{"id":640,"date":"2010-09-07T11:53:37","date_gmt":"2010-09-07T17:53:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/raincitypastor.wordpress.com\/?p=640"},"modified":"2010-09-07T11:53:37","modified_gmt":"2010-09-07T17:53:37","slug":"adaptive-leadership","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/","title":{"rendered":"Adaptive Leadership –"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

You might remember the book \u201cInto Thin Air\u201d from over a decade ago? \u00a0It catalogs some teams climbing Everest and attempting to summit on May 10, 1996, a day which became the deadliest day<\/a>, in the deadliest year, of Everest mountaineering history. \u00a0One of the heroic stories of that day was the actions of Ed Viesturs and his climbing team, who were on the mountain to make an IMAX film. \u00a0Though they would summit later, their encounter of the storm created an entire reshuffling of their expedition\u2019s goals and timetables, as the needs of the moment superseded previous goals. \u00a0You can read about all that here<\/a>. \u00a0Ed demonstrates the priority of what I call \u201cadaptive leadership\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

There\u2019s a fine line between healthy vision and ambition, on the one hand, and the dangers of unbridled devotion to one\u2019s goals, on the other. \u00a0Scott Fischer and Rob Hall were leading expeditions that day and what made them great climbers was their commitment to their summit goals. \u00a0They were the kind of visionaries who could see the future so clearly that they\u2019d let nothing stand in their way of getting to the top. \u00a0That same sense of drivenness, though, is what made them dead climbers by the end of that same fateful day.<\/p>\n

There are important lessons to be learned here for anyone who\u2019s charged with leadership. \u00a0I was at a conference two weeks ago, where some high powered, nationally famous pastors were charging up a room full of low powered, anonymous pastors. \u00a0There were lights, rocking music, and lots of good teaching about vision casting and leadership. \u00a0There were plenty of \u201ctake aways\u201d from this conference, and I was grateful to be there. \u00a0I\u2019m still digesting lots of the valuable things a learned.<\/p>\n

I left this conference feeling these guys were the spiritual rock stars of American Christianity. \u00a0They have goals to plant 1000 churches, or take their stuff \u2018on the road\u2019, franchising their worship services for sites across the country. \u00a0They\u2019ve some ambitious summits in their sites. \u00a0This is a good thing, largely. \u00a0We all need goals, because goals frame our values and priorities. \u00a0They unify people and align their energies towards a purpose. \u00a0They catalyze. \u00a0Yes. \u00a0Yes. \u00a0I get that.<\/p>\n

My biggest problem with this, though, is that many stories of the Bible don\u2019t point me in the direction of unbridled devotion to goals.<\/p>\n

#1 \u2013 God tells Abraham to go to a new land, where he\u2019ll become the father of nation, and become a blessing to the whole world. \u00a0Abraham might have questions: \u00a0\u201cHow long will it take?\u201d \u00a0\u201cWhere is this new land?\u201d \u00a0\u201cHow will I know when I\u2019ve arrived there?\u201d \u00a0\u201cWhen will the baby come?\u201d \u00a0Over and over again, God says, in essence, \u201cI\u2019m not telling \u2013 just follow me.\u201d<\/p>\n

#2 \u2013 God tells Moses that he\u2019ll lead people out of slavery, into the promise land. \u00a0He doesn\u2019t talk about how whiny the people will be, or how they\u2019ll make idols, or how he\u2019ll never actually realize the goal.<\/p>\n

#3 \u2013 Jesus tells Peter at the end of John to follow Him, and hints that some things will happen to Peter that will be hard. \u00a0Peter looks at John and says, \u201cWhat about him? \u00a0Will he have it tough too?\u201d \u00a0Jesus won\u2019t answer, he just says, \u201cyou follow me.\u201d<\/p>\n

#4 \u2013 Over and over again in the church of Acts, the apostles are essentially saying, \u201cwhat do we do now?\u201d \u00a0We\u2019ve grown faster than we thought we would, or one of our members has been killed for his faith, or there\u2019s some doctrinal division cropping up, or some people in need of help over here because of a famine. \u00a0What\u2019s next?<\/p>\n

These Bible stories paint a picture of leaders who knew a general direction, but its clear that there was more about the future that they didn\u2019t<\/em> know, than that they knew. \u00a0When I listen to the rock star pastors, and then have breakfast with a guy who\u2019s leading a church of 40 people, I realize that there\u2019s a missing piece to the grand vision discussion, and the missing piece is adaptive leadership<\/em>.<\/p>\n

We who lead need to be mindful, not only of the grand vision, but of the continually changing landscape of personalities and events around us that are beyond our control. \u00a0We can\u2019t control how many people will come to our church (I suppose we can, by being sloppy about what we do, but you get my point). \u00a0We can\u2019t control how our children will respond to the gospel. \u00a0We can\u2019t control the economy. \u00a0We can\u2019t foretell where the next earthquake, or terrorist attack, or doctrinal challenge will come from. \u00a0But we can adapt. \u00a0We can respond to our situations in such a way that we emerge from unanticipated crises stronger than ever.<\/p>\n

The climbers who died that day allowed unbridled commitment to the summit to become the real vision, and it cost them their lives. \u00a0We who lead churches are called to do one thing: go into the world and make disciples<\/strong><\/em>. \u00a0We\u2019re not told how far to go, or how many disciples to make. \u00a0We\u2019re not told whether to franchise our efforts or content ourselves with a house church, or simply making disciples in our family. \u00a0We can expect fruit, surely. \u00a0But that timing and nature of that fruit is, frankly, beyond our control. Presuming a certain particular scope of fruitfulness might get us in trouble, if our commitment to that scope causes us to lose sight of more important things, like the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.<\/a> Failures here have resulted in abuses of power that have wounded multitudes over the centuries.<\/p>\n

As our church begins a new season of ministry, we have plans, and we\u2019re growing, and we\u2019re believing God wants us to impact our city significantly. \u00a0But we\u2019re holding all of it with an open hand because in the end, how high we\u2019ll climb is dependent on factors outside our control, which is actually very good news when the One who\u2019ll make that call is Jesus.<\/p>\n

I welcome your thoughts\u2026<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You might remember the book \u201cInto Thin Air\u201d from over a decade ago? \u00a0It catalogs some teams climbing Everest and attempting to summit on May 10, 1996, a day which became the deadliest day, in the deadliest year, of Everest mountaineering history. \u00a0One of the heroic stories of that day was the actions of Ed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,12,14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-640","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-intimacy","category-leadership","category-questions"],"yoast_head":"\nAdaptive Leadership -<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"You might remember the book "Into Thin Air" from over a decade ago? \u00a0It catalogs some teams climbing Everest and attempting to summit on May 10, 1996, a\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Adaptive Leadership -\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"You might remember the book "Into Thin Air" from over a decade ago? \u00a0It catalogs some teams climbing Everest and attempting to summit on May 10, 1996, a\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Fibonacci Faith: Changing Everything\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-09-07T17:53:37+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.learnnc.org\/lp\/media\/uploads\/2009\/04\/img_0499_600.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Richard Dahlstrom\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Richard Dahlstrom\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/\",\"name\":\"Adaptive Leadership -\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2010-09-07T17:53:37+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2010-09-07T17:53:37+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/#\/schema\/person\/35cc34ea723fe19cdf6bfe9446fde728\"},\"description\":\"You might remember the book \\\"Into Thin Air\\\" from over a decade ago? \u00a0It catalogs some teams climbing Everest and attempting to summit on May 10, 1996, a\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Adaptive Leadership –\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/\",\"name\":\"Fibonacci Faith: Changing Everything\",\"description\":\"The Blog of Richard Dahlstrom\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/#\/schema\/person\/35cc34ea723fe19cdf6bfe9446fde728\",\"name\":\"Richard Dahlstrom\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c70ef6941167d00acda35b40d90cb1e0?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c70ef6941167d00acda35b40d90cb1e0?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Richard Dahlstrom\"},\"description\":\"As Pastor of Bethany Community Church in Seattle, Richard teaches with vision of \\\"making the invisible God visible\\\" by calling people to acts of service and blessing. It's working, as a wilderness ministry, homeless shelter, and community meals that serve those living on the margins are all pieces of Bethany's life. \\\"We're being the presence of Christ\\\" he says, \\\"and inviting everyone to join the adventure.\\\" Many have, making Bethany one of the fastest growing churches in America in 2009 according to Outreach Magazine.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/author\/richarddahlstrom\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Adaptive Leadership -","description":"You might remember the book \"Into Thin Air\" from over a decade ago? \u00a0It catalogs some teams climbing Everest and attempting to summit on May 10, 1996, a","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Adaptive Leadership -","og_description":"You might remember the book \"Into Thin Air\" from over a decade ago? \u00a0It catalogs some teams climbing Everest and attempting to summit on May 10, 1996, a","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/","og_site_name":"Fibonacci Faith: Changing Everything","article_published_time":"2010-09-07T17:53:37+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/www.learnnc.org\/lp\/media\/uploads\/2009\/04\/img_0499_600.jpg"}],"author":"Richard Dahlstrom","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Richard Dahlstrom","Est. reading time":"5 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/","name":"Adaptive Leadership -","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/#website"},"datePublished":"2010-09-07T17:53:37+00:00","dateModified":"2010-09-07T17:53:37+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/#\/schema\/person\/35cc34ea723fe19cdf6bfe9446fde728"},"description":"You might remember the book \"Into Thin Air\" from over a decade ago? \u00a0It catalogs some teams climbing Everest and attempting to summit on May 10, 1996, a","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/2010\/09\/07\/adaptive-leadership\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Adaptive Leadership –"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/","name":"Fibonacci Faith: Changing Everything","description":"The Blog of Richard Dahlstrom","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/#\/schema\/person\/35cc34ea723fe19cdf6bfe9446fde728","name":"Richard Dahlstrom","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c70ef6941167d00acda35b40d90cb1e0?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c70ef6941167d00acda35b40d90cb1e0?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Richard Dahlstrom"},"description":"As Pastor of Bethany Community Church in Seattle, Richard teaches with vision of \"making the invisible God visible\" by calling people to acts of service and blessing. It's working, as a wilderness ministry, homeless shelter, and community meals that serve those living on the margins are all pieces of Bethany's life. \"We're being the presence of Christ\" he says, \"and inviting everyone to join the adventure.\" Many have, making Bethany one of the fastest growing churches in America in 2009 according to Outreach Magazine.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/author\/richarddahlstrom\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=640"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/richarddahlstrom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}