DLGP

Doctor of Leadership in Global Perspectives: Crafting Ministry in an Interconnected World

Jesus is an Anomaly!

By: on April 7, 2025

Last spring we read The Hero with a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell.  In this book, Campbell presents the idea of the monomyth, when examined the myths of different cultures are all essentially the same including the multi-stage journey that every hero takes.[1]  Another book read was Matthew Petrusek’s Evangelization and Ideology.   Petrusek discusses the…

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Brain Play

By: on April 7, 2025

After reading the books from the beginning of this class some very heavy theoretical others practical and most of them classics in their own rite it was really refreshing to read a play Full in four acts 14 scenes, with intermission, encore and various actors coming in and out of the stage with the director…

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Between a Rock and a Hard Place

By: on April 5, 2025

“What is next?” was my first thought after I hung up the phone. The sudden announcement of the 100M+ business loss still tumbled through my head.  It had taken years to develop, nurture, and deliver extraordinary services for this large customer, and now it was scheduled to disappear within 90 days.  My facility was now…

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Storytelling and your Brain at Work

By: on April 4, 2025

I know I have said this before, but so much of my life has been spent fighting wars, sharing the love of Christ among those who have never heard, and as much as the first two, I am considered a raconteur. I love storytelling and have been around many excellent spinners of yarn. I really…

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The Mystical Path to Productivity

By: on April 4, 2025

Working with this three-pound organ in my skull has been my full-time job for most of my adult life. I’ve tried every productivity and management system I could find to keep the infinite areas of interest and responsibility passing through my awareness somewhat under control. There have been lots of fits and starts but rarely…

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Parasitic Shortcuts

By: on April 3, 2025

In the film Inception, Dom Cobb warns, “What is the most resilient parasite?… An idea. Once an idea has taken hold of the brain, it’s almost impossible to eradicate.” The film explores how hidden thoughts shape reality, often without people realizing it. This premise mirrors a real-world truth: Much of our thinking is shaped by…

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With whom do I want to conform?

By: on April 3, 2025

Sway, Unravelling unconscious bias, by behavioral scientist, Dr. Pragya Agarwal, brings awareness to biases that exist and the discriminatory behavior that results from them. Specifically, she wanted to know why unconscious biases occur and how they are manifested within individuals[1]. Many implicit biases are based on who is part of the in-group and out-group. Using…

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Who is Bias? Not Me

By: on April 3, 2025

It was early on a Sunday morning. I was arriving at church, and upon entering, I greeted several of our leaders in the sanctuary who were preparing for worship. I was approached by a couple who had recently joined our congregation. They were prominent members in our community. The husband a public figure whose status…

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Doctor or Film Star?

By: on April 3, 2025

I am putting all my cards up front. Sway: Unravelling Unconscious Bias by Pragya Agarwal was a depressing read for me. Dr. Agarwal is a behavioral and data scientist who writes and speaks about the impacts of unconscious bias in numerous arenas and specializes in gender. Although the book covered other topics, I chose to…

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Third Spaces to Combat Bias

By: on April 3, 2025

“We need one person in your table group to facilitate the conversation and one person to take notes,” instructed the leader of a working group. I sat at a table of a dozen men as the only female, and several eyes came towards me. Finally, one of them said, “Christy, do you mind taking notes…

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Quick to Hear, Slow to Speak

By: on April 3, 2025

“The woman at the bank would not let us make the transaction because she was Arab. The lady who usually works at the bank is black and always permits me to complete this transaction.” Sadly, in my host country, there is often open discord and discrimination between light-skinned Arabs and dark-skinned African ethnicities. In an…

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Sometimes My Brain Doesn’t Work At Work

By: on April 3, 2025

As I write these words, I’m keenly aware of neurology. Not as a (formal) student of neurology or brain physiology but as a patient. One Sunday a few years ago, I awoke to strange sensations and cognitive fog that progressed to the point that a day later, I was unable to walk under my own…

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Seeing Through Others Eyes

By: on April 3, 2025

The French poet Marcel Proust is credited with the paraphrased quote “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.” This loose paraphrase is from The Prisoner, published in 1923, and is taken from volume five of his seven-volume work, Remembrance of Things Past. The original statement is…

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Unconscious Bias and Women In Church Leadership

By: on April 3, 2025

In my denomination, both egalitarian and complementarian views regarding women in eldership coexist. Each local church is tasked with determining its stance and practice through a structured process. This position has proven to be difficult, as it represents one of the more contentious issues our denomination has faced. The church I pastored had decided many…

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Basal Ganglia, Liminality and Other Big Words I Know

By: on April 3, 2025

The subtitle of this post is: “What did the basal ganglia say to the prefrontal cortex? Why are you always pushing your liminality down into me! And other jokes for doctoral students.” This week, I read Your Brain at Work by David Rock. This book is a confluence of psychology and leadership, applying insights about…

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What Bias Do I Need To Address Now?

By: on April 3, 2025

Pragya Agarwal’s book Sway: Unravelling Unconscious Bias reminded me of the time a few years ago when I took the Implicit Association Test (IAT) from Harvard’s Project Implicit. With my conviction that all people are created in the image of God and are equally worthy of love and life, I thought I would achieve neutrality.…

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How Much Power Do We Have?

By: on April 3, 2025

What power do humans have and what power do we think we have? As leaders these are crucial questions to wrestle with as we intentionally seek to build cultures where power is used to help rather than harm. Within my work I aim to empower those we support, so that they feel equipped to create…

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Not a waste but an investment.

By: on April 2, 2025

This week’s reading, Your Brain at Work by Dr. David Rock, reminded me of “Thinking, Fast and Slow” by Daniel Kahneman, which we read a few weeks ago. Both books break down how our brains function. Kahneman explains the two systems in our minds—one that operates on autopilot and another that activates when we need…

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