"Psychologically Regressive"

At a recent theological forum I encountered something I have frequently encountered in recent theology, and it disturbs me. In the debate, alternative theological viewpoints were characterised, dozens of times, as being "regressive" or "psychologically regressive". Similarly, in my postgraduate studies, free Church tenets have been described as "dangerous", faith-based leadership as "irresponsible", and so on. OBSERVATION: Personally, I don't think such language belongs in theological debate, even if it is backed up with charts and graphs.

Bubbling Under

Despite months of neglect, I have noticed that Leadership South continues to pop up from time to time among the South African Top 30 Religion blogs. Perhaps it deserves to be revived -- although it is unlikely to receive diligent attention. It also deserves to be less obscure. Given the time, I might rework some of the older posts to be more intelligible.

Coercive Leadership: Mixed Signals

Transformational Christian leadership generally disavows coercion. On the surface of it, that is. My M.Th. thesis has required a semantic analysis of the literature, which reveals the following. On the one hand, the literature explicitly rejects (I’ll put all the citations in one place) power, force, authoritarianism, power-seeking, control, command, coercion, domination, cajoling, and manipulation (Banks and Ledbetter 2004:86,108; Engstrom 1976:40; Wofford 1999:92,182; Hunter 2004:16,53,55,108; Jinkins 2002:24; Thomas 1999:19; Halcomb, Hamilton, and Malmstadt 2000:219; Thrall, McNicol and McElrath 1999:21; Ford 1991:43; Munroe 2005:43). On the other hand, it regularly describes transformational Christian leadership in terms which suggest much the same: power, forceful power, authority, inducement, enforcement, control, and strength (Hunter 2004:62,63,67; Hybels 2002:64; Halcomb, Hamilton, and Malmstadt 2000:46; Stanley 2006:118; Munroe 2005:76; Maxwell 1998:36,70). Leadership, writes Engstrom (1976:114), is “to control others”, while Wright (2000:16) considers that it is “the exercise of power ... Power is at the heart of leadership, ...” Servant leadership (which is generally synonymous with transformational leadership) “does not avoid the exercise of power ...” (Banks and Ledbetter 2004:108). QUESTION: So which is it? Why the apparently conflicting language -- often by one and the same author? What would represent a genuine alternative?

Attractional vs. Incarnational

There is, particularly in the Global North, and among “younger church leaders”, a keen debate surrounding “attractional” vs. “incarnational” forms of Church. This has been described most simply as “come to us” vs. “go to them” (http://mondaymorninginsight.com/index.php/site/comments/attractional_and_incarnational/). Attractional is “dedicated to producing an event that pagans will want to come to”, while incarnational is “to ‘go’ to their world and enculturate the gospel there” (http://www.backyardmissionary.com/2005/08/incarnational-v-attractional-mission.html). I downloaded the five most viewed Attractional vs. Incarnational articles on the Internet, and compared their various emphases. It is interesting to note that, in a comparison of Church vs. Trinity (each including various terms, e.g. "Church" including "εκκλησία", "community", "Christ-followers", etc.), Church receives 99% and Trinity 1% emphasis in the articles (or 90% and 10% if the Trinity is seen to include Christ in His humanity). By way of contrast, as best I am able to recognise it, there tends to be a greater emphasis in the Global South on the exalted Christ as both the Attraction and the Incarnation. The concepts “attractional” and "incarnational” thus seem to become fairly redundant. QUESTION: What do the above emphases signify? To what extent would one’s Christology generate one’s ecclesiology or missiology? Thanks to http://leeh.wordpress.com/2007/07/05/attractional-vs-incarnational/ for the table.

Leadership vs. Manipulation

I find that I continually encounter what would seem to be inner tensions in the Christian leadership literature. See if you can see this one. Vance Packard's definition of leadership is "getting others to want to do something that you are convinced should be done". But George Barna (Leaders on Leadership) rejects this definition, commenting that it "speaks more of manipulation than of true leadership" (Barna G 1997:22). Turn the pages, however, and Barna states that, in his view, vision is "communicated by God to His chosen servant-leaders ... The leader who possesses such vision knows exactly what he wants to achieve and what the end product will look like" (:47). QUESTION: How, then, do Barna's own views differ substantially from those of Packard? I fail to see it. Surely it's still a matter of getting others to follow my conviction.

Stick to It?

Here’s something interesting in Transformational Ministry. Quoting Eugene Peterson, Michael Jinkins emhasises that, once one has been ordained to Christian ministry, “we want your vow that you will stick to it” (Jinkins M 2002:32). He adds: “I want to reiterate what he [Peterson] is saying ... our responsibility is to keep on keeping on -- and on -- and on.” The back cover states that Jinkins has been in ministry. The Preface states that he now has “the privilege of teaching in a seminary”. QUESTION: Did I miss something?