{"id":37382,"date":"2024-04-11T09:08:41","date_gmt":"2024-04-11T16:08:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=37382"},"modified":"2024-04-11T09:08:41","modified_gmt":"2024-04-11T16:08:41","slug":"where-do-i-find-my-identity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/where-do-i-find-my-identity\/","title":{"rendered":"Where Do I Find My Identity?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Church has potential to be a breeding ground for domineering leadership. Open up your news app and you\u2019re sure to see yet another story of a church leader\u2019s downfall. But this is not just a current problem. According to J.R. Woodard, in his book, The Scandal of Leadership<\/em>, it is a historical issue, as old as the church itself and will require more than just a psychological and sociological analysis. We will need to see it from a cosmic viewpoint.[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

By \u201ccosmic viewpoint\u201d Woodard says we need to be able to unmask and engage the principalities and powers, that are always unhelpfully influencing and shaping us. Without examining these powers and principalities and how they influence us, deep transformation in individual leaders and in the culture of leadership in the church is impossible.[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

Woodard looks to Jesus to show us how we might unmask the principalities and powers. Drawing on the story of Jesus\u2019 baptism and the work of Henri Nouwen, Woodard writes, \u201cAt the start of Jesus\u2019 ministry at his baptism he heard a voice from heaven saying, \u2018This is my beloved. In him I am well-pleased.\u2019 These words revealed the true identity of Jesus as the beloved. Jesus heard that voice and all his thoughts, words, actions came from his deep knowledge that he was infinitely loved by God. Jesus lived his life from that inner place of belovedness.\u201d[3]<\/a> Woodard continues saying, \u201cIdentifying as the beloved is an integral concept for leaders to absorb and embody so that our lives and leadership flow from a secure identity found in Christ.\u201d[4]<\/a><\/p>\n

To combat the principalities and powers Woodard looks to Philippians 2. In Philippian culture honor was of utmost importance. Some honor was just ascribed at birth and could not be taken away and some was earned honor.[5]<\/a> Roman rulers claimed divine status and used their status to enhance their glory and honor. The Philippian social elites imitated Rome\u2019s values in their own social world.[6]<\/a> On the other hand, Jesus, who had true divine status, did not do this. Instead, he emptied himself becoming not just human but a slave, the lowest status in the Roman and Philippian world.[7]<\/a> He was able to do this not just because he was God, but because his identity was \u201cbeloved.\u201d<\/p>\n

Identity<\/strong><\/p>\n

Where we find our identity is a core theme in this course. Simon Walker would have us become undefended, secured not by our skills and resources but by our attachment to Christ.[8]<\/a> In her book Leadersmithing, Eve Poole stresses the need for character because it\u2019s the very thing that will save us when everything else is stripped away.[9]<\/a> And in Jules Glanzer\u2019s book, The Sound of Leadership, he writes, \u201cWho you are determines how you lead. How you lead flows from who you are.\u201d[10]<\/a><\/p>\n

Whiteness as Identity<\/strong><\/p>\n

Lately I\u2019ve been wrestling with how as a person who wears white skin I have been taught and conditioned to put my identity in my whiteness. In his book, Not So Black and White, Kenan Malik writes, \u201crace did not give birth to racism. Racism gave birth to race.\u201d[11]<\/a> He then goes on to explain the history of how this came to be, namely that the intellectuals and elites \u201cbegan dividing the world into distinct races to explain and justify the differential treatment of certain peoples.\u201d[12]<\/a> In other words, it wasn\u2019t skin color that divided people, it was one\u2019s social class.[13]<\/a><\/p>\n

In an article in the Guardian<\/em>, author, Robert Baird writes, \u201cBefore the 17th century, people did not think of themselves as belonging to something called the white race. But once the idea was invented, it quickly began to reshape the modern world.\u201d[14]<\/a> Baird then gives an historical account of how if one was a Christian she could not be kept as a slave indefinitely but as Africans started getting baptized, slave owners changed the laws so that Christianity could not be grounds for seeking freedom. Baird continues, \u201cNo longer could religious identity separate the elites and their servants from enslaved Africans so they needed a screen of racial contempt. They would need to start thinking of themselves as white.\u201d[15]<\/a><\/p>\n

To use the language of the Philippians, \u201cwhite\u201d became the identity of honor. Americans (and others in our world) put their identity in their whiteness.<\/p>\n

What to do about Whiteness<\/strong><\/p>\n

While Woodard was writing about leadership in the Church, I am using his wisdom to reflect on how I might steward my white privilege like Christ stewarded his privilege. I am curious about how my identity is wrapped up in my whiteness and how I might disentangle whiteness so that I can rely wholeheartedly on my identity as beloved in Christ. What does this look like in word and deed? How do I embody an identity in Christ rather than an identity in my whiteness?<\/p>\n

Woodard suggests we practice emptying ourselves as Christ emptied himself.[16]<\/a> This involves not just knowing the power of his resurrection but experiencing his sufferings. We must \u201cdie daily\u201d as Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15. We must die to the old ways of constructing our identity and live into our identity in Christ, or as Woodard says in a podcast, \u201cWe have to become a nobody in this system in order for God to make us a somebody in God\u2019s system.\u201d<\/p>\n

As I think about dismantling my white privilege, I think it must become a daily practice of dying to the systems of this world that tell me that my whiteness should privilege me and make me superior trying to instead embrace humility and vulnerability. I\u2019m still working on what this looks like in my daily life. Does it mean continuing to educate myself and others about racism? Does it mean lifting up voices of people of color? Does it mean making reparations? How do I experience Christ\u2019s sufferings so that I might die daily to my white privilege and in doing so, become a more compassionate leader?<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> J.R. Woodard, The Scandal of Leadership<\/em>, 100 Movements Publishing, 2023, 55, (Scribd).<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Ibid, 59.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> Ibid, 155.<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> Ibid, 442.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> Ibid, 471.<\/p>\n

[7]<\/a> Ibid, 475.<\/p>\n

[8]<\/a> Simon Walker<\/em>., Leading Out of Who You Are: Discovering the Secret of Undefended Leadership, Carlisle: Piquant Editions, 200, 154.<\/em><\/p>\n

[9]<\/a> Eve Poole, Leadersmithing<\/em>, Revealing the Trade Secrets of Leadership<\/em>\u00a0(London\u202f; New York, NY: Bloomsbury Business, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 2017), 55.<\/p>\n

[10]<\/a> Jules Glazner, The Sound of Leadership<\/em>, Invite Press (2023), page 29 (Scribd).<\/p>\n

[11]<\/a> Kenan Malik, Not So Black and White;<\/em> : A History of Race From White Supremacy to Identity Politics<\/em>. London, Hurst, 2023, 14.<\/p>\n

[12]<\/a> Ibid, 8.<\/p>\n

[13]<\/a> Ibid, 9, 10.<\/p>\n

[14]<\/a> Robert Baird, The invention of whiteness: the long history of a dangerous idea,<\/em> https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/news\/2021\/apr\/20\/the-invention-of-whiteness-long-history-dangerous-idea<\/a> (accessed April 9, 2024).<\/p>\n

[15]<\/a> Ibid.<\/p>\n

[16]<\/a> J.R. Woodard, The Scandal of Leadership<\/em>, 100 Movements Publishing, 2023, 475, (Scribd).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Church has potential to be a breeding ground for domineering leadership. Open up your news app and you\u2019re sure to see yet another story of a church leader\u2019s downfall. But this is not just a current problem. According to J.R. Woodard, in his book, The Scandal of Leadership, it is a historical issue, as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":170,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2489,3180],"class_list":["post-37382","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dlgp02","tag-woodard","cohort-dlgp02"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37382","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/170"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37382"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37382\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37383,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37382\/revisions\/37383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}