxes appoints him as foreman of the rebuilding effort. Then, after some early success in Jerusalem, the king promotes him to governor. When my pastor Glen Nudd preached on Nehemiah recently, he summarized it neatly:

At the end of it all, Nehemiah is given a job, a position, an assignment, a mission. He invites it, he receives it, he accepts it, he embraces it.

Can you do that? Is it okay for believers to show such ambition? Aren’t we supposed to resist the temptations of advancement and the lure of power? Isn’t it Christian to be content and to suppress ambition? Doesn’t Nehemiah’s action show complete lack of humility? As Pastor Glen put it:

Sometimes, as believers, we think that to be spiritual and godly we should always refuse advancement, promotion, or any kind of upward mobility and just go play in the shadows quietly, unnoticed and not expecting to influence anything very much. Maybe we think it’s the humble thing to do.

Were Moses and Gideon more godly than this young upstart, Nehemiah? After all, wasn’t Moses described in Numbers 12:3 as the most humble person on earth? Yet a careful reading reveals that Moses and Gideon were paralyzed by fear. I think many believers today have the same problem. While Pastor Glen allowed that there are valid reasons to turn down promotion, he pointed out that sometimes humility is a mask for the real issues for reluctance: fear of responsibility, fear of commitment, or fear of having our faith and abilities tested.

Pastor Glen asked us to consider promotion in a different light:

What if God wants to promote you so that He can use you in an even greater way to be salt and light in a dark world? What if your “no” is actually refusing the potential for great influence and ministry and impact for the Kingdom of God?

Proverbs 29:2 says, ‘When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but when a wicked man rules, the people groan.’

It’s a good thing, a God-honoring thing, when God’s people are promoted and the salt gets better distributed and the light shines farther. When the gospel and the glory of God are advanced, that’s a good thing.

There’s no Biblical prohibition on ambition for a cause, and that’s why Nehemiah willingly accepts position. The question is how you lead in whatever position God gives you. Jim Collins will tell you that a great leader engaged in a cause should lead with humility. I met a few Proverbs 29 Members of Parliament a couple of weeks ago in Ottawa. I was impressed at their quiet competence, but also their fire when it came to causes like human trafficking. Like Nehemiah, they embraced high positions and the voice it gave them. Through years of faithful witness, each has earned respect for the way they handled the challenges of federal politics.

So, is the act of stepping up in leadership antithetical to humility? Not at all. The answer, as we’ll see in Nehemiah 5, is servant leadership.

Fearless leader

Posted on by
1

If I had a nickel for every time someone referred to me as “our fearless leader,” I’d be a wealthy man. I realize people are trying to honour me, and I accept that, but the label rubs me the wrong way because it suggests that I’m cut from different cloth. It suggests I must be among the fearless ones, when most people have fears, and many are debilitated by fears.

It puts a leader on a pedestal that places leadership safely out of reach for the normal person.

But leading isn’t about being fearless. It’s about overcoming fear. Think about some of these Old Testament characters. We remember that all three boldly approached a foreign king, asking for favour:

  • Esther seems to have tried to dodge the pending annihilation of her people, keeping her heritage hidden beneath the robes of a queen. But then she accepted her cousin’s charge that she was God’s woman on the scene “for such a time as this.” She asked her people in the city to fast for three days while she summoned courage to visit the king and make her request. She concluded, “If I perish, I perish” (Esther 4:12-17). After winning the king’s favour, she still took two days to make her request, easing into it by filling the king’s stomach with feasting. Was it continued nerves or a strategic approach?
  • Ezra’s burden to teach the returning exiles God’s Word led him to approach the king and ask for favour to return to Jerusalem. He had more faith than strategy, because he kicks himself for failing to ask for protection. This became an extra burden when the king was so taken with this scribe’s request that he appointed him governor and overloaded him with donations. God’s hand and love had been so clearly extended to Ezra that he “took courage” (Ezra 7:28), but he admitted a few verses later that he had been “ashamed to ask the king” for protection after boasting in God’s power (Ezra 8:22). Desperate, he proclaimed a fast “and implored our God” to come through for them.
  • Nehemiah prayed four months before slipping up and allowing the king to see the burden he carried. When asked why he was so glum, he was “very much afraid.” He gulped and offered a teaser. When the king took the bait and asked his request, this cupbearer prayed a desperate plea before illogically seeking an appointment as construction foreman for a city wall (Neh 2:1-5).

My point is that we usually remember the outcome, not the struggle. Often the perception is self-inflicted, as leaders reinforce the hero myth. If followers only see the outcome, they put leaders on the pedestal. Leaders need to be clear about the burden we couldn’t shake, the wrestling with God, the dark nights of the soul that led us to make a bold decision.

Worse yet, sometimes leaders convince themselves that they were fearless. Perhaps it’s delusion, believing the headlines. Perhaps it’s forgetfulness. Perhaps it’s poor self awareness. Both Ezra and Nehemiah refer often to “the hand of God” being on them to the point of compulsion. They never claimed credit for their own courage.

Followers can also play a role in overcoming fear. In a later scene after Ezra gets to Jerusalem and exposes a pattern of sin among the clergy, he faces a horrendous decision. The king had given Ezra incredible authority to back up his teaching with strict judgment: death, exile, bankruptcy or prison (7:26). Still, Ezra struggled with the decision until his followers—the ones caught in sin—told him he must follow-through. “Arise, for it is your task, and we are with you; be strong and do it” (10:4). What an amazing verse of followership! Clearly God’s hand was on Ezra to have followers ready to face their punishment.

So how do you overcome fear? As I was putting this blog together, a friend referred me to the blog of Jeff Iorg, President of Golden Gate Seminary. In July 2012, he wrote three powerful and practical blogs on the subject of overcoming fear. They’re a worthy follow-up to this blog post.

Leadership lessons on the Alberta election

Posted on by
Reply

Not sure how many of my readers are from Alberta, so let me quickly summarize the “Orange Crush” that happened while I was out of town this week. For my American readers, skip to the end quickly for an abbreviated primer in parliamentary government.

Bottom line: the Progressive Conservative party that had ruled Alberta for 44 years lost an election Tuesday that seemed a sure thing when called a mere 30 days before. They lost so soundly they came in third, and their party leader and incumbent premier resigned on the spot. For the first time, the NDP, which has been largely irrelevant in Alberta politics, has won a majority, their leader Rachel Notley premier-elect. The Wildrose Party came in second, returning to its familiar role as “the official opposition,” but in a much stronger position than it was before then-leader Danielle Smith tried to merge it with the Conservatives in December.

I was in Ottawa meeting with leaders on Parliament Hill as the results came through, and my views were challenged and inspired as MPs reacted to and tried to interpret what had happened. I’m going to attempt to avoid political bias while steering our attention to the leadership lessons we can learn from this week in politics.

Hubris

Premier Jim Prentice wanted it all. In the Calgary Herald, Graham Thompson theorized,

Prentice thought he had it figured out — undermine the Wildrose with a mass floor-crossing, appoint his favourites as candidates, call an early election — but it all backfired.

He goes on to call it “hubris.” That’s an excellent description of the overreaching we saw in the last six months. Prentice wasn’t the only one. Danielle Smith could have been premier today if she hadn’t reached too far. I suspect both felt they could do something historical, uniting the right, squashing the opposition and winning an unprecedented mandate. Such a move could perhaps launch at least one of them on to federal prominence.

In How the Mighty Fall, Jim Collins offers 5 stages of decline:

  1. Hubris Born of Success
  2. Undisciplined Pursuit of More
  3. Denial of Risk and Peril
  4. Grasping for Salvation
  5. Capitulation to Irrelevance or Death

Sometimes, Collins says, you can be well into decline when you appear to be at the top of your game. The Alberta Progressive Conservative Party demonstrated the incredible speed with which everything can fall apart. As the Amazon review of that book says, “By understanding these stages of decline, leaders can substantially reduce their chances of falling all the way to the bottom.” All leaders can learn from this week’s object lesson, but the first warning sign is hubris. The solution is contentment, as I’ve blogged about before.

The bird in the bush

They say a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. But Thompson’s analysis suggests that, though many didn’t know much about “Notley’s Crue,” they preferred a bunch of rookies to the current set of politicians.

Change theory says for change to be successful, a leader has to explain why a group needs to move from “here” to “there.” It’s not enough to paint a picture of what could be; you also have to create what some call the “burning platform,” the rationale behind leaving what’s known and comfortable. Leaders like Bill Hybels have argued that many change initiatives fail because a leader failed to establish why we can’t stay “here.”

But what happens when an entire group decides they can’t stay “here” without really knowing what “there” looks like? Alberta apparently reached the tipping point, where the pain of sticking with the party of 44 years was higher than the pain of change. They moved en masse into the unknown. Change theorists will be paying attention to the outcome.

But can she lead?

At the beginning of the Invictus film, Mandela’s security detail are offended by a headline that reads, “He can win, but can he lead?” Mandela dryly responds that it’s a fair question. Over the last few months, we’ve seen a lack of leadership from Danielle Smith and Jim Prentice. Smith admitted this week that she had been “very very naive.” The void created an opening for leaders like Brian Jean and Rachel Notley. The latter rallied the vote of frustration and anger. She proved she can win an election. But can she provide leadership in a province that’s looking for it?

Notley’s stunning NDP-orange victory reminds me of Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi’s “Purple Revolution”  in 2010. He rallied the young vote and the frustrated vote into a winning combination. He turned out to be a competent leader who became a bit of a superstar after the flooding of 2013, leading to February’s over-the-top selection as the world’s top mayor. I suspect that’s overstating it, but it’s a demonstration of the  combination of popularity and leadership rare in today’s politicians.

All eyes in Ottawa were on Alberta this week, and few politicians are making plans beyond this October. It’s too early to see how it will all turn out, so I won’t join in any prognostications. But this week wasn’t just about politics. The earthquake of Alberta was also about leadership, and it is a case study on a number of fronts. Let me know your thoughts about the leadership lessons and implications.

An abbreviated primer in parliamentary government
(Canadians, if I get any of this wrong, I’m sure you’ll correct me in the comments.)

For my American readers, this will help you understand both our elections and the British election that just happened this week. On the federal level, the prime minister functions like your president, but he is actually within the legislative branch and first among cabinet members (aka “ministers”), therefore “prime minister.” As a legislator, the prime minister is also a member of parliament (MP) representing a specific district, called a “riding.” On the provincial level (kind of like states), this same function is called a “premier” rather than a governor, and he or she is a member of the legislative assembly (MLA).

Incidentally, as in the US, there are two legislative bodies. The prime minister comes from the House of Commons, made up of “commoners,” who represent the people of Canada. The second body is the Senate, made up of appointees who are not elected and have no terms. Unlike the UK, senators are not nobility. No earls and dukes in Canada’s Senate.

In Canada, the premier or prime minister is the leader of his or her party, and there are numerous parties. The potential swings from an irrelevant party with very few seats to an upset win (and vice versa) are astounding. I’ve quickly learned that you can never count out a party. The premier or prime minister has a 4-year window to call the next election, and it makes sense to choose the most optimal time rather than wait for the deadline. Once that election is called, the vote will happen 30 days later. It’s refreshingly quick! Even better, the candidates have 24 hours to take down all their signs or face fines.

For a more complete primer, try this guide to the Canadian Parliamentary System.

God’s requirement for leadership

Posted on by
Reply

About once a year Wycliffe Canada’s leadership team thinks about succession planning. We haven’t been doing it for very long, and each time we dust off the charts and consider our bench strength, I feel a bit more confidence in our process and note that we’re closing gaps. This is where we finally look at the evidence regarding what we feel to be true: we are making progress in developing leaders at all levels of the organization. It’s slow progress, but anything systemic is going to take some time.

When doing succession planning, there are a couple of questions you have to consider, and some traps that are too easy to fall into.

  • Do we really want to continue in the same structure we’ve had? The temptation with succession charts is to put names in all the boxes: immediate successor, 2-3 years and long-shot/dark horse candidates. But what if the best solution for any of those is to restructure, combine roles, partner or outsource? Does your format allow for that kind of thinking?
  • Just because the incumbent exhibits certain skills, experience and characteristics doesn’t mean her successor should. The challenge is to consider 3-5 years into the future and look for successors who can lead that functional area into the future. That’s why Jack Welch says that in the eight years he planned for his succession before stepping down as CEO of GE, most of the names eventually fell off his list, and it was the long-shot and dark-horse candidates who eventually became finalists.
  • And finally, we add a lot of our own biases when we consider names. Leaders often think themselves good judges of character, but I’ve seen a lot of leaders write candidates off too quickly. If we were brutally honest, a lot of CEOs would have written off the person their board selects to succeed them.

I could wade further into that subject based on my own reading and faltering attempts at it, but others would have a lot more expertise. If I based this blog post primarily on my own experience and wisdom, the prime benefit for you readers would be along the lines of one of my favourite leadership axioms:

A lot of good judgement comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgement.

For this post, I want to consider what God says about succession planning.

Let’s go back a step and consider some of the mythology around leadership in the first place. In Leading with a Limp, Dan Allender says our view of what a leader should be is quite different than God’s. For instance, we want the following:

  • “First, a leader must be physically attractive.” Full head of hair, all that. If they can’t be that, then they at least need to be over 6′ tall.
  • “We also presume our leaders will be fluent public speakers with a firm command of their audience.” We want panache, charisma and great storytelling.
  • “We seek leaders who are well-educated, open, sincere, humble, salt-of-the-earth people able to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, leaders who never forget their humble beginning or the values and convictions of those they represent.”
  • “We expect a leader to make tough decisions… yet we want him to tear up over a sad story and be sentimental on Mother’s Day.

Tell me that’s not true! How many of my readers measure up? This author certainly doesn’t. But we can’t stop there; Allender goes on to say,

What we want is an illusion and we know it. We prefer the illusion because we have a deep need to be buffered from reality. (p27)

The illusion is dangerous because it keeps any of us from qualifying. The pedestal we put leaders on makes leadership unattainable or destroys leaders with unmanageable expectations, sometimes self-imposed. When we apply our own biases to our successors, it gets truly scary. Ultimately, I want Me 2.0: a leader who matches my strengths but doesn’t have my weaknesses. But Me 2.0 doesn’t exist.

Even Moses had the same temptation, and he had the audacity to tell God what He should look for in his successor. Let’s look at Numbers 27:15-23:

Then Moses said to the Lord, “O Lord, you are the God who gives breath to all creatures. Please appoint a new man as leader for the community. Give them someone who will guide them wherever they go and will lead them into battle, so the community of the Lord will not be like sheep without a shepherd.”

Look at that list of requirements: a male, a guide, a general, and a shepherd. Where did Moses come up with this list? Is he simply trying to clone himself? Certainly, the wilderness needed a guide and a shepherd. While the historian Josephus tells us Moses had been a general in Egypt, he never takes direct control in any of Israel’s battles. At the same time, Moses is likely looking ahead and considering the next phase for Israel: as it moves into the Promised Land, it will certainly require a military leader as well as a guide and shepherd.

In contrast, what was God’s requirement for leadership?

The Lord replied, “Take Joshua son of Nun, who has the Spirit in him, and lay your hands on him.” (v18)

This doesn’t mean that Joshua didn’t measure up to Moses’ requirements. But God wasn’t looking at the man’s resume; he was looking for evidence of His Spirit. Joshua showed evidence in his past, and it becomes his primary hallmark of leadership after his commissioning:

Now Joshua son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom, for Moses had laid his hands on him. So the people of Israel obeyed him, doing just as the Lord had commanded Moses. (Deuteronomy 34:9)

Let’s apply these ideas to ourselves. Think for a minute about your successes. How many of them really happened because of your amazing ability? Or does your biography read more like Joseph’s? Potiphar… the prison warden… even Pharaoh himself didn’t need to pay attention to anything that was in Joseph’s charge, “because the Lord was with him. And whatever he did, the Lord made it succeed.” (Genesis 39:2-6; 39:21-23)

Are you self-aware enough to look at yourself with sober judgement and not take credit for God’s handiwork? Have you taken time to reflect and see God’s hand reaching into and through your life to bring about His purposes?

Second, how do we include in our hiring/interviewing practices queries for evidence of the Spirit? If character is bad, if the Spirit is not evident, or the person hasn’t reflected on whether his/her success might have come from God, then to develop their leadership abilities is to enable them. In the future, you will see someone who abuses power, position and people.

In short, without God’s Spirit, all you get is competence. Is that all you want? Is that enough?

Christmas like you mean it

Posted on by
2

I inherited from my father a love for word play. I love palindromes, Spoonerisms and contronyms and I love verbing nouns. At this time of year, I like to verb the word “Christmas.” In other languages, it’s easy. For instance, the Germans verb Weinachten. The famous German poem that I memorized in High School, “Christkindl`s Weihnachtsgedichte,” includes the line, “es Weinachtet sehr,” which literally means, “It Christmases a lot.”

The English language has always been adaptive, ready to embrace new words. If you look online, English uses of the verb form today include towns getting Christmased-up and people getting Christmased out. Perhaps it’s catching. But it’s not just a new phenomenon. I found this fantastic poem from 1887:

The Verbing Man

“Oh, yes I Christmased,” says the man,
Who skips from verb to noun;
I dined and turkeyed à la mode,
And curry sauced in town.

I restauranted everywhere,
I whiskyed, beered and aled;
Cigared I on Havanas rare,
And on Regalias galed.I

New Yeared, too, on viands rich
And I champagned myself;
Or Tomed and Jerryed — can’t tell which,
Expenditured my pelf.

I resolutioned on that day,
As spirits throbbed my head;
But when the pangs next panged away,
I just cocktailed instead.

—Texas Siftings
[reprinted in the Los Angeles Times, Feb. 3, 1887, p.9]

Let me get to my point. We’re well into the Christmas season, and the annual grumbling has begun. One thing you can count on every December is the Christians complaining that nobody’s recognizing Christmas anymore. Cashiers and waitresses won’t say, “Merry Christmas.” Cards opt for “Season’s Greetings” and “Happy Holidays.” Now we have Holiday trees, Holiday spirit and Holiday blend coffee.

One song probably grates on these Christmas defenders more than any other: “Holiday Like You Mean It.” The CBC has been running it on radio and TV this month. (If you haven’t gotten the song stuck in your head yet, you can find it here.) Rob Wells captured the essence of the Holiday season: festive, jolly and merry; presents, lights and bells. The fact that the Holiday has reached the point of verbing tells me the culture has crossed a line. December is the month to Holiday as we used to Christmas. And I for one am grateful that we’ve finally gotten to this point of honesty.

As I was wandering around the Eaton Centre in Toronto at the beginning of December (with that jingle stuck in my head), I realized I’m happy to tease this mashup season apart. Let’s let Holidaying refer to the rampant consumerism and materialism, the hustle and bustle and general busyness of the season, even the Santas and reindeer and elves.

As believers, I say we let them have the Holiday and we take back Christmas. Rather than defend the label, let them move on to new terminology for the season they’ve co-opted while we return to the real reason for Christmas: God coming to earth to be with us and live among us. Let’s redeem the term and let Christmas be a reflective and joyful time, centred around Christ and the fact that he gave. Then let’s renew our commitment to His mission: to be light in a dark world.

The well-known conclusion of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol says of Scrooge that, “it was always said of him, that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us!” In other words, after his transformation, Scrooge Christmased well. How did he do that? He took on the joy of generosity, his heart laughed, and “He became as good a friend, as good a master, and as good a man, as the good old city knew, or any other good old city, town, or borough, in the good old world. Some people laughed to see the alteration in him, but he let them laugh, and little heeded them.”

Let the world Holiday while we Christmas. As we do that as a minority Church, we’ll stand out against the culture rather than fighting to conform the culture to our ideals.

Christians, let’s Christmas like we mean it.

Even these times God makes beautiful

Posted on by
1

Have you ever stopped to consider that God has made death beautiful?

The Preacher in Ecclesiastes 3:11 states boldly that God “has made everything beautiful in its time.”

It’s a good sentiment, but have you ever taken time to think about the implications? The author reaches this conclusion after considering a long list of contrasts. You know the passage… or the Pete Seeger song:

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
a time to be born, and a time to die;
a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted…
a time to break down, and a time to build up;
a time to weep, and a time to laugh… (Eccl 3:1-4)

God has made everything beautiful: death, plucking up, breaking down, weeping. They’re all beautiful in their time. This season is a perfect one to consider that truth. Rather than simply letting the leaves brown and wither, God opted to allow them a glorious goodbye. In some ways, the fiery golds and reds of autumn declare the glory of God better than the vibrant reds and golds of spring.

Ecclesiastes tells us we can never have constant growth, constant abundance, constant life. In fact, death is necessary to create the conditions for life to spring up again.

Let’s dig a little deeper. Paul reached a parallel conclusion when he considered another set of contrasts in Philippians 4:11-12:

…I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.

I’m challenged on a personal level by Paul’s perspective, but I’m also convicted on an organizational level. There’s been a lot written about organizational life cycles and “S” curves. The intense pressure on public companies for constant growth spills over to non-profits. As a leader, I never want to report on decline, let alone preside over it.

The reality is that organizations will have, must have, times of plenty and times of want. There are times when God’s provisions are abundant, when you’re able to engage in mission in new ways. It’s a fun time of dreaming, expansion and starting up. Likewise, there are lean years, times when vision leaks, when mission is difficult and programs must be contracted and commitments pulled back. Such times require digging deep and persisting.

Even those times God makes beautiful.

I’ve noticed in myself a strong sense of discontent about my organization’s situation. We’ve recently come out of a season of decline and contraction, and things are beginning to turn around. But it seems like we never quite have enough resources to do what we think we need to be doing. It feels like we take one step forward and one step back. Every time a new resource comes that we’ve been waiting on for years—and now we can do this big thing we’ve been waiting on—suddenly another resource evaporates and we’re stretched and waiting again.

Even these times God makes beautiful.

Perhaps it’s God’s way of maintaining dependence. Perhaps it’s God’s way of testing our contentment. Like Paul, I need to ask myself whether my contentment comes from circumstances, from growth and abundance, from the need to preside over “success” or from God Himself.

As the leaves start turning and falling to the ground, remember the fact that God has made death and waiting beautiful. And remember that unless these leaves fall to the ground, life can’t come in the spring.

Turn Turn Turn.

[This post republished from my President’s blog on Wycliffe.ca]

Quieting the desire for more

Posted on by
1

God has been working on me in the area of contentment recently. As I’ve considered the issue, I’ve begun to appreciate just how counter-cultural it is, flying in the face of every marketing campaign and our own ambitious natures.

When we were in Atlanta this summer, a few family members gave our kids some money. Instead of spending it immediately, their eyes got big as they pooled their new-found wealth and realized they had enough to buy one of the bigger Lego sets. My immediate reaction was, “How much Lego is enough?” They have so much Lego already. Why do they feel they need any more? Can’t they be content with what they have?

Like so many Christians before me, I can weaponize Scripture. I can sharpen 1 Timothy 6:6-10 and thrust it like a dagger:

But godliness with contentment is great gain, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.

It took a few weeks before I felt my own conviction. I do the same thing, but not with Lego. At some point, my greed transferred to other, more adult fare: ambition, for instance. Ambition lacks contentment with current circumstances. Ambition always wants more.

Picture for a minute a tethered dog, or one contained within a fence. Where will the grass be well-worn? There will always be a well-worn track around the limits. I’m the same way; I always want more, I’m always looking beyond the space God has defined for me.

Psalm 131:1-2 pricks right to the heart:

O Lord, my heart is not lifted up;
    my eyes are not raised too high;
I do not occupy myself with things
    too great and too marvelous for me.
But I have calmed and quieted my soul,
    like a weaned child with its mother;
    like a weaned child is my soul within me.

How do we quiet our souls? How do we find contentment? Hebrews 13:5 recommends shifting our desires.

Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

In other words, God tells us, “All you need is me.” David agrees, as he closes out Psalm 131:

O Israel, hope in the Lord
    from this time forth and forevermore.

I hear David crying to my soul: “O Roy, hope in the Lord.” Yearn for Him, be content in Him. He never gets rusty, He never breaks down, He never goes out of fashion, He will never let you down, He will never leave you.

[This post republished from my President’s blog on Wycliffe.ca]

So, what movie did I pick?

Posted on by
Reply

The movie I went with for the Leadership Development Initiative film study was Invictus. In the end, what persuaded me was the timeliness of the story as well as the tight package of leadership lessons in 135 minutes. Let me share a few of my questions I used to stir conversation after the movie.

Invictus Study Guide

There were a number of characters who demonstrated leadership. We’ll start with Nelson Mandela, but most of us can’t identify with his character, so we’ll then look at a couple of the other characters.

  1. At the beginning, there’s a headline: “He can win an election, but can he run a country?” As Mandela grants, it’s a good question. Describe the leadership insight in that headline.
  2. Describe Mandela’s leadership style. In what ways—both bold strategies and small gestures—did Mandela demonstrate servant leadership?
  3. Can you think of any times when Mandela used a different leadership style? How did he employ situational leadership?
  4. What symbols and images were used by Mandela to bring about change?
  5. What are the upsides and challenges of attempting to repurpose a symbol?
  6. Mandela sets his goal on winning the World Cup—a goal he has no direct influence over. What strategies does he deploy?
  7. What did you learn about the relationship between leadership and followership?
  8. Name some of the other leaders in this movie. Which one do you most identify with? Why?
  9. Two in particular stand out, both of which are in #2 positions. Francois Pinaar, of course. But consider his chief of staff. In what ways does she support Mandela? In what ways does she challenge and become a foil to Mandela’s goals? What can we learn from her example?
  10. From Pinaar’s example, what can we learn about leadership when you’re not in the top position? How can leaders in #2 positions contribute to carrying forward the vision?
  11. The William Ernest Henley poem Invictus became an inspiration to Nelson Mandela during his captivity, and he uses it to inspire Pinaar. It ends with the lines, “I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.” What does Mandela’s inspiration tell us about the importance of leading yourself before you lead others?
  12. While there’s no evidence that Mandela was a follower of Jesus Christ, his life exemplifies the gospel message. Ultimately, Mandela’s modeling and message of grace is what sets him apart in human history. In what ways does he lead his country into grace and forgiveness? What were the pundits saying about South Africa when Mandela was first released, and what was the result of his counter-cultural leadership?

So, what movie did I pick? (Runner Up)

Posted on by
Reply

As I mentioned in my April 12 post, I needed to pick a leadership movie for our film study in Wycliffe’s Leadership Development Initiative. After considering more than 65 suggestions from comments here and other social media venues, I settled on one. Let me start with the runner up, which didn’t make any of my previous lists.

Runner Up: Band of Brothers

I can’t summarize it any better than my friend Brandon Rhodes, who made the initial suggestion:

Band of Brothers is the best sustained exploration of leadership that I have ever seen. Hard to narrow it to one episode, though, since it unfolds the issue in such detail over many incidents—episode 1, 2, 3, 5, or 7 might do. That last one especially, as it shows someone who displays de facto leadership while not actually possessing rank over the soldiers he winds up leading, encouraging, and protecting. Note that the first episode takes leadership as its topic, and also includes not a single act of violence—which might make it more appropriate for an audience that might include people who are sensitive about violence in film.

Not having seen the whole series, I borrowed the disks and watched all of the episodes during a one-week window. An incredible series that looks at leadership from a lot of different sides, at different levels. Some of the characters who model leadership:

  • First Lieutenant Sobel models everything you don’t want to do. Do his problems stem from a lack of character or a lack of confidence? I suspect it’s the latter, and much of his autocratic style is designed to mask his personal deficiencies.
  • Like Brandon, I really enjoyed the servant leadership style of First Sergeant Lipton during unfathomable difficulty. While the ranked leaders fail, he steps into the void. He gains a title only after he demonstrates leadership.
  • Major Winters is of course the leadership hero. While others demonstrate greater feats on the battlefield and he only fires his gun once in battle, he’s a hero to me because he consents to be promoted and step away from his loyalty and love for Echo Company. The series does a great job of portraying his competence but also his sacrifice for the greater good.
  • I think my favourite leader has to be First Lieutenant Speirs. He seems to have an instinctual ability to lead men. I love the way he cultivates his image. He builds a reputation on a couple of brave, crazy acts that keep his men in awe and fear, then refuses their attempts to dispel the rumours and break down the image. And because he’s decisive and excellent under pressure when those traits are most needed, he becomes the rescuer the company needs, fostering a form of love and loyalty that I suspect went both ways.

In addition, the stories are extremely well-told and depicted. If you want evidence, ask my wife, who regularly falls asleep in action movies. She watched every minute of Band of Brothers. Well, she did drift off during that one battle… I loved the way every episode followed a different character and used different story-telling techniques. A very clever, well-done piece of art.

So if I liked the series so much, why did I not pick it? It’s not the violence that held me back. Brandon nails it: the series is a sustained exploration of leadership and didn’t suit the format of one tight movie. I wasn’t happy that any single episode would meet my need.

Top leadership movies on my list to see

Posted on by
Reply

These movies are even more difficult to rank, except to go by how many recommendations I got, who recommended them and the fervor of their comments.

Lagaan – A Hindi film, with subtitles in English, that’s been on my list before. Now that it’s been cast in the leadership category, it’s very high on my list.

Elizabeth – “The first one is the best, I think.”

Gandhi – “Great for… vision, modelling the way, courage, determination, sacrifice, unselfishness”

October Sky – A couple of nominations for this one, the highlight being, “Laura Dern’s character (the high school teacher) who inspires, challenges, and stands up for the “rocket boys” in Coaltown, WV. She is not the main character, but is a key catalyst whose commitment and leadership brings about positive transformation of her students and community. One of my favorite movies.”

Gettysburg – I’m a fan of the Shaara Civil War series of books, and “Gods and Generals” was great. So this war leadership one has been on my list.

Coach Carter – “Great for… vision, setting clear expectations, team ethic, overcoming resistance, influencing.” There are just so many coaching movies. Guess I missed this one.

Secretariat – “The story of Penny Chenery is the best example of empowered female leadership in the last 20 years.”

Of Gods and Men – “It has more to do with the impact of a crisis on a small community – 8 monks in the face of terrorists in Algeria. You see their decision making process and how that changed. (Very moving and tragic story, but really better for crisis management, theology of risk, etc).”

12 O’Clock High – “A 1940′s WW2 movie about redeption vs. maxium effort…and the cost.” Great for “seeing what happens when a Leadership Change occurs.

Shake hands with the Devil – Somehow when my wife and I went through our Africa movie marathon, we missed this one about the Rwanda Genocide

 

Bonus:

These next ten aren’t on my list yet, but I could be convinced.

Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps – “’Greed is good.’ Unfortunately, greed and sustainable leadership cannot occupy the same space.” Haven’t seen it, but I’m a big fan of Michael Douglas.

The Lady – The story of Aung San Suu Kyi is one I’ve been interested in. Just discovered there’s a movie, but is it any good? One person thought so.

Places in the Heart – A movie “for which Sally Field won the Oscar in portrayal of depression era TX widow who keeps family and farm together against great challenges.”

Freedom Writers – I got a few nominations for this one.

Norma Rae – “Older and less well-known, but 2 Oscars and Sally Field.”

Lion in Winter – “3 Oscars, O’Toole & Hepburn.”

The Hiding Place – “Those women are still leading others today through their story and testimony.” I did watch half of this the other day when my son was watching it for a school project.

The Emperor’s Club – Nominated “for its Integrity focus that is so absent in much leadership today and as a result also in those mentored.”

Mulan – The person who nominated this one felt strongly enough about it to give it three exclamation points.

Whip It – Hard to get excited about a roller derby movie as an excellent leadership portrayal, so maybe I’m missing something.

 

Credit: Some of the comments I received included links to other lists. So let me give due credit for some of these thoughts: