By: David Beavis on November 30, 2023
Young, Ambitious, and Anxious My first few years of serving in local church ministry was at an “influential megachurch.” This was a big deal for me. I was eager to have my “big break” and become a successful leader within this institution. But I was not the only one with such ambitions. In fact, when…
By: Esther Edwards on November 30, 2023
Leadership has the power to “change the way people think about what is possible.”[1] This power has given rise to much interest in leadership research over the last century at an unprecedented rate, documenting styles, processes, theories, and proposed leadership solutions.[2] Hunt counted more than “10,000 empirical studies on leadership”[3] and Northouse notes the development…
By: Jenny Dooley on November 30, 2023
I’m embarrassed to confess that I have not read many books on leadership prior to this doctoral program and I was not given to thinking of myself as a leader. I simply considered myself a good follower. Reading Leadership: Theory and Practice, Ninth Edition by Peter Northouse was fascinating and presented a thorough and broad…
By: Jenny Steinbrenner Hale on November 29, 2023
Identifying the Scandal and Offering Prevention JR Woodward, in his book, The Scandal of Leadership: Unmasking the Powers of Domination in the Church, addresses the downfall of church leaders through their abuse of power. He addresses this problem by looking at the roots deep below power abuse, “naming the Powers of domination in order to…
By: Cathy Glei on November 29, 2023
“Both leaders and followers are involved together in the leadership process. . . . Leaders have an ethical responsibility to attend to the needs and concerns of followers.” [1] In Peter G. Northouse’s leadership textbook, “Leadership: Theory and Practice”, the author explains various leadership theories incorporated into practical applications for aspiring leaders. Each chapter includes…
By: Audrey Robinson on November 29, 2023
Hillsong NYC During the height of COVID-19 in 2020, a mega-star Church pastor fell from grace and rocked the world. He was an instrumental mentor to Justin Bieber. This pastor sat with Bishop T.D. Jakes exchanged powerful insights into racism and how to guard against it and, more importantly, at the time, how to process…
By: Kally Elliott on November 29, 2023
In prepping for this blog post I asked Chatgpt to write a critique of Peter Northouse’s book, Leadership: Theory and Practice in the voice of the Reverend Kally Elliott. What follows is the introductory paragraph: Greetings, dear readers, and blessings upon your journey! Today, let us embark on a reflective journey into the realms of…
By: Jean de Dieu Ndahiriwe on November 29, 2023
Introduction: Woodward’s recently released book, The Scandal of Leadership: Unmasking the Powers of Domination in the Church, is impressive. It is one of the books I will return to time and time again. For now, I want to bring a few excerpts from the author’s interview on a podcast with Rohadi. A Correlation between scandalous leaders…
By: Tim Clark on November 29, 2023
I regularly have the opportunity to talk to others about leadership. Often this is in a discipleship context with a small group of emerging ministry leaders. During these kinds of conversations, inevitable questions arise, such as… “Are leaders made or born?” “Is leadership something people grow into naturally, or is it an assigned task?” “What…
By: Pam Lau on November 28, 2023
Last year while I was working on our biblical foundations and expertise paper for class, I chose to research the life and leadership of Caleb, from the well-known story of Joshua in the book of Numbers. As you can imagine, finding scholarly research on the often overlooked Caleb was not as easy as I’d hoped.…
By: Russell Chun on November 28, 2023
Зачем изучать лидерство? – Zachem izuchat’ liderstvo? Why study Leadership? (Russian) Part 1: What my peers are saying. Part 2: Highlights from Northouse. Part 3: Epilogue Part 1: What my peers are saying. John Fehlan, says, “Perhaps leadership IS influence and the Christian Leadership industry got us all to buy their stuff… I then…
By: Kim Sanford on November 28, 2023
We are 15 or so months into our doctoral journey, and this week’s reading may be the first book that feels like a classic textbook. Leadership is a notoriously slippery concept to pin down, but Peter Northouse’s Leadership: Theory and Practice provides a helpful definition: “Leadership is a process whereby an individual influences a group…
By: Kristy Newport on November 27, 2023
The book Antifragile is not for the faint of heart. The term “antifragile” is difficult to define, but the author Nassim Taleb describes it this way: “The resilient resists shocks and stays the same; the antifragile gets better.” [1] Through my lens as a Marriage and Family Therapist, I will provide a summary of a…
By: John Fehlen on November 27, 2023
I’ve gone through a number of “leadership phases” in my 52 years of living and serving Jesus’ Church. Each season was marked by a Christian author/speaker and the volumes of work they would produce that impacted me, and so many others like me. Although written in 1967, I remember when “Spiritual Leadership” by J. Oswald…
By: Jennifer Vernam on November 27, 2023
Familiar Territory? I was excited to see that we had Leadership: Theory and Practice[1] on our reading list this term. I will be candid: I was excited to have a book I had already read because it meant I had less reading to do. This was territory I had already covered, so “I should be…
By: Travis Vaughn on November 27, 2023
Two topics routinely come up in conversations with leaders in some of my circles. One is the subject of leadership and management. A second topic is the situational leadership approach, illustrated by Ken Blachard in a model “called the Situational Leadership II (SLII) model.”[1] Peter Northouse addresses both of these subjects in Leadership: Theory and…
By: Laura Fleetwood on November 25, 2023
When psychology, neuroscience and spirituality connect, it’s an ultimate trifecta of interest for me. That’s exactly what Daniel Lieberman offers in his 2022 book Spellbound: Modern Science, Ancient Magic, and the Hidden Potential of the Unconscious Mind. Dr Lieberman is a professor and vice chair for clinical affairs in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural…
By: Greg McMullen on November 22, 2023
Antifragile will remain one of my favorite books from this program. I will continue to come back to this book from time to time.[1] To be honest with you, I felt it was one of the few books that really identified with me. I have been challenged with church growth models, methods and systems over…
By: Tonette Kellett on November 22, 2023
The Scandal of Leadership by J.R. Woodward merges the works of three primary thinkers, among others. The first is Walter Wink and The Powers That Be and Unmasking the Powers, which discuss the theology of the principalities and powers of the world in which we live. Rene Girard’s book Mimetic Theory deals with mimetic desire and…
By: Kristy Newport on November 21, 2023
“Do what I say and not what I do.” Ha! What child has ever taken this to heart by a parent who gives this instruction? We are sorely mistaken if we believe that a child or others will judge us by what we say and not by what we do. What we say and what…
