Post by philiprosenthal on Jun 16, 2006 13:51:53 GMT
LEADERSHIP TRAINING AND MENTORING
His People Ministries has a major emphasis on leadership and the training of leadership. Some of this teaching is good. Some is bad. This makes it really dangerous for the young leader in the organisation - because he is getting fed good and bad teaching together - and doesn't necessarily have the discernment to tell the difference. I would divide the training into three parts:
Part 1: The formal teaching on leadership. This is what is taught at Bible school and in special leadership training sessions. This stuff is mostly really good. You can learn most of it from published materials ('Leadership in serving' by Paul Daniel; 'Developing the leader within you' and 'Developing the leaders around you' by John Maxwell)
Part 2: Informal training and mentoring. This includes both good and bad practices and attitudes. It also includes a lot of secular business leadership wisdom (some good; some bad). For example 'How to win friends and influence people' by Dale Carnegie.
From a pragmatic point of view, it works for a while - but it usually leads to a dark and dangerous stony path in which the leaders integrity is sacrificed for the good of the organisation and the leader's pride and ambition. Its just not the Bible's teaching on leadership.
Worse there are all sorts of unbiblical practices to get promotion:
* Slavish obedience, 'sucking up' to the boss; and boot-licking;
* Defending the organisation even when it is ethically wrong;
* Collecting status symbols;
* Lording it over others;
* Veneration of hero-leaders in place of Christ;
* Manipulating people by false promises and threats to intimidate;
* Competition with other ministries (and with other leaders even in the same organisation);
* Trying to build your own personal empire rather than Christ's kingdom';
* Trying to be a messianic hero, instead of just humbly serving God;
* Deceit to defend yourself.
* Victimisation and persecution of anyone who questions authority.
Not all EveryNation-His People leaders are guilty of the above, but a lot are and it destroys integrity. A lot of other good leaders don't do the above, but still fail to speak against those who do - and thus allow the system to perpetuate.
Part 3: This is the stuff that is seldom taught and even less practiced on the subject leadership, but which is taught by Jesus and the prophets in the Bible. For example, the need for:
* Us to become less and Jesus to become more.
* For us to be servants and consider others better than ourselves. * To speak the prophetic truth even when it costs us dearly in popularity and status.
* The fact that all leaders may abuse power and we need checks and balances to stop us from doing this.
When I was a younger inexperienced leader, I thought that the senior leaders in His People were experts at leadership while I knew very little - and very much looked up to them. Nevertheless, none were really interested in mentoring me - because I realise now I was not interested in the slavish obedience part. I thank God now that I escaped such mentoring - which might have corrupted me. I found much better mentors outside the organisation - humble men who sought to please God - not man. I learned there are many ways to lead which work successfully, but the hyper-autocratic method taught in EveryNation is really dangerous and leads to all kinds of problems.
All of the above may seem harsh. I write it not to criticise the leaders but to save younger ones from taking the wrong path that leads to unChristlike behaviour and destruction.
Do others find a similar problem elsewhere in EveryNation?
His People Ministries has a major emphasis on leadership and the training of leadership. Some of this teaching is good. Some is bad. This makes it really dangerous for the young leader in the organisation - because he is getting fed good and bad teaching together - and doesn't necessarily have the discernment to tell the difference. I would divide the training into three parts:
Part 1: The formal teaching on leadership. This is what is taught at Bible school and in special leadership training sessions. This stuff is mostly really good. You can learn most of it from published materials ('Leadership in serving' by Paul Daniel; 'Developing the leader within you' and 'Developing the leaders around you' by John Maxwell)
Part 2: Informal training and mentoring. This includes both good and bad practices and attitudes. It also includes a lot of secular business leadership wisdom (some good; some bad). For example 'How to win friends and influence people' by Dale Carnegie.
From a pragmatic point of view, it works for a while - but it usually leads to a dark and dangerous stony path in which the leaders integrity is sacrificed for the good of the organisation and the leader's pride and ambition. Its just not the Bible's teaching on leadership.
Worse there are all sorts of unbiblical practices to get promotion:
* Slavish obedience, 'sucking up' to the boss; and boot-licking;
* Defending the organisation even when it is ethically wrong;
* Collecting status symbols;
* Lording it over others;
* Veneration of hero-leaders in place of Christ;
* Manipulating people by false promises and threats to intimidate;
* Competition with other ministries (and with other leaders even in the same organisation);
* Trying to build your own personal empire rather than Christ's kingdom';
* Trying to be a messianic hero, instead of just humbly serving God;
* Deceit to defend yourself.
* Victimisation and persecution of anyone who questions authority.
Not all EveryNation-His People leaders are guilty of the above, but a lot are and it destroys integrity. A lot of other good leaders don't do the above, but still fail to speak against those who do - and thus allow the system to perpetuate.
Part 3: This is the stuff that is seldom taught and even less practiced on the subject leadership, but which is taught by Jesus and the prophets in the Bible. For example, the need for:
* Us to become less and Jesus to become more.
* For us to be servants and consider others better than ourselves. * To speak the prophetic truth even when it costs us dearly in popularity and status.
* The fact that all leaders may abuse power and we need checks and balances to stop us from doing this.
When I was a younger inexperienced leader, I thought that the senior leaders in His People were experts at leadership while I knew very little - and very much looked up to them. Nevertheless, none were really interested in mentoring me - because I realise now I was not interested in the slavish obedience part. I thank God now that I escaped such mentoring - which might have corrupted me. I found much better mentors outside the organisation - humble men who sought to please God - not man. I learned there are many ways to lead which work successfully, but the hyper-autocratic method taught in EveryNation is really dangerous and leads to all kinds of problems.
All of the above may seem harsh. I write it not to criticise the leaders but to save younger ones from taking the wrong path that leads to unChristlike behaviour and destruction.
Do others find a similar problem elsewhere in EveryNation?