The Christian leader of the future is called to be completely irrelevant and to stand in this world with nothing to offer but his or her own vulnerable self. God loves us, not because of what we do or accomplish, but because God has created and redeemed us in love.
Interpretation
True leadership involves vulnerability and authenticity, rather than relying on achievements or position.
This quote emphasizes the importance of authenticity and vulnerability in Christian leadership. Henri Nouwen suggests that rather than seeking relevance through accomplishments or status, leaders should focus on being genuine individuals who embody love and grace. The essence of leadership, according to Nouwen, lies not in what leaders provide materially or positionally but in their capacity to reflect the love of God and their acceptance of their own imperfections.
In practice
Use this quote in a leadership training seminar to emphasize the importance of authenticity.
The immense joy in welcoming back the lost son hides in the immense sorrow that has gone before....our brokenness may appear beautiful, but our brokenness has no other beauty but the beauty that comes from the compassion that surrounds it.
Suffering invites us to place our hurts in larger hands. In Christ we see God suffering – for us. And calling us to share in God’s suffering love for a hurting world. The small and even overpowering pains of our lives are intimately connected with the greater pains of Christ. Our daily sorrows are anchored in a greater sorrow and therefore a larger hope.
To listen is very hard, because it asks of us so much interior stability that we no longer need to prove ourselves by speeches, arguments, statements or declarations. True listeners no longer have an inner need to make their presence known. They are free to receive, welcome, to accept.
Waiting is a dry desert between where we are and where we want to be. (Finding My Way Home)
Becoming the beloved is pulling the truth revealed to me from above down into the ordinariness of what I am, in fact, thinking of, talking about and doing from hour to hour.
The life-converting experience is not the discovery that I have choices to make that determine the way I live out my existence, but the awareness that my that my existence itself is not in the center. Once I 'know' God, that is, once I experience God's love as the love in which all my human experiences are anchored, I can desire only one thing: to be in that love.
The only thing I don't think people don't understand about good leaders is that they're both good and lucky. A lot of it is timing.
In order to cultivate a set of leaders with legitimacy in the eyes of the citizenry, it is necessary that the path to leadership be visibly open to talented and qualified individuals of every race and ethnicity.
The more responsibility the Scoutmaster gives his patrol leaders, the more they will respond.
I believe that close association with one who refuses to compromise with circumstances he does not like, is an asset that can never be measured in terms of money.
You can't just give a speech and expect people to fall down and agree with you.
You need people who have their own views, whose views you respect, whom you can have a productive disagreement with, and work out ideas which you might not have come up with, or who improve on ideas you had.
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