Leading Christianly

Dangerous Faith

David Hopper, the Missions Pastor at Northside Church and current MOL student, comments on an excerpt from Holy Sweat, a text used in Biola's M.A. in Organizational Leadership program:

I read a quote in the book Holy Sweat by Tim Hansel that stuck with me recently: "Some of us really believe that the point of Christianity is to look good and have a good reputation. But the kingdom of God is a life-changing, life-transforming experience. It's more than just...nice." (Page 41) "...we often hear that Daniel's faith got him out of the lion's den, but we forget that it also got him into the lion's den." (Page 42)

I have been in ministry as a profession for over thirteen years and this was a new
way for me to look at the story of Daniel. In the Christian world, we talk about martyrs and we remind ourselves that if we are doing what the Bible tells us to do, the world will not like us, but we don't actually practice this in church. Somewhere along the way we started making church look really good so everybody would want to be a part of it. At first glance this is a beautiful thing. In fact, it has sparked greeters, welcoming teams, hospitality teams and follow up teams to make sure everyone who visited really enjoyed their time at Church. We have made our campuses as friendly as possible with parking attendants, friendly signs and the most beautiful buildings for every age group. All great things, but is it the faith we read about in the Bible?

The Bible that says, "If your hand or your foot causes you to sin cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell." (Matt 18:8-9) Are we building a kingdom of God that believes with all their heart, soul and mind that sin is so bad that they would do anything to stop pouring on to the sins Christ had to experience and die for on the cross?

The Bible says, "He also saw a poor widow put in two very small copper coins. 'I tell you the truth,' he said, 'this poor widow has put in more than all the others. All these people gave their gifts out of their wealth; but she out of her poverty put in all she had to live on.'" (Luke 21:2-4) Do we have churches in this world that are full of people giving until it hurts? Call every church in town and ask how they are doing in tithing while America faces this economic collapse? As we learn that churches are laying off people by the thousands all across this country that was originally founded by a protestant movement, ask yourself, "Did we build churches the Bible talks about or was it more about us?"

The Bible that says, "He called a little child and had him stand among them. And he said: 'I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.'" (Matt. 18:2-6) Are our churches filled with awe inspired people? Are we men and women who look at the Bible with a sense of wonder? Are we convincing people of the Bible, God, Heaven, Hell, etc. through our apologetic arguments or reminding people to look at God through a child's eye? Are we ourselves like that child that sees the moon and is awestruck with its bigness? Am I a child that is excited to be held? A child who wants to play? A child that stares at a flower for hours because a bee is flying around it? A child that loves Jesus because He is Jesus? Is this the church of today or the church that once was?

The Bible that says, "'Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and
pay no attention to the plank in your own eye ? How can you say to your brother, 'Let me
take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You
hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye , and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.'" (Matt. 7:3-5) Do our Pastors of today take more phone calls about frustrations about programs and other members of the Church, or frustrations about wanting to do more for their neighbors, co-workers, family and/or wanting to grow closer to God? Being a Pastor, I sadly know the answer to that question. How many more letters will I receive about the temperature of the building, the clothes being worn, the songs being sung, the times of our programs? When will the letters be an all out call for war against the devil no matter what it takes and what it costs?

We've heard,  "'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God. Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you. (Matt. 5:3-12)

This is the Church I want to be a part of. Does it still exist? "...the time has come...the kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!" (Mark 1:15)

David Hopper
Northside Church Missions Pastor
Masters of Organizational Leadership Student

To submit an article for publication in the Leading Christianly blog, please email Sarah Ailes at sarah.ailes@biola.edu

MOL Equips Church Leaders, as published in "Church Executive Magazine"

Even the most winning head coach won’t keep his job long if his players won’t follow his plays. No matter what your vocation, leadership requires more than knowledge – it requires an understanding of how to influence others with both skill and integrity.

Reverend Dennis Estill believes this to be especially true for church executives. Senior Pastor of Heartland Community Foursquare Church in El Cajon, CA, he affirms, “Leadership is an art, and no one is born a good leader. It takes time, experience and discipline.”

Estill acknowledges that a gap existed in his education when he entered the ministry several decades ago, a gap that time alone could not fill. “I came to the realization that even with 25 years of pastoral experience, I lacked understanding of leadership theory,” he recalls. “To be more effective as a leader who could influence and mentor other leaders” – what he believes to be one of his primary responsibility as a pastor – “meant I needed to prepare myself.”

Estill, along with other pastors and church leaders, turned to the Master of Arts in Organizational Leadership (MOL) at Biola University to fill this gap. Designed to help students grow in their unique leadership abilities, the MOL focuses on building skills such as leadership development, group dynamics, people management, and ethics. MOL students retain full time employment, allowing them to immediately test and apply what they are learning in their circles of influence.

Unlike either a seminary degree or an MBA, the MOL focuses on what student Patti Fenton calls “the human component of leadership.” Such a distinction was what led Fenton, Estill and others to choose the degree over other options.

Fenton joined the MOL after sensing a personal need “to gather tools and resources.” She firmly believes that it was through the “empowerment” of her time in the program that led her “to initiate change in our church community as well as our local community” by transitioning from children’s to family ministry.
Now serving as Pastor to Families at The Beacon Orange County, Fenton enthusiastically recalls having her “world rocked” in a class taught by Dr. Henry Cloud and being led by a professor in solving a church staff communication problem. “As one who longs to initiate change, I cannot speak highly enough of my experience at Biola,” she commented.

Integrating contemporary leadership theory with a biblical worldview and intentional character development, it’s no wonder this program has found an appeal among church leaders like Ryan Sharp, Associate Pastor of The Lamb’s Fellowship of Murrieta, CA.

At Sharp’s church, which “has grown from 50 to more than 600 over a three-year span, internal organizational challenges are a daily reality.” Sharp affirms, “The MOL classes and professors have not only presented solutions to many of these challenges, they have also provided answers to questions I didn’t even know I should be asking.”

Students participate in the MOL in two formats: a traditional on campus program at Biola’s main campus in La Mirada, CA, and a distance learning modular program.

The modular program, a recently added delivery format, has allowed the MOL to expand the impact of the degree beyond the Southern California area, meeting a national demand that has existed for some time. Students nationwide participate in online discourse with classmates and professors, traveling to campus twice during the course of the program to enrich their education with face-to-face learning. While maintaining the high academic standards of all Biola University programs, the modular program provides increased flexibility to students, allowing students to outside the Southern California area to enroll in the MOL.

Pastor Ryan Sharp speaks to the value of the Biola’s MOL program, saying “I highly recommend this program for any pastor who sees a need for growth or transformation within the local church…or simply within himself.” For more information on the MOL, visit www.biola.edu/leadership or call 1.866.99.BIOLA.

By Dr. Alexis Alipuria and Carissa Abrego
Originally published in Church Executive Magazine, March 2008
Masters in Organizational Leadership

Taking a Sabbath Rest

I am in Kiev, Ukraine, teaching a character development class (called Personal Foundations of Ministry) to a cohort of Ukranian pastors and seminary students.  Today in class a question was asked: "How can I spend time with my family?  There is no such time available, especially since I am taking this course."

The question wasn't just a "how-to" question asking for some creative ideas.  It was culturally loaded.  Ukrainians work longer hours than Americans, and most mothers as well as fathers work outside the home.  A major problem we discovered here is the number of parents working in other countries, sometimes for years at a time, because they can make more money there than in Ukraine.  Often both parents are gone and the care of children is left to grandparents or others.  Even the state has stepped in, developing homes for such abandoned children to prevent the development of gangs of street children that can be seen in many third world countries.  To stay in Ukraine with their wife and children, many men work two jobs.

How would you answer?  "Learn to live with less"?  This answer implies that Ukrainians have an economic cushion they simply don't have.  Life is still not much more than survival.  We don't learn to live with less in America. Ukrainians would ask "How did America become the economic powerhouse that the world envies by working less?" To answer "Work smarter, not harder" would imply that Ukrainians are not as smart as Americans.  This isn't true either. Ukranians are very smart, and on average more highly educated than Americans.

Is there an answer that is culturally relevant or even culturally possible?  I think so.  The Ten Commandments were written to a culture of ex-slaves trying to become a nation, wandering in the desert, and finally conquering and settling a land of their own.  The fourth commandment is, "Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.  Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath of the LORD your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you.  For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day and made it holy."  This commandment didn't set up a worship day; it set up a rest day, because God rested.

The inter-cultural principle is that human beings need a day of rest every seven days.  If we, Ukrainians or Americans, use our designated day of rest for more work, we will pay for it - in lowered efficiency, deteriorating relationship with God, deteriorating relationships with mate and family and extended family, deteriorating relationships with the family of God, and eventually personal burn-out.

How Ukranians respond to the challenge to have a "sabbath" will be up to their pastors and other leaders, and whether those leaders take or don't take a sabbath themselves. As an American minister my challenge to myself and my church family is to take God's gift of a day of rest seriously - and rest!  This probably will not mean we stay in bed all day.  But we can have a day of not working; a day of play (unless play is work), a day of investing in relationships with God, with family, with our church family, and sometimes a day or part of a day in solitude.

What would you do if you had such a day each seven days?  Would you read more, play games with the kids, take your wife out for a date, visit friends, go on a walk, take a hike?  Think about slowing down a bit one day each week.  Is the feeling that comes with this idea panic, because you would get more behind than you already are?  Is it concern that you would be bored?  Is it simply "You gotta be kidding?"  Or does it sound like a too-good-to-be-true promotion?

God has given you a sabbath.  What will you do with it?

Rex Johnson
Professor for the
Master of Arts in Organizational Leadership
Biola University

(C) 2007 Biola University

Reflections on "What Would Jesus Do?"

There's a classic book that I read by Charles Sheldon called In His Steps, written in 1896. The principle of the whole book is, "What would Jesus do?"

When I read it, it was pretty novel to me. It showed how the most challenging thing could be returning change at a grocery store. If somebody mistakenly gives me an extra dollar, even today, I fight with whether to give it back.

Today, whatever I do in my business, this is the key. I ask before I make any business decision, in board meetings, when we do our budgets, when we have labor disputes, when we have personnel issues - "What would Jesus do?"

Sometimes you'll get an answer that you may not want to hear, but you need to do it. It can be very difficult, but it's similar to working out - painful at first, but you become stronger and healthier. The more you practice asking and then following what Jesus would do in your business, the more you'll find that you’re running your business right. You’ll know you’re in the will of God, and the answers will come. He’s going to give you the answer to follow and guide you in the most difficult circumstances there are.

Everything started moving because I asked, “What would Jesus do?” I remembered the instance of Jesus clearing out the temple, so I said, “I’ll try it.” I began trying to clean out my work.

It has been a fabulous thing to take that lesson wherever I go now. Over time, I’ve gotten better in this principle. Nine out of ten times I follow what He tells me to do. When I don't, I am sorry for it, because that’s when I’ll find trouble. That’s the time I need his help.

Many times, I’ve got so many pans in the fire that I drive home at night thinking, “Oh, my goodness.” But, what would Jesus do? He would just do one thing at a time, do it to the best of His ability, and trust in God to take care of Him. That’s what He would do.

Michael Klausman
Guest Lecturer for
MA in Organizational Leadership
Biola University
(C) 2007 Biola University

In Times like This, Where Can CEO’s Find Reliable Advice

Times are getting more and more difficult for CEOs.  Once a secure job, the new economic realities have placed many executives in perilous positions.  No longer are they safe and secure.  The once cozy set of board relationships, that insulated top executives from the vicissitudes of marketplace pressures, is now becoming rare.

An interesting phenomena has emerged from this new condition: CEO as author.  Jack Welch didn't invent this role; he just took it to a new level.  Carly Fiorina, the recently deposed top executive from Hewlett-Packard, has used her celebrity to reveal the imperfections of life at the top.  While I have not yet read her book, I continually bump into her as I watch the late-night talk shows.  She has changed the CEO as author/expert role to CEO as social critic.  No doubt these books are interesting to read, but is this where executives should turn for valuable insights?

What can a CEO do to overcome these pressures and where should she or he look for advice?  Sure Jack Welch did a good job at GE, but are these principles he espouses transferable to other situations?  Moreover does he truly understand the conditions that led to the firm’s success?  How much of the gain in stock price was due to his popularity?  It really scares me to think that some folks believe that success in one situation can hold the key for prosperity somewhere else.  Social, market, and economic conditions are always complex.  Conditions change quickly and in dramatic ways.  In order to espouse "what should be done" principles that are applicable across multiple settings, the author had better know what they are talking about.  Is there such an author?  How can we know that their prescriptions are reliable and can be generalized?

Interestingly, there is one book that has withstood the test of time for thousands of years.  For a while, it had a great influence on executive practice here in America.  One hundred years ago the founders of many leading companies actually looked to it for guidance.  The early executives of General Electric actually quoted it in their speeches.  Peter Drucker, the greatest management guru of all times, used it to ground much of his thinking.  The Harvard Business Review ran a series of articles based upon it during the 1950s.  Of course I'm talking about the Bible.

Perhaps the most dramatic global economic success story of the second half of the 20th century was the Toyota Motor Company.  While I would never profess them to have followed biblical principles intentionally, their success can be directly linked to two parables Christ taught -- described in Luke 14:28 and 31.

For which one of you, when he wants to build a tower, does not sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it?

And,

Or what King, when he sets out to meet another king in battle, will not sit down and consider whether he is strong enough with 10,000 men who encounter the one coming against him with 20,000?

Turn back the clock 40 years and think about what Toyota did.  It built a stronger, albeit smaller, organization based upon a radically different labor policy, fundamentally different ideas about production -- the principles of just in time and lean production, and with this stronger approach greatly reduced its investment requirements and costs.  No two principles better explain this company's success.

What's the point?  Choose carefully where you find instruction and spend your limited time.

~Dr. Jeffery Decker
Professor for MA in Organizational Leadership
Biola University