This is the question I recently posed to a number of students in Oxford while completing a three week residency requirement for my research.  Most of the answers fell in the range of ‘you suck’ and ‘repent!’  From these responses it quickly became obvious that we view most leaders as doing a poor job.  Is that a reflection on ourselves I wonder?  Or is it how we think about God?  Or is it the other guy who is doing the bad job and we know we could teach him a thing or two? 

Is what’s wrong with leaders the fact that we are always judging others instead of ourselves?  We seem to know what others should do or how they should behave.  However, we seldom question our own motives or actions.  How many of us can say that we daily live our values?

The most interesting response however, came from the philosophy student (you could have guessed), who said that God would say: ‘chill out’ ‘don’t take life so seriously.’  I think the philosophy student has a point.  The mischievous, creative, innovative side of leadership has had to kowtow to the unrelenting pressure of performance.  I have discovered that performance is enhanced by creativity, innovation, fun  and a new way of thinking! 

Predictable; is the only way to describe most of the answers to the above question.  I guess that is why I was so intrigued by the answer from the philosophy student.  It was unpredictable – I think it takes the unpredictable to make us sit up and take notice, to make us ponder and think, to make us see the world in a different way.

We have become so predictable, even in the church that we are failing to engage the multitudes.  I personally think that it was the unpredictable nature of Jesus that got the multitudes following his every move.  It wasn’t like he was necessarily nice to them – not even to his disciples.  After all, telling someone they will lose their life if they try to gain it, doesn’t make for charismatic leadership, neither does using your whip to dispense of unsavory characters, selling their wares in your church foyer.

Jesus loved keeping people on the edge – He lived on the edge.  He understood the tribe but didn’t cater to them.  He told Peter to get over himself and being a kid at heart he played with mud pies. Liking the look of them he decided to try out his newly invented eye packs with sight restoring properties on a blind man walking by.  Besides which he liked nothing more than a good storm and finding money for his taxes in the mouth of a fish!

I think the philosophy student is right we should all take a chill pill, relax and rediscover the wonder of our world and what it has to offer in terms of innovative ways to interest the multitudes.

Check out Gaby’s blog at www.worldimpactnetwork.org