#114 Book Review: The Three Dimensional Leader a Biblical, Spiritual & Practical Guide to Christian Leadership
ABSTRACT
The Three Dimensional Leader a Biblical, Spiritual & Practical Guide to Christian Leadership is a book about Christian Leadership. The book is divided into three dimensions: Biblical character, spiritual power, and practical methods. The book attempts to create a framework for considering christian leadership in light of the Holy Spirit.
The first dimension is biblical character. Biblical character is the idea that from a christian perspective leadership is different and towards a higher calling than that of the secular leader. The godly leader is one that “driven by an experience of Christ’s love in his life” rather than by selfish ambition. This is built on the foundation of Bible passages like 2 Corinthians 5:11-15 and and Romans 12. Taking a closer look at 2 Corinthians 5:11-15 we see Paul choosing to work without pay to show the Corinthians that his work is not for selfish ambition but rather for the betterment of the community in leading them towards Christ. Page ten of The Three Dimensional Leader has an image of two triangles to demonstrate this connection. The way Paul was leading is a triangle with a point on the bottom with the leader and an arrow pointed upwards this demonstrates that the leader goes first and makes changes for the whole organization. For comparison the second triangle is the other way around. With the subordinates at the bottom building up the organization for the leader. The first triangle is an example of unselfish leadership the second is of the leader taking building himself up.
The second dimension is that of spiritual power. Within this dimension we recognize that it is the Holy Spirit that personally guides our leadership. This dimension points out the value of Spirit filled leadership as opposed to self centered leadership. Self centered leadership looks like, being a “self promoter,” “uses people to get ahead,” and is “committed to carrying out their agenda.” This is opposed to the Spirit filled leader who is “committed to discovering and following God’s agenda,” “works hard for God’s approval,” and “elevates other team members.” The self centered leader can be thought of as a leader who makes themselves the center of the organization. If they succeed everyone does, if they fail everyone fails. But the Spirit filled leader is not the center of the organization, the Holy Spirit is the center of the organization and the leader is leading everyone towards God and His will. This is demonstrated in the theology of John Frame as noted on page seventy-one of The Three Dimensional Leader.
The third and final dimension is that of practical methods. The practical methods is a realization that God has already told us to some degree how to lead, what to lead towards, and given us the reason why. This is seen in the great commission where Christ says “I am with you always” in Matthew 28:20b (NASB). The great commission can be divided into three goals as seen in the image on page one-hundred-forty-eight where Christ’s promise to be with us is surrounded by three actions: going, teaching, and baptizing. This serves as a guide to how we ought to organize our actions and goals within a christian organization but furthermore it is a framework for how we can make goals in semi secular organizations. Our vision needs to be “in light of Christ’s mission.”
CONCRETE RESPONSE
I remember my first summer in Oregon. I was nine-teen years old. I lived on campus at college and it was summer time. I was in love with the woman I am now married to, I had a full course load of classes. And I had my first job for someone that wasn’t family. I was a gardener for the university. I was busy, broke, tired, in a strange place, and in love. My sleep was erratic. That was a problem for my job at the campus. I was supposed to start work at 7:30am every morning. I slept in a few too many times. My boss Kent took me aside one day to a couple benches on the edge of the big lawn next to the library and had a conversation with me about my sleep habits. He dug into my heart and priorities. He said, “Elliott, why do you have trouble getting to work on time?” I replied “I am not sure, I have always had trouble with sleep and consistency.” Kent eventually said, “Elliott you are good at your job, I want you to work here. But you need to be here on time or else I will have to let you go.” Kent and I spoke for over half an hour and he related my need to be on time to the Bible. After that day I changed my way and was fifteen minutes early to work every day for the rest of the summer. Kent and I are still close, he even supports my missionary work. That was a turning point in our relationship. Kent acted as a biblical leader by focusing on what is good for the organization as a whole and on my character. He could have focused on my problem and his needs. But if he did that I know that I would have quit that job. That is the day that I realized that biblical leadership leads subordinates to a higher purpose and ideal.
REFLECTION
The book The Three Dimensional Leader failed to take the idea of secular leadership seriously. Secular leaders oftentimes operate in similar ways to those of biblical leaders. A question that could have been asked is, what happens when a secular leader organizes the team around a higher calling? The answer to this question is somewhat straightforward. Humans regardless of religion operate according to their beliefs. If a leader can connect the goals of the organization to the deepest held beliefs of the employees then what happens is the employees become highly motivated to succeed. This in turn helps the leader to accomplish their stated goals. An example of this from the secular world is that of a shoe company called Zappos. It is notoriously hard to get shoes in the right size. In person people will often try on three or four pairs of the same shoe to find the right size. With an online store for shoes the problem is exacerbated. That is where Zappos attempted to solve this problem by making the best customer service in the world. The customer service team received awards for having the best service. Not based on how many calls they could handle which is the normal method. But instead for who was on the phone the longest. It became normal for some Zappos customer service representatives to be on the phone for hours at a time. All to achieve the highest customer satisfaction possible. See the book Delivering Happiness by Tony Hsieh for more details.
ACTION
I am going to attempt to implement two different action steps into my life as a result of reading this book. First I am going to change the way I think about the bedtime routine I do with my kids. It is normally fifteen minutes of clean up, twenty-five minutes of reading and then a prayer before bed. I tend to think of this as a type of chore where the goal is to be done as soon as possible. I am going to change my thinking about this so that I am leading my children to do more of the process on their own and build positive memories in the process. Secondly, within my ministry as a missionary I am going to provide more support to my friend Michael who is planting a church. My ministry is partially online and partially at YWAM bases around the country. I normally help with his church plant by preaching on Sundays and helping to do brainstorming. The church is five hours away. I don’t want him to be doing ministry alone. Before the term is over I am going to become more involved in that ministry and see how I can relieve some of that burden. At the very least I am planning to visit the area where the church is twice in the next couple months. So while there for other reasons, I will attempt to make ministry at the church part of those trips.
Bibliography
Dempsey, Rod; Early, Dave; and Mcclendon, Adam. The Three Dimensional Leader: A Biblical, Spiritual & Practical Guide to Christian Leadership (Bellingham, WA: Kirkdale Press, 2023).
