My Death in Life

Part of being at Moody Bible Institute is that they require you do an internship.  If you're lucky you will be able to participate in at a church like mine, but that may not happen because mine is pretty rad.  But the pastor of my church had the interns read Henri Nouwen's In the Name of Jesus.  If you have not read this book and are either curious about what leadership in Christianity looks like or you are a Christian leader then this book is a great resource.  It's a very quick read so there is little excuse not to try to find it and use it to think.

I just wanted to share what I thought was one of the most potent excerpts;

What makes the temptation of power so seemingly irresistible?  Maybe it is that power offers an easy substitute for the hard task of love.  It seems easier to be God than to love God, easier to control people than to love people, easier to own life than to love life.  Jesus asks, 'Do you love me?'  We ask, 'Can we sit at your right hand and your left hand in your Kingdom?' (Matthew 20:21).  Ever since the Snake said, 'The day you eat of this tree your eyes will be open and you will be like gods, knowing good from evil' (Genesis 3:5), we have been tempted to replace love with power.  Jesus lived that temptation in the most agonizing way from the desert to the cross.  The long painful history of the church is the history of people ever and again tempted to choose power over love, control over the cross, being a leader over being led.  Those who resisted this temptation to the end and thereby give us hope are the true saints.

One thing is clear to me: The temptation of power is greatest when intimacy is a threat.  Much Christian leadership is exercised by people who do not know how to develop healthy, intimate relationships and have opted for power and control instead.  Many Christian empire-builders have been people unable to give and receive love. [p.77-9]