Climbing The Summit 20,000 Feet!

David Gergen, author of Eyewitness to Power, was the next speaker on the docket at the Summit. Gergen is currently a professor of public service at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government, and Director of its Center for Public Leadership. He is also editor-at-large for U.S. News & World Report and a Senior Political Analyst for CNN. In earlier years, he served as a White House adviser to Presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton. (On the web at davidgergen.com). What can you say about a man who has been an advisor in the White House to four different presidents? His whole presentation was on leadership. The following are some sound bites:

Leadership

• is working with others in pursuit of shared goals.

• is about trust and communication.
• cannot be produced.
• principles can be shared.
• is a culture to be created, within a church, for example.
• thinks carefully.
• chooses big goals.
• goes after them tenaciously.
• does not have to be lonely.
• is no longer being The Lone Ranger.
• is in teams built to lead.
• can go fast, alone, or far, together.


Becoming a better leader

• is a must.
• means being a reflective practitioner.
• requires learning while in the arena doing it.
• means continuing to be self-educated.
• and reader – not every reader is a leader, but every leader is a reader.
• requires getting away to reflect on what you did.
• requires self-confidence to get away and get in communion with God and reflect.



He also shared the most admirable qualities of the following presidents, which I thought was historically amazing.

• President Nixon was the best strategist. He could look into the future 20-30 years and bend the forces of history to benefit the U.S. Someone that can look further back can see further ahead. (Henry Kissinger, for example – Nixon’s sidekick.)

• President Ford was the most decent one. You did not have to keep your back to the wall. “Nice guys finish last” is not true. Decent people are so rare that we prize them.

• President Reagan was the best leader in the White House since FDR. He had strong beliefs and principles. He had contagious optimism. He encouraged everyone to go forward.

• President Clinton was a very bright guy and had a very quick mind. His resiliency was remarkable. He was always willing to get back up.

Gergen also touched on some of the weaknesses in these presidents. He prefaced this by stating that we all have weaknesses. Amen.
• President Nixon had a very dark side that he could not control. He was the author of his own tragedy.
• President Ford was a little too naïve at times. (President Carter was the same way.)

• President Reagan was a little too detached at times. He entrusted too much.

• President Clinton paralleled Nixon as far as fundamental character cracks. He should have come clean and asked for forgiveness.


“Great leaders carry great flaws.” All leaders are flawed in some way, but growing and maturing is coming to grips with our flaws. Many people will not conquer their flaws, but we do need to make an effort to get them under control so they do not derail us. The key, in David’s opinion, is to integrate the dark side and the light side. For example, we may have to align our private behavior and public life. Martin Luther King was a great moral leader of the 20th century. In his private life, he was clearly a sinner, a very chaotic life; he never claimed to be a saint, always struggling to make that alignment. Nelson Mandella also had a very messy private life. However, he would get up every day and try to be better. David would tell us that we need to be more tolerant with public figures’ private lives. What if our lives were as public as theirs? We would need the great tolerance of others toward us, too.


Then there are personal habits of leaders that he considered. These matter a lot. A leader needs to be self- disciplined. They need to have regular habits, have control of their life and who they are as a person. We need to be physically fit. Build time into your day to reflect. Build time into your day to be with people who cherish you – the more loving relationships we have, the longer life we will lead. Do not expect to do everything in one day. And – read a lot. Well, how did you evaluate yourself in the light of all of Gergen’s lists?


The last area he touched on dealt with more of the spiritual side of things. For example, he stated that when a person drives into your church, they believe three things will happen in the service. 1. There will be help for finding inner peace. 2. They will learn something. 3. They will progress on their spiritual journey. Their spiritual foundation will help them find their moral compass. Church should be designed to give us a moral compass. A church should nourish this.

Also, from a spiritual perspective, he touched on the ego of a leader, and how that can be held in check. David says, “Your ego gets so big as you become a great leader that nothing applies to you anymore (e.g., “If the president does it, that means it’s not illegal.”) Religion would put this in perspective: There are so many things that are bigger than us. God is God and we are part of the grander scheme; we are not the scheme.

A good way to finish on a November blog is with a big slice of humble (pumpkin) pie, enjoy! (But remember what I said earlier about needing to be physically fit, too. If we could only Overcome Acedia concerning that!)

Climbing The Summit 14,000 Feet!

This quote is taken right from Dave Gibbon’s website http://davegibbons.tv/ as he defines what “Third Culture” is: “Third culture is about the fusion of multiple cultures, the art of adaptation, dialogue rather than dictation, diplomacy over strong arm tactics, and the embrace of discomfort as part of the journey to real community. Third culture is the mindset and will to love, learn and serve in any culture even in the midst of pain and discomfort. In short, 3rd Culture is PAINFUL ADAPTATION." Dave Gibbons is the founding pastor of Newsong, a multi-site international third-culture church. His book, The Monkey and the Fish, would give you a more in-depth look at this fascinating topic.

Dave says that the two Greatest Commandments: Love God and Love Neighbor tend to impact most churches. Most of us would think our neighbor is someone who is like us (racially, economically, socially, educationally, etc.). In the homogenous principle, likes attract. However this principle has created churches that tend to be comsumeristic. Dave would advocate that we need to start churches that are abnormal, with the above being the norm. You would have to admit most churches you and I attend would have the same types of people in them, and now gray and balding.


The reason this will be a painful process is that we will have to start to love people that are unforgivable people, people whom we may even hate. I do believe Jesus is ahead of us here when He told us, “Love Your Enemies”! Who do we hate, dislike, or not want to be around? As thoughts enter your mind about who would make you feel uncomfortable, whose face appears?


The Third Culture Leader will start to develop the following characteristics. We will have to start to focus on the fringe, on the misfits and not focus on the masses. The people we would consider on the fringe, the margins in history, have traditionally led movements. Vision starts on the fringes and moves the people and leaders to that vision. We need to, as God’s people, start to love the margins in our society. Jesus here again was a man that lived on the margins.


Can we pinpoint what holds us back from living on the fringe? Maybe it scares us because there are a different set of metrics there? “Failure is success to God; it is the thing that the world connects with us on.” Our weaknesses and failures are gifts from God. It is what the world resonates with. They understand suffering. Our weaknesses will tend to guide us more than our strengths. We will soon realize that the best discipleship is life on life, not some program or more programs. Amen.


Third culture leaders will also learn to understand that obedience is more important than passion to Jesus. If we want to change the world, Dave asks us to consider four principles that third culture leaders must develop:

• We need to strive for deeper collaboration. Spend more time working together with other bodies of Christ and take advantage of our strengths.
• Experience more communal living within the churches we attend - hang out together more often and have open door policies in the homes of believers.
• A house of prayer, that is what the church has to become. The church doesn’t believe in the power of the Holy Spirit. We don’t pray because we don’t believe in the power.
• Adapt to a lifestyle of radical sacrifice - die to our own values of material possessions. Maybe we could try moving to another culture or visiting another culture to put our western wealth in perspective.

This was a hard pass to climb up to. Dave really makes you think outside the box and challenges all conventional thinking in terms of how we are doing church today. A blog hardly does justice to the many ideas and principles he talks about, so I would highly recommend further study on this topic.


Good luck on your exploration of 3rd Culture!

Climbing The Summit 10,000 Feet!

Harvey Carey is founder and senior pastor of Citadel of Faith Covenant Church in Detroit, Michigan - citadeloffaith.org - the fastest-growing multicultural church in the region. He is known internationally as a dynamic speaker whose inspiring leadership and vision for urban renewal unites people across boundaries of race, age, class and culture. That sounds pretty good doesn’t it. Took it right off his bio on his webpage. Harvey took us all to the 10,000 foot level at the Leadership Summit with his talk on what we should do when the odds are stacked against us. It reminded me of one of my better half time speeches when I coached football. Ha-ha!


Harvey spoke from Ephesians 4:11, in terms of we are always fighting the odds. But his first of eight points was “We have to believe God’s word is true.” If you follow the thought process of Ephesians 4:11, we all know that God will win and we will overcome any odds. Satan will be defeated. Believe it. Celebrate it. Preach it!


Unlike some of the teams I coached, always hoping for a hail mary pass to bail you out (Okay, so you watched Brent Favre and the Vikings last week), “God is getting ready to show up” when we think there is no way we can beat these odds. He comes to the rescue and throws us a life line.


Another way Harvey talked about overcoming the odds is to “Equip the body to serve and equip others.” It will take the whole team to overcome the odds, not just the paid staff. Sometimes when we are facing extreme odds, we tend to circle up the wagons and get into a protection mentality. What we need is more troops in the cavalry who are ready and willing to help fight in the battle.


For churches to overcome odds, “the people must take ownership of the work it will take to defeat the odds, and then become genuinely engaged in that work.” If the odds are stacked against you, it will take hard work, determination, and discipline to carry through. Which leads to his next point, “Look at the Bible for examples God gives us of His people overcoming the odds!” The Bible is full of stories like this! These examples have to become real to us, not just "page 856, last paragraph on the right." God is using a bullhorn and yelling into our ears, "You can do this with My power!"


Whatever you do, if you want to overcome the odds, don’t put this item in a church committee. Things only get delayed and eventually die in a committee. Don’t even be on a committee. Join a task force, if anything. But more importantly, Harvey would say, “more prayer meetings and less strategic meetings.” Amen and amen to that. I couldn’t agree more! We are never going to overcome any odds without the power and concerted effort of massive amounts of prayer!


The church that overcomes the odds “realizes its potential.” I always get a kick out of a resume from a potential church planting candidate who has switched churches about every two years. Perhaps he has never realized that God’s body, no matter where it is located, no matter what the attendance is running, has POTENTIAL. It is, after all, God's body of believers. There are hidden diamonds in every church. We just need to spend some time digging for them and then harvesting them. Do you know of any church in the world where God doesn’t want to do great things with that body?


Lucky number 7 (of Carey's eight points) - the true Biblical answer: “Step out of the boat of complacency.” If the boat is sinking, don’t’ just stay in it and end up drowning. The reason you might be facing great odds is because of complacency. I believe the longer we are complacent, the more the odds build up against us, until we get to the point where we just sit in the boat, going down with it.


And last, but my favorite point of Carey's eight -  “Stop making excuses.”

• "If we only had a better building and a better location, we could grow."
• "I don’t think I will ever be able to break that sin habit."
• "Please God, just send us more money."
• "If we had better leaders, this church might be able to overcome the odds."
• "A good youth minister would solve all our problems we are having with kids."
• "The poor economic times have really hurt us financially."

Hey. Seek ye first the Kingdom of God. That'll work. It's not a gamble.