Spiritual/Servant Leadership Course Analysis

After a car accident three years ago, God used the recovery period to hone my old skills and birth new. Over the course of the process, He repositioned me for a different journey. The new path led to a transition from a secular K-12 setting to Christian higher education; yet, still within the context of supporting a diverse student population. My purpose became preparing and teaching ministerial leadership in a

Michelle’s life embodies the idea of a person who has the x-factor, she shows that leadership is something that is developed over time and learned through experiences. The x-factor is when individuals in a society spark creativity, it is a multi-discipline that borrows and synthesis existing intellectual resources to generate new ones and approach causation. (Burns, 2003). Michelle is a prime example of the ideals of the x-factor that crates a leader.

Many people want to attain and hold influential positions in society whether it would be in the field of science, politics, education, or in public service. However, many people tend to forget how servitude is one of the main life highways to travel in order to arrive at that successful destination called “Leadership.” Nevertheless, there was one man who knew how powerful the concept of servitude was in order to grasp the reigns of successful leadership. Socrates was a phenomenal philosopher, scholar, teacher, and servant. Socrates leadership style was unique in regards to letting students communicate among one another in an articulate theological reasoning process by questioning and probing at one’s belief system in order to

James A. Autry is the author of the bestselling book The Servant Leader. He has put together the fundamental skills every leader should hold in order for them to successfully run their businesses. Within thirteen chapters, the book has been divided into four categories: a foundation of character and vision, servant leader as manager: the everyday nuts and bolts, the harsh realities of organizational life, and finding the balance. The importance of developing yourself into the character of ‘servant leadership’ is identified to show how to harness productivity, creativity, courage, a nurturing nature, and handle both short and long term management situations. Although a particular purpose or mission leads every organization, all organizations are in a sense the same. The dependency on people is a dominant factor (Autry 2001, xviii).

If I am going to become a leader in the church and continue to be a firm believer in God, I should probably learn more about the Protestant religion that I am a part of. Even though I grew up in the church and a Christian family, there is still plenty about this religion that I do not know about. This class has already greatly helped my understanding of certain aspects of Christianity. Before this class, I had never even heard of Bebbington's Quadrilateral or the Wesleyan Quadrilateral and I also definitely did not know what the apostles' creed was. I have already learned a great deal of new information about the quadrilaterals and I look forward to learning about the creed; although, I am not great at memorization so we will wait and see how that part of the class turns out. I have attended a nondenominational church my entire life so I do not know much about too many of the Protestant denominations and I believe it will be interesting to gain knowledge of some of them in this class. Good leaders usually need to have knowledge and be smart in order to lead well, so I hope this class will lend me new knowledge, that way I can become a leader in the church and not lead people astray, but lead them with confidence and know that I am helping other people in their walk with Christ just as this class should help me with my walk. Honestly, I do not know what denomination (if I even pick a denomination) I will become a part of after I am done with college, but I am expecting this class to help me narrow down the choices. I do not think it will matter what denomination I choose though, since I am sure that God will help me prosper and grow in whatever type of church I decide to plug into once I graduate. I deeply hope this class will also help me to prepare for contributing to civil society. I

Like professional athletes, effective leaders must continuously stretch and grow their leadership skills. In college ministry, personal development is not only about building strengths it is the commodity of the community. Despite living and working among educators and students for over twenty years, it still surprises me how much more engaging students, faculty, and administrators are since I began this program; clearly personal growth is the currency that moves the machine.

As I entered adulthood, I had a natural instinct for organization and leadership and I had a strong interest in using those talents to serve the church. I worked with youth groups, participated in WELCA, served on the church council and it seemed there wasn’t a task I would not take on. Many people, myself included, anticipated the next logical stop on my journey would be seminary.

My interest in the PhD program with a focus on Christian Leadership at SEBTS was developed decades before I knew of its existence. I cultivated an insatiable fascination with leadership in my backyard as a young kid learning to lead peers and persuade them to buy into an underdeveloped vision. I have been a leadership enthusiast for the majority of my life and

David currently leads the campus development of Chi Alpha on the Tarrant County College (TCC) campuses. To this position, he brings twenty years of corporate managerial experience. David divides his responsibilities between Chi Alpha at the downtown Trinity River TCC campus and his position as college and career pastor at Fossil Creek Church. Considering the importance of David’s role at Fossil Creek Church to this ability to serve Chi Alpha, this motivational plan will address excellence both in terms of ministry responsibilities and balance. In our interview, David communicated the value he places on developing leaders, therefore, I will focus on leadership development a primary measure of excellence.

I set up a date for my interview with Pastor Andrew to become part of a team. I explained to them how I wanted to make a difference with them, grow closer to God, and become a better leader. I ended up becoming part of the Student Leader Team. We had meetings at five thirty three times a month before church. They would put us in different positions in the church like sound booth, greeter, snack stand, and walker. Every Wednesday but one we would switch off and sometimes we would have the same one every week. During my meetings we would have a discussion over a leadership book we received when we joined. We would read passages and right our answers about the leadership style we saw and how God came into the situation. Also, I would take surveys in the packet to see what type of leader I am. That taught me that relationships are one of my highest skills when it comes to leadership. That taught me that me more about myself and that I care about the relationships with the people around me. It became valuable when I got put into a team aspect where I had to work with others. An example is when we put together our Christmas party for our whole youth group we all had to decide what theme we wanted, the food, time, and how we were going to spread the word about it. We all worked together as a team and had all different leadership roles that we each played. Overall the

The first major experience I have had with the course is I have learned to stop pretending to be someone I am not. God made me exactly as He saw fit to create me, so why would I want to change His vision He has for me? I am not an overly outgoing person, and trying to act like an extrovert has only made me more frustrated and seemingly less effective when it came to spreading my faith. Instead of trying to keep up with the world’s view of what an Evangelical Christian should look like,

Effective leadership approaches from a biblical perspective consist of God’s nature in his manifested character. Christian leaders are willing to pay the price to lead in Christ’s affliction. Paul said there is a price to pay in order to lead and Jesus reminded us, “Remember what I told you: 'A servant is not greater than his master. ' If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also” (John 15:20, New International Version). Christian leaders need core attributes of God’s styles and approaches, support and linkage from scriptures, and knowledge of his leadership models of truth for effective leadership. However, these perspectives will gave me a better appreciation and insight of who God is and who I can be with his guidance.

Throughout the semester, I have gained skills necessary for understanding and utilizing logic while writing. I am now aware that for any writing to be scholarly, it must possess an introductory section, a body and a conclusion section. Further, I am now able to understand as well as utilize most of the basic techniques useful in pre-writing, revision and editing. Through writing the “downloading from torrents” paper, I acquired skills in word processing, sentence elements, and punctuation. Further, I developed some special skills in writing a website analysis which is a critical aspect in contemporary learning as argued by Flateby (p 182). As the semester folds, I believe that I have gained the prerequisite skills in writing and critical thinking. However, I need to improve much on some of the common problems in writing that seems to disturb me especially grammar.

Transformational and servant leadership are rooted in the study of charismatic leadership. An early conceptual model of "charismatic leadership" has been closely linked with the work of Max Weber, who described the leader as a charismatic person who exercised power through followers' identification with and belief in the leader's personality. Both transformational and servant leadership are both inspirational and moral.

What is a serving society and does that concept embrace spirituality? Does the fact of incorporating spirituality into an organization or a workplace provide healthier and more effective employees? How does the concept of a serving society and an organization that incorporates spirituality into its mission relate to Robert Greenleaf's servant leadership model? These questions and issues are reviewed and critiqued in this paper.