Leighton Ford understands how important it is for effective leaders to offset or ‘intercept entropy’ (see LF #21). When an organization is ‘new’, it’s like eight small boys chasing a chipmunk: lots of noise and confusion, lots of wasted energy, but great flexibility and motivation. As the organization matures, the challenge of the leader is to keep the youthful zest without youthful disorder, to grow into maturity without taking on an aging rigidity.
Have you ever seen this struggle played out in your church or institution? So what can be done to prevent the implosion? I will offer some suggestions next week. Until then, observe and assess your present location on the ‘entropy spectrum’.
I think the Church of Ephesus in Revelation 2 reflects what we are talking about here. In their zeal to remain doctrinally pure (a good thing) they became so narrowly rigid that what they were known for (love of God and love of others) disappeared (a not so good thing). They had lost their first love.
The challenge: how to keep youthful passion alive while embracing the wisdom of maturity.
Friday, July 18, 2008
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Intercepting Entropy
This is a profound leadership principle. Leighton Ford’s 1991 IVP book Transforming Leadership: Jesus’ Way of Creating Vision, shaping Values & Empowering Change, captures the concept wonderfully. Everything has a tendency to deteriorate, and a leader must learn the signals of impending deterioration. Some of these are:
- A tendency toward superficiality
- A “dark tension” among key people
- No time for celebration
- Problem-makers outnumber problem-solvers
- Day-to-day pressures push aside vision and risk
Have you ever seen this in a church? One of the most important jobs of a leader is to SUSTAIN. Spiritual leaders need to learn this before it’s too late.
(In coming weeks: what remains unchanged for the church? How to sustain, what to sustain; the ‘chasing chipmunks’ leadership style ;)
- A tendency toward superficiality
- A “dark tension” among key people
- No time for celebration
- Problem-makers outnumber problem-solvers
- Day-to-day pressures push aside vision and risk
Have you ever seen this in a church? One of the most important jobs of a leader is to SUSTAIN. Spiritual leaders need to learn this before it’s too late.
(In coming weeks: what remains unchanged for the church? How to sustain, what to sustain; the ‘chasing chipmunks’ leadership style ;)
Thursday, July 3, 2008
The Leadership Strategy of Jesus
According to Leighton Ford, who wrote Transforming Leadership in1991 (Inter Varsity Press), here are the leadership strategies of Jesus:
• HE SHOWED HIS WAY: Early followers were called people belonging “to the Way” (Acts 9:2). Jesus said “I am the way” (John 14:6). He set the direction, not so much by a detailed road map, but by His very person.
• HE SHAPED HIS PEOPLE: Jesus had succession in mind. Future leaders must be fostered. Jesus carefully picked and developed his inner core of followers and let them share the centre of His life. When the time came for him to leave, he did not need to put together a crash program of leadership development. No election was needed. The curriculum had been taught, lived out for three years among the next group of leaders who would carry his mission.
So what does this mean for the church? Certainly Jesus understood leadership to be much more than just filling vacant positions! He ‘groomed’ future leaders, not just by classroom instruction, but by the popular term of our day – mentoring. Effective leadership strategy is a long term process that involves so much more than memorizing information content.
• HE SHOWED HIS WAY: Early followers were called people belonging “to the Way” (Acts 9:2). Jesus said “I am the way” (John 14:6). He set the direction, not so much by a detailed road map, but by His very person.
• HE SHAPED HIS PEOPLE: Jesus had succession in mind. Future leaders must be fostered. Jesus carefully picked and developed his inner core of followers and let them share the centre of His life. When the time came for him to leave, he did not need to put together a crash program of leadership development. No election was needed. The curriculum had been taught, lived out for three years among the next group of leaders who would carry his mission.
So what does this mean for the church? Certainly Jesus understood leadership to be much more than just filling vacant positions! He ‘groomed’ future leaders, not just by classroom instruction, but by the popular term of our day – mentoring. Effective leadership strategy is a long term process that involves so much more than memorizing information content.
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