By: Bill Dobrenen on October 24, 2014
Bob Dylan was cranked up to the max as I drove the streets of Orange County, California that night in 1980. I knew all the lyrics. After all, I was a Dylan fan. You might be an ambassador to England or France You might like to gamble, you might like to dance You might be…
By: rhbaker275 on October 24, 2014
We recently experienced a mission conference that was a great success. I am analyzing this event in retrospect; in fact, I have been asked to write a news release recounting for what happened, the back story, and the membership’s reaction to the event. Our outcomes were more than double our set goals. What happened? Did we…
By: Miriam Mendez on October 24, 2014
Throughout my years of study and ministry I have read many books and articles on the topic of leadership. After a while one notices a common theme running through the pages of these leadership books. Interestingly enough, Manfred Kets de Vries is quick to let his readers know that in The Leadership Mystique some of…
By: Michael Badriaki on October 24, 2014
Manfred Kets De Vries’s book The Leadership Mystique; leading behavior in the human enterprise was a refreshing read. Leadership is such a board subject and it is sometimes difficult to find practical material that delivers on everyday strategies on leadership. I am particularly drawn to leadership strategies that seek to encourage the development of leadership skills…
By: Julie Dodge on October 24, 2014
A long time ago, I picked up a mantra that has guided much of my work: If you understand how a person thinks, their behavior makes sense. I’ve fine-tuned this thought over the years to include feelings (if you understand why a person feels the way that they do, their behaviors also make sense) and…
By: Clint Baldwin on October 24, 2014
The Leadership Mystique: Leading Behavior in the Human Enterprise by Manfred F. R. Kets de Vries is very simply a wonderfully insightful and useful book. Read it. Then, read it again. The text offers a multiplicity of insights into the personal and organizational dynamics of leadership. It includes questionnaires that allow one to relatively quickly…
By: Michael Badriaki on October 24, 2014
In modernity there is a prevailing quest for the taste of free and successful societies. People are eager to find purposeful careers and meaningful ways to express their rights or lack thereof. The use of freedom of speech can allow for the voicing of certain issues through contestations. Religious freedom at its core aims to…
By: Jon Spellman on October 24, 2014
Theology, allow me to RE-introduce myself. It feels like I’m being introduced to theology all over again. I knew her once really well but life happened and we grew apart. I am reflecting on the timeline leading up to and immediately following my completion of the MA in theology (remember, it’s practical!). My program concluded…
By: John Woodward on October 23, 2014
One of the hardest lessons I learned in ministry was a truth echoed throughout the book The Leadership Mystique: Leading Behavior in the Human Enterprise by Manfred Kets De Vries: “All human behavior, no matter how irrational it appears, has a rationale.”[i] As a campus minister for 23 years, I had privilege of working with…
By: Dave Young on October 23, 2014
In my last post I mentioned that “My American evangelical bubble is deflating; maybe that’s good.” Jason Clark asked me to comment further on what I meant and why I thought it was ‘good.’ I’d like to answer that in this post. My reality has been deflating generally since I started this GFES graduate study,…
By: Liz Linssen on October 23, 2014
On our very first date with my husband, Willy brought with him an emotional intelligence test (yes, it’s true. He tested my EQ on our first date). Within the first hour of our first-ever meeting, he explained to me the Five Love Languages by Dr. Gary Chapman, and then promptly asked me to guess his…
By: Nick Martineau on October 23, 2014
I have lived my entire life in the Bible belt. Not just the Bible belt, but white Christian suburbia. No doubt this plays deeply into my theology of God, even in ways I don’t understand. I can remember when I first realized God is bigger then the box I have put him in. When I…
By: Dawnel Volzke on October 23, 2014
Each religion has core theological beliefs, which have come about as theologians and scholars have debated the great questions of life throughout centuries. Today, we have many different flavors of religion or theological views. Ford, in his book, Theology: a Very Short Introduction, asserts that there are “between four and five billion of the world’s…
By: Ashley Goad on October 23, 2014
This week I am on vacation with my family. Work calls and emails have been minimal, and my family has surrounded me with rest and comfort. Manfred Kets De Vries’ The Leadership Mystique: Leading Behavior in the Human Experience has been exceptional beach reading. In fact, I am thankful to have had time (more than…
By: Deve Persad on October 23, 2014
It’s World Series time. A time when leadership discussions take place inning to inning let alone game to game. Kansas City Royals. San Francisco Giants. Baseball is much harder than it looks. Getting to the World Series is even tougher. “Leadership” has never been something that came easily to me, so I decided to become…
By: Mary Pandiani on October 23, 2014
Understanding God Theology and Wisdom Humble Transforming Trying my hand at Haiku (5-7-5 syllables) today as I attempt to assimilate the “whole shape of living” by David Ford at a deeper level. I’m struck by his words at the end of his book, Theology: A Very Short Introduction: “Who will do theology?….God will..by taking the initiative…
By: Brian Yost on October 23, 2014
When picking up a book that includes “a very short introduction” in the title, one may expect to find a pamphlet of about a dozen pages or fewer. This is not the case with David Ford’s Theology: a Very Short Introduction, which is nearly 200 pages long. The ironic thing is that, given the immense…
By: Phillip Struckmeyer on October 22, 2014
I like your Christ, I just don’t think you understand your theology? While being a loose spin-off of a famous quote of Mahatma Gandhi, after reading David F. Ford’s book, Theology: A Very Short Introduction, I am concerned about the church I know and it’s capacity to theologically engage the emerging culture and increasingly complex…
By: rhbaker275 on October 20, 2014
I have always been skeptical of books on economics. It probably goes back to the single professor that I had in an economics introductory class early in my undergraduate work. In his mono-tone voice and dry sense of humor, he was able to do very little to electrify what I had already determined to be…
By: Clint Baldwin on October 20, 2014
So… This. This is good. This is worth your time. This just might change some of the way you engage with the world. Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States by Albert O. Hirschman is acknowledged by a number of those people who generally go around acknowledging things as being…
