Category Archives: Leadership

Grounded and Descending

For the last two weeks I have been meditating/memorizing Isaiah 53:2-6 and the spirituality of descent of Jesus. Out of a desire to offer a “sincere gift of Himself,” Jesus chose a downward journey of ordinariness, obscurity, rejection and powerlessness. He chose crucifixion. It preaches well but my resistance to death (and thus resurrection) is deep. Contemplating the cross, however, has made me sensitive, at least recently, about the choices I make each day to follow, or not follow, the crucified Jesus. The following are three simple gifts God gave me this past week: 1. I visited one of our core church family members this past week. Their child has Lennox Gestaut Syndrome –www.lgsfoundation.org, a severe type of epilepsy. For the past four years, they have been in and out of hospitals, working with countless doctors and specialists to control their son’s seizures, and carrying full time jobs in the NYC school system. Their son, once. Read more.

The Components of Emotionally Healthy Spirituality

I am often asked, “Pete, what exactly is emotionally healthy spirituality?” The above chart describes her five different components. 1. Contemplative Spirituality (Slow Down to Be With God). EHS is a commitment to slow down our lives in order to create a rhythm to be with Jesus. It is about creating space through contemplative practices (e.g. Daily Offices, Sabbath-Keeping, silence, solitude and Scripture) so that we remain in Jesus’ love. We draw deeply from the radical movement of the desert fathers as well as Moses, Elijah and John the Baptist in order that we might love others out of the love we have first received from Jesus Himself. 2. Emotionally Healthy Discipleship – EHS recovers a number of lost biblical themes often ignored in evangelical discipleship. These include a theology of grieving (e.g. Psalms, Lamentations) and limits, of breaking the sinful patterns of our family of origin and cultures, loving well and brokenness as the basis by which we. Read more.

My Top Ten Lessons of Leadership

If you ask 10 different leaders what they had learned over a long period of time, you will receive 10 different lists. It is determined by your unique journey and your strengths and weaknesses. This is not meant to be a comprehensive list of what a leader needs to learn. Rather it is what I wish a mentor had helped me understand from the beginning. I wish some kind mentor might have said the following words to me: 1. Be Yourself Pete, calmly differentiate your “true self” from the demands and voices around you. Discern the desires, vision, pace, and mission the Father has give you as you lead. Take off Saul’s armor. Be clear about yourself. Learn to control your reactivity. And remember, “to live unfaithfully to yourself is to cause others great damage.” Rumi 2. Your First Work is to be a Contemplative before God. (i.e. to be with Him) You are not. Read more.

EHS Foundational Tenet 1: Prayed Theology

As pastors and churches are beginning to explore integration of emotionally healthy spirituality into their lives and churches, I believe it is important to step back and reflect on the wider theological and historical foundations upon which we are building. The following is my list: 1. Prayed Theology 2. A Humble Spirit to Learn from the Whole Church 3. A Sense of Global Church History 4. Contemplative, Monastic Spirituality 5. Integrity in Our Leadership 6. Emotionally Healthy Practices 7. The Marriage Covenant 8. Sexuality 9. Calling, Life and Work 10. Preaching and Teaching 11. Bringing Christ to Culture (Contextualization) 12. Bridging Racial, Cultural, Economic and Gender Barriers Last week I showed our staff a four minute video on the revolution occurring in our culture with regards to social media and its implications for NLF (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVXKI506w-E&feature=player_embedded#t=92). While I am not sure of all the implications of social media for us today, I am convinced of. Read more.

Book Review: How the Mighty Fall, by Jim Collins

I just finished reading Jim Collins’, How the Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In, and found it filled with excellent insights. While his study and work is focused on corporations and why great ones decline, a number of the principles he lays out have application to the leadership of churches and non-profits. The following were 3 highlights for me with particular application to my journey in answering the question, “What does an emotionally healthy leader look like? How does one bring contemplative leadership that waits on the Lord and actually leads?” Be careful about being distracted from your primary, core values that make you who you are (He calls it your primary flywheel). In our case, it is emotional health and contemplative spirituality, reconciliation and leading people to deep, personal relationships with Jesus Christ here in NYC. He observed that great painters (Picasso), musicians (Beethoven), and companies (Walmart) continue to intensely and. Read more.

Learning Leadership from the Presidents

I recently finished the very enjoyable read of David Gergen’s EyeWitness to Power: The Essence of Leadership in which he describes his work with Nixon, Ford, Reagan and Clinton. He now teaches leadership at Harvard so his book is particularly focused on lessons to learn from their divergent styles as well as their failures. Here are a few points he made that are particularly revelant to those of us in leadership. Lesson 1: Time for study and reflection are critical for long-term leadership. Richard Nixon –His years in the wilderness (after he lost to John F. Kennedy in the 1961 election) became one of his most productive periods in his life as he had time for reflection, study, and to develop a long –range view of world affairs that became a foundation for his presidency. He seized those years for personal growth and a springboard to serious, tempered, seasoned leadership. There is a time. Read more.

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