From One Degree to Another

Phil Auxier's Blog

Connect

Leadership Email – Playing It Safe

by

Here’s my Monday email to leaders in Reno County from 3/4/13:

In Vol. 4, Issue 2 of the Journal of the Kansas Leadership Center (p.51), Joyce Webb made an interesting few comments about our engagement in the civic arena, especially on issues that are “value-laden.”  She writes,
“Effective interventions requires a keen sense of self-awareness and awareness of others, which is really hard to hold onto when the person across the table is polarized.  People have territory and values to protect and often get mired in the energy this defensiveness brings. 
“Whether one of us agrees with any factions’ opinions or not probably isn’t the issue when it comes to practicing leadership.  It’s OK to hold to purpose and not compromise values.  But one is always presented with a potential dilemma when deciding to make opinions and beliefs clear.
“This work requires us to be honest, yet challenges us to be intentional in reaching out and embracing those who have different life experiences, beliefs, values, and sometimes fears to protect.  It highlights our own beliefs and exposes our own biases and potential losses.  It requires tremendous courage, openness and love for our neighbors to be effective. 
“That kind of vulnerability seems to be too risky these days for most of us, including myself.  But we need a great strategy than playing it safe and doing nothing in order to make progress.
(Webb, Joyce. “When It Comes to Civic Life, We Need To Do More Than ‘Play It Safe’,” in The Journal [published by the Kansas Leadership Center] Volume 4, Issue 2, Fall 2012.  Pp.50-51.)
There are many things that resonate with me in what Webb writes, but one issue we consistently encounter is what we might call “Kansas Nice.”  We don’t want to cause trouble or a ruckus, so we choose silence and miss out on opportunities for leadership.  Now, I’m not suggesting we try to be intentionally unkind or mean-spirited.  I am saying that to make progress on issues that matter, it will require us to step into acts of leadership that are risky.  We must try to free ourselves out of that ever pressing default mode and find new behaviors that will help us make progress.  The competencies like managing self, diagnosing the situation, intervening skillfully and energizing others help give us some different ways of acting in leadership.  Today, what strategy will employ to help our community make progress?  It might be that rather than helping us make progress, playing it safe will actually hinder progress.  At the very least it’s something to think about.  At the most, it requires our skillful intervention.  Let’s check ourselves on this point, then, and see if we can’t make progress in these areas we are so passionate about.

Dangerous Calling Email – Needing The Body

by

As our leadership team reads through Dangerous Calling together, I try to pull together a devotional insight for us.  Here’s one from Chapter 5:

Chapter 5 of Dangerous Calling (if you’re reading roughly a chapter a week) is the chapter we come to this week.  It’s called Joints and Ligaments.  The point: leaders are not above the ministry of the body of Christ, they are in need of the body of Christ.  Using Hebrews 3:12-13 as a springboard, Tripp outlines the critical warning: see to it that none of you has an evil—unbelieving, falling away—hardened heart.  He then follows that up with the essential call of this passage: encourage each other daily so that sin doesn’t do its blinding work in you.
Much of this chapter is written to pop the ministry bubble that pastors often live in, devoid of the body of Christ.  So, it’s a great reminder for us.  The question Tripp began this chapter might be an appropriate way to end: “Who are you and what do you spiritually need?”  Know that I’m here for you if you need to talk and I know many of you are there for me.  Let’s model the body of Christ in action to our body and see if it doesn’t help our people see how glorious the Gospel we believe is.

Leadership Email – Natural Born Leader

by

As we’ve maneuvered our way around some of the 5 civic leadership principles over the past few weeks, some collisions might have occurred in your brain regarding other examples or definitions of leadership that we regularly encounter.  Part of the foundation of these principles comes from the pen of Ed O’Malley: “Kansas said a different type of leadership is necessary if we want to make more progress on our biggest challenges and opportunities.  The ideas in [the KLC Quick Guide] embody that leadership and come from intense listening across our state.  Today, thousands of Kansans are working to exercise the type of leadership described here.” 
One notion that you’ve maybe heard of is that of the “natural born leader.”  When we press a little further to define what we mean by that, the language we gravitate toward can often tend to be a charisma, twinkle-in-the-eye, or a willingness to step out and lead by example.  So, as you think about these 5 principles: 1) Leadership is an activity, not a position. 2) Anyone can lead, anytime, anywhere.  3) It starts with you and must engage others.  4) Your purpose must be clear.  5) It’s risky.  I might concede that there are certain traits within certain people that make them more willing to engage others in risky ways, but leadership is decidedly about making a conscious choice for yourself to be about the activity of mobilizing others to difficult work. 
Progress in our communities doesn’t happen as we all sit passively waiting for the next great natural born leader rise up and fix the daunting challenges we face.  No, progress happens as we individually choose to step into risk and engage others with a purpose (often higher than ourselves) so that progress is made little by little and our community is a better place. 
Today, then, step out and be the leader you’re capable of being.  With you…

Leadership Email – Risk

by

Here’s the email I sent out to Leadership Reno County alum on 2/18/13:

Good morning, everyone.  We’ve been looking at the KLC Civic Leadership Principles:
1) Leadership is an activity, not a position.
2) Anyone can lead, anytime, anywhere.
3) It starts with you and must engage others.
4) Your purpose must be clear. 
And, today, we finish up with the 5th principle: “It’s risky.”  I grew up loving the concept of the game Risk.  I was fascinated that the “older kids” could maneuver those wooden pieces around the board and seem to have so much fun.  There’s a risk to playing risk and achieving global domination. 
For those engaging in acts of leadership, we probably don’t need to be reminded that “It’s risky,” but it certainly is.  When we make a conscious choice to intervene (even if we’ve been effective at managing ourselves and diagnosing the situation), there is a risk involved.  That’s why, we’re encouraged to act experimentally or take a “smart risk” with our actions.  When it comes to deeply adaptive work, where neither the problem nor the solution of our adaptive problem is clear and there are many stakeholders involved, we should be very aware of the risk inherent to an act of leadership.
Deeper still, since leadership is risky, it calls for courage.  We can’t let the risk that goes along with acts of leadership paralyze us from this activity.  In this sense, this final point works well with the other principles we’ve seen.  Since leadership is activity done by anyone, anytime, anywhere and it begins with me and engages others out of a clear purpose, I can courageously step into this risky adventure and see what progress can be made, little by little, on the issues I care about so deeply. 
Today, then, will you resolve to remember that leadership is risky and courageously act to make progress for the good of our community?  With you to that end…

Dangerous Calling Email – Chapter 3

by

My Wed AM email to leaders at Crestview is based on Paul Tripp’s book, Dangerous Calling:

“Heart Disease?  Or Theology Problem?”

There’s been a trend in reason days (maybe since the Enlightenment?) to emphasize human reason over and against everything that stands in its way.  And, this has subtly filtered into the church world.  In certain pockets, there are people who believe (even though they might not verbalize this it is very much how they live) that if you have correct, orthodox beliefs or theology, then that is what God requires of you.  Part of what Tripp is going after in Chapter 3 of Dangerous Calling, “Big Theological Brains and Heart Disease,” is this kind of thinking. 
After recalling some history as to how he’s arrived at his conclusions, Tripp asks “What are we doing with the Word?”  In this section, he says, “All creation is meant to be finger pointing us to ultimate glory, the only glory that can ever satisfy the human heart, the glory of God.”  And, then, he uses that amazing illustration from Isaiah 55:10-13 and the conclusion: “The ultimate purpose of the Word of God is not theological information but heart and life transformation.” 
After lamenting how theological institutions have become increasingly specialized, Tripp asks, “What the Danger?”  What’s the danger in losing sight of God’s heart transformation through His Word:
1) Spiritual blindness – handling Scripture that doesn’t allow people to see themselves as they are
2) Theological self-righteousness – thinking maturity is more a matter of knowing that living
3) Dysfunctional personal relationship to the Word – study is more a world of correct ideas that a world of submission to the Lord
4) Lack of personal gospel neediness – not approaching God’s Word with tender, needy hearts
5) Impatience with others – being critical, dismissive, impatient with others
6) Wrong perspective on ministry – driven more by theological correctness than by worship of and love for the Lord Jesus Christ
7) No living communion with Christ – a Christ-less Christianity that puts hope in theology and rules and somehow forgets that if theology and rules had power to transform the heart of idolaters, Jesus would never have had to come, live, die and rise again.
So, in our church, where we love truth, are we in love with the Savior or drawn to mere academic growth?  Let’s be careful to exalting reason at the expense of our hearts. 
Grateful to be in trenches with you all…

Leadership Email – Purpose

by

My Monday Email to Leaders in Reno County from 2/11/13 was entitled “Peter Piper Picked A Peck of Pickled PURPOSE”:

Good Morning.  Here’s a review of where we’ve been for the past 3 weeks:
We’ve been looking at the KLC Civic Leadership Principles:
1) Leadership is an activity, not a position.
2) Anyone can lead, anytime, anywhere.
3) It starts with you and must engage others.
Today, we move to principle #4: “Your purpose must be clear.”  Purpose should loom large in our acts of leadership.  One exercise that has helped some of us get after purpose is that “Why, Why, Why” exercise.  If you’re not familiar, we form a class into groups and encourage participants to think of an issue that they care about so deeply that they would be willing to give their time to be involved in it.  Then, we have them explain their purpose by digging deeper and asking “Why?”  What emerges is typically what is driving you to do what you do and often this purpose is shared between people with different issues they care about.  This simple exercise helps, then, to inspire a collective purpose, energizing others, as well as helping each individual hold on to purpose, which might make their interventions more skillful. 
As we think in this core principle, then, about how “our purpose must be clear,” we can begin to see that our engaging in acts of leadership—mobilizing people to difficult work—is helped by a clear purpose.  A clear purpose doesn’t mean our acts of leadership will be easy, but it does remove some of the fog off of the windshield of our journey.  A clear purpose helps everyone: it reminds us why we are doing what we’re doing and helps unite us with others so that progress can be made on issues we care about deeply.  
So, today, focus.  Have a clear purpose in what you do and see if it doesn’t affect our community for the better.
Have a great week…

Dangerous Calling Email – Chapter 2

by

Here’s an email I wrote to our church leadership about Tripp’s Dangerous Calling.  I entitled this one “Losing Focus.”

I don’t know if you take many pictures, but I find myself taking pics all the time on my phone.  Just this week, I snapped one to use in a document only to find that once I transferred it, the picture ended up being blurry.  Evidently, my desire to take pics isn’t matched by a steady hand.  In chapter 2 of Dangerous Calling, entitled, “Again and Again,” Tripp helps shine light on why so many can lose their way (read focus) in ministry.  Here’s the nine points he makes:
1) Ignore clear evidence of problems.
2) Be blind to issues of his own heart.
3) Lack of devotion.
4) Not preaching the Gospel to himself.
5) Not listening to those closest to him.
6) Ministry became burdensome.
7) Begin to live in silence.
8) Begin to question calling.
9) Give away to fantasies of another life.
Here’s the concluding charge:  “No, not all of these characteristics are in the lives of each of the men I have talked with, but in all of them many of these things are operating.  And not only are they operating, but they are operating outside of the motivating, encouraging, empowering, transforming, and delivering truths of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  I write this because I am concerned for me and I am concerned for you.  And I am concerned for the culture in our churches that allows this to happen unchecked.”
So, gentlemen, let’s take a look at our hearts today.  Let’s check them so that we can freshly apply the Gospel to them and grow in our fellowship to God and one another. 
Have a great week.

Leadership Email: You To Others, That’s The Deal

by

Here’s my email to leaders in Reno County from Monday, 2/4:

Happy “Day-After-Super-Bowl”.  Hope everyone’s doing well.  We’re in a bit of a series on our Monday emails.  Here’s a quick review:
We’ve been looking at the KLC Civic Leadership Principles:
1) Leadership is an activity, not a position.
2) Anyone can lead, anytime, anywhere.
Today, I want to remind you of principle #3: “It starts with you and must engage others.”
Keeping in mind that leadership is “mobilizing people to difficult work” and authority is “providing comfort, order and direction” we can see that acts of leadership begin with us.  It starts with you, that is, acts of leadership begin with you making a conscious choice to engage.  It’s like flipping a switch.  It might be choosing to “raise the heat” over an uncomfortable issue or choosing to disengage when one of your triggers have been tripped.  But, leadership begins with you making a conscious choice. 
And, leadership engages others.  Leadership isn’t you climbing up on Pride Rock and roaring out orders for the masses (yes, another Disney film reference for those of you without small children).  Leadership involves others.  Typically, we “lead” by surrounding ourselves with people who will agree with us and proceeding accordingly.  But, leadership might mean we engage others by seeking out the unusual voices, strive to understand the factions on a dilemma or what people might lose if a direction is pursued.  Leadership engages others and this is what makes it such hard work.  It’d be easy if we just had to lead ourselves.  But throw others in the mix and things get a little complicated.
Today, then, remember that civic leadership “starts with you and must engage others.”  You can step out into acts of leadership and make a difference today.  So, what are you waiting for?

Dangerous Calling Email #1

by

Last week, we had an Elders/Deacons Meeting and began to take some time looking at Paul Tripp’s Dangerous Calling book.  Here’s the first of weekly emails I’ll be sending our leaders from last Wed entitled Suspect Yourself:

As we jump into thinking about Dangerous Calling this year, I was reminded of a Sherlock Holmes case in which the inspector asked Holmes if he had any suspects yet and Holmes replied, “I suspect myself—for jumping to conclusions too rapidly.”  Really the Introduction and Chapter 1 of this book highlight the importance of tender hearts before God.  In the Intro, for instance, Tripp clearly lays out his aim: “This is a diagnostic book.  It is written to help you take an honest look at yourself in the heart-and-life-exposing mirror of the Word of God—to see things that are wrong and need correcting and to help you place yourself once again under the healing and transforming power of the gospel of Jesus Christ” (p.11). 

In Chapter 1, Tripp recounts “three underlying themes that operated in [his] life…”
1) I Let Ministry Define My Identity.
2) I Let Biblical Literacy and Theological Knowledge Define My Maturity.
3) I Confused Ministry Success With God’s Endorsement of My Lifestyle.
Here’s some good diagnostic questions for this first chapter:
“What about you?  How do you view yourself?  What are the things you regularly say to you about you?  Are there subtle signs in your life that you see yourself as being different from those to whom you minister?  Do you see yourself as a minister of grace in need of the same grace?  Have you become comfortable with discontinuities between the gospel that you preach and the way that you live?  Are there disharmonies between your public ministry persona and the details of your private life?  Do you encourage a level of community in your church that you give yourself to?  Do you fall into believing that no one has a more accurate view of you than you do?  Do you use your knowledge or experience to keep confrontation at bay?”
There’s great hope for us because of the Gospel, so, let’s remember that God is opposed to the proud but gives grace to the humble and bow our knees (and lives) in awe before this God we serve.  

Leadership Email – Anyone? Really?

by

My weekly email to leaders in Reno County is here:

Last week, we looked at the first of the KLC Civic Leadership Principles and today we add another:
1) Leadership is an activity, not a position.
2) Anyone can lead, anytime, anywhere.
I think #2 is more than the KLC encouraging us to be equal opportunity employers.  Recognizing that anyone can lead, anytime, anywhere, helps us realize exactly what leadership is.  Remember, point 1 was that leadership is an activity, not a position.  It would naturally follow, then, that anyone can do this.  Leadership is more than a position or being in a position to flex one’s authority.  It seems like in the foggy recesses of my mind I have a definition of leadership emblazoned from Lynette and Kris: “Leadership is moving people to do difficult work.”  And, this takes more than just those in authority.  Leadership takes everyone.  We all have to make conscious choices to be leaders in situations that will produce lasting change.  Anyone can lead.
Oh, I guess I was reminded of 1 more thought, too.  Some of you may know I have 4 kids 6 and under.  So I get a regular diet of some of the, how do I say it?, cartoon part of television.  We love the Pixar movies and the premise of Ratatouille is that “anyone can cook.”  It is rather shocking that the heir apparent to the best chef was a rat.  But, anyone can cook.  Likewise, in our acts of leadership, anyone can lead.  It might be you, in a position where you don’t feel you have the authority to make a difference, yes, you, can lead.  Further, if you’re one of those in authority you must remember that you’re not the only person in your organization who can make a difference but anyone can lead.  You have leaders all around you.
Let’s remember this principle: “anyone can lead, anytime, anywhere” and see if by holding true to it, we don’t see progress made in those areas we care about the most.