Nothing leadership

Leadership today has become such a hot topic that legions of books, seminars, courses, and graduate degrees offered in both secular and Christian leadership are available. I typed in “Leadership” on Amazon.com and found that the word appears in 154,199 book titles, everything from Monday Morning Leadership to Primal Leadership to The Benedictine Rule of Leadership to The Leadership Secrets of Santa Claus.

Let’s suggest another type of leadership and make it an even 154,200: Nothing Leadership. What is nothing leadership? It’s the kind of leadership compressed into one word in one verse concerning one Person in Philippians 2:7, and it could be called self-emptying leadership, or downward mobility leadership. That Greek word for “made himself nothing” in Philippians 2:7 (kenosis) simply means, “to empty.” It remains a mystery, and the meaning can hardly be comprehended.

Of what did Christ empty Himself? He emptied Himself of Himself. Notice that Paul says Jesus made Himself nothing—an intentional and willful choice. To become a nothing leader means I will seek no selfish ambition, I will practice humility toward others, and I will cultivate the same attitude as that of Jesus—to intentionally empty myself of myself and become a humble servant obedient unto death.

To understand this challenge better, let’s take a look at the fuller context of Philippians 2:3–8:

The postmodern condition

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus:

Who, being in very nature

God,

did not consider equality

with God something to

be grasped,

but made himself nothing,

taking the very nature of a servant,

being made in human likeness.

And being found in appearance

as a man,

he humbled himself

and became obedient to death—

even death on a cross!” (Phil. 2:6–8)¹

During the last fifty years, numerous cultures have been transitioning into what many scholars call postmodernity—namely, the cultural quest to move beyond modernity. At its heart, the modern view focuses on reason; the postmodern view focuses on relationship. Authenticity has become a common word for postmoderns. Len Hjalmarson writes, “Postmoderns reject authority in position in favor of authority in relationship. They do not buy into hierarchies, and they tend to assign authority only when it is earned. They don’t respect leaders who are ‘over’ but not ‘among.’ This aligns with the New Testament teaching on the priesthood of believers and Jesus’ teaching that ‘the greatest among you must be the servant of all.’ ”²

With postmodern context ripe for “nothing” leaders, I interviewed Leslie, our twenty-seven-year-old pastor of student ministries, who is a sharp, intelligent, and deeply spiritual postmodern leader. I asked her what she felt were some of the key qualities that she would admire and want to be as a leader in the postmodern context. She replied, “Postmodern leadership means that I shift from walking in front of you to walking beside you, shoulder to shoulder. When I try to be ‘the leader,’ the students don’t follow me. My leadership has to be about relationship leading to respect leading to trust. We must share life together, connecting, and helping students belong, believe, and become, in that order. I must not be afraid to allow people to wrestle with faith issues and explore deep theological questions like, ‘could I ever stop being a Christian?’ Narrative is important. Sharing life together is important. Spiritual leadership is more informal.”

I also interviewed another postmodern young adult—Steven, a twenty-one-year-old university student who really understands the modern-postmodern conversations. When I asked him what he felt were the characteristics of a good leader whom he would follow or would be attracted to, this was his reply: “Honesty—the postmodern assumption is that we are going to be lied to and be deceived. Authenticity and integrity. Someone who is iconoclastic, meaning, someone like Jon Stewart of The Daily Show who is anti-institutional, who does what he believes is right and will do what is right rather than do what he is expected to do and...willing to challenge the status quo. Someone who is fearless. Will speak on the same level as me and not talk down to me, treating me as an equal, as a friend, relating to me.”

Servant leadership

In 1977, Robert Greenleaf published a foundational secular leadership book entitled Servant Leadership³ with a very telling subtitle: “A Journey into the Nature of Legitimate Power and Greatness.” From it I gained that nothing leaders will become servant leaders; however, servant leaders do not necessarily become nothing leaders. Nothing leaders are humble leaders who empty themselves in their leadership. They do not assert their own ambition or interests but become servants in their attitudes and actions toward others. Servant leaders will empower and serve others but can still do this in a functional way, as a style or strategy not genuinely based on a self-emptying foundation.

The Gospel of Mark highlights the idea of nothing leadership expressing itself in service. Notice what Jesus regards as important: “ ‘You know that those who are regarded as rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be...slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many’ ” (Mark 10:42–45).

Whoever wants to become great must be a servant. The Greek word used comes from the words deacon and minister. The term has associations with waiters at tables and of servants to a king. “ ‘And whoever wants to be first must be slave of all.’ ” The word “slave,” also translated as “servant,” is the same word used in Philippians 2:7, for slaves are servants. It is one thing to practice servant leadership and another thing to be a servant leader. Being will flow into doing.

Jesus, by the way, implies it’s OK to be great. How I become great becomes the issue.

Love leadership

What quality do I need that will ultimately characterize me as a servant leader? Henri Nouwen expresses it for me. “Here we touch the most important quality of Christian leadership in the future. It is not leadership of power and control, but a leadership of powerlessness and humility in which the suffering servant of God, Jesus Christ, is made manifest. . . . I am speaking of a leadership in which power is constantly abandoned in favor of love. It is a true spiritual leadership.”⁴

The ultimate characteristic of servant leadership centers around love leadership. I can serve people but not love them; however, I cannot love people and not serve them. The whole point of the incarnation was love demonstrated by God who so loved the world that He gave His son. God is love. I remember when I was in Bible college, I read Francis A. Schaeffer’s The Mark of the Christian.⁵ I was expecting some insightful or deep theological exposition on the mark or secret of what it really means to be a Christian. I was surprised to discover that the mark of the Christian is love.

I believe that good servant leadership founded on nothing leadership will be marked by love because leadership is relationship, not just functional. Love makes good relationships; in fact, Scriptures clearly say that spirituality is relational. I believe that we are spiritual to the degree that we love. Notice the following texts: “The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love” (Gal. 5:6). “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the sinful nature with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit” (Gal. 5:22–25).

Spiritual leadership (marked by the Spirit) will be leadership that loves. Just last night, my wife Gail and I were out in our backyard working in her flower beds. I was installing some wood borders for a new flower bed, a task that required sawing, nailing, and dumping in new soil. Normally, I don’t like yard work. While I was working, she queried, “Why are you doing this? I usually have to talk you into yard work.”

I replied, “Well, I am doing this for you. Instead of only doing what I want, I need to do what you want. That is part of love.”

Whether I’m involved with my wife, children, or church, I must choose to love as a leader.

Leadership integrity

Kevin Mannoia, in his book The Integrity Factor,⁶ writes that leadership performance flows out of the unseen foundation of being. Using Moses and Jesus as models of spiritual leadership, Mannoia presents his thesis that the process of building integrity between who one is and what one does directs in the growth as a spiritual leader. He calls this “leadership formation” centered on “the integrity factor”—a balance between identity and performance.

For Mannoia, the unseen foundation of leadership can be compared to the invisible 80 percent of an iceberg under water, which gives stability to the visible 20 percent part. If I intentionally concentrate on my unseen foundation of character, that will have a dramatic influence on my conduct as a leader, for then I will always behave out of my identity. For Mannoia, the central unseen foundation and identity for Christian leadership is self-emptying humility and servanthood described in Philippians 2:5–11.

Allow me to be honest. There are times when I feel like I am playing the pastoral game: put on a happy face, be nice to everyone, exude passion for God, cast vision for spiritual formation and discipleship, show up at key events so people will notice I am there “doing my job being a leader.” But I’m concealing the fact that sometimes my thought life, my family life, and my spiritual life are like the cavern full of snakes that Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) fell into in the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark. Then I read books like The Integrity Factor, In the Name of Jesus, or A Tale of Three Kings⁷ and quickly realized that my struggles duplicate the ones that Paul faced (Rom. 7:15–19).

I feel secure, however, that during times when my identity and my performance are in alignment, I enjoy the feelings that freedom and fulfillment bring. But there are also times when I have to preach or teach or give spiritual counsel in my office or lead a meeting with a group of leaders only to wish that I could stay home and forget the charades, knowing that my life and doctrine do not match (cf. 1 Tim. 4:16). I suppose I receive some solace in knowing Paul had similar issues when he dictated, “I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out” (Rom. 7:15–19).

Lately, I have been reflecting on what it means to be a nothing leader who needs to discover how to experience Philippians 2 in practical and intentional ways in which I surrender my ambition and agenda. I am contemplating what it means to be a slave and servant to my family, my friends, and my flock. This does not mean doing servant leadership stuff but being a servant leader. Jesus Christ was the greatest Leader ever, and God rewarded Him for being a self-emptied Servant who surrendered to God all the way to the cross. Notice the word therefore in these next verses:

Therefore, God exalted him to

the highest place

and gave him the name that

is above every name,

that at the name of Jesus every

knee should bow,

in heaven and on earth and

under the earth, and every tongue confess that

Jesus Christ is Lord,

to the glory of God the

Father (Phil. 2:9–11).

Quite a reward, therefore, for someone who made Himself nothing (Phil. 2:7). Just refl ect for a moment on the whole notion of Jesus leaving His eternal place in glory: becoming a zygote in the womb of a young woman in Israel, growing into a tiny baby inside her womb for nine silent and solitary months, and then being born, nursing on her breasts as an infant while soiling whatever kind of diapers they would have used then, growing up as a boy and teenager (imagine Jesus Christ as a sixteen-year-old!). Then He finally became a fully adult Man who was crucified on a rugged Roman cross. How much faith would be required to navigate that kind of path of self-emptying, service, and surrender?

Arturo Toscanini was a famous Italian symphony conductor specializing in the works of Beethoven. One night in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Toscanini conducted the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra in a program that included the Ninth Symphony, one of the most difficult pieces to direct. The music was so majestic and so moving that when the piece was completed, the audience stood for round after round of applause. Toscanini took his bows again and again; then he turned to the orchestra and they bowed. The audience continued to clap and cheer. The orchestra members themselves were smiling and clapping. Finally, Toscanini turned his back to the audience and spoke only to the orchestra, “Ladies, gentlemen—I am nothing. You are nothing. Beethoven is everything.”⁸

That’s the essence of nothing leadership.