Devotional – Red-Letter Team Leadership
Throughout the class, we will look at this Red-Letter Leadership (in many Bibles the words of Jesus are printed in red) as it applies to teams. This week, we look at an example of how Jesus used teams of different sizes for different purposes. Throughout the Holy Bible, we are able to see ways in which Jesus demonstrated leadership principles that we today hold up as best practices.
Upon successful completion of this assignment, you will be able to:
· Appraise a biblical perspective regarding team composition.
Background Information
Read(new tab) or listen(new tab) to Luke 6:12-16 (NIV)
The Twelve Apostles
One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray and spent the night praying to God. When morning came, he called his disciples to him and chose twelve of them, whom he also designated apostles: Simon (whom he named Peter), his brother Andrew, James, John, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Simon who was called the Zealot, Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.
Read(new tab) or listen(new tab) to Luke 10:1 (NIV)
Jesus Sends Out the Seventy-Two
After this, the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go.
Read(new tab) or listen(new tab) to Matthew 17:1 (NIV)
The Transfiguration
After six days Jesus took with him Peter, James, and John the brother of James, and led them up a high mountain by themselves.
Read(new tab) or listen(new tab) to Matthew 26:36-38 (NIV)
Gethsemane
Then Jesus went with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to them, “Sit here while I go over there and pray.” He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then he said to them, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.”
In each of these scenes, Jesus chooses a different number of people to use as a team depending on the task. When he is choosing the number of people into whom he will pour and mentor over a three-year period, he chooses 12.
When he wants future towns to be aware of his message before he arrives, he chooses 72 people and puts them into groups of two. When he is going up the mountain for his Transfiguration, he brings three, his inner circle. Right before his death, he brings his 12 disciples with him to Gethsemane and asks them to pray. Then he takes just three to go with him to a further spot. There are more examples.
We have all witnessed teams that failed due to not having enough people involved and teams that have failed because too many people were involved. Jesus knew, as do good leaders today, that for each task there is an optimal team size or composition.
The team number might be dictated by the size of the task or by the particular skills needed. Either way, it is helpful if the leader thinks critically prior to developing the team about what skills are needed for the task and the size of the team that will give the team the best chance of success.
Another thing to consider from these scenes of Jesus choosing specific teams for specific tasks is, who is the inner circle? Who is it that you share your greatest wins with and count on when you are at your most distressed? The literature on resilience tells us that the most important factor in increasing the resilience of an individual is whether or not that person has supportive relationships.
If you do not have this in your life, it would be wise to seek it out. Proverbs 18:24 tells us that “One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” And in order to gain that friend, you may have to be that friend for someone else first.
Instructions
1. Review the rubric to make sure you understand the criteria for earning your grade.
2. Review the information in the Getting Started and Background Information sections.
3. Write a 250-300 word reflection paper (Word document) that shares your thoughts/perspectives on the following:
a. Think of a team that you are on. What is an upcoming task that this team will have to perform?
b. What are the specific skills needed to complete this task? Do you have those people on your team, or do you need to recruit someone? What is the optimal team size for this task? Why?
c. What are some of the relational elements related to the team size or composition?
d. What personal, professional, or even spiritual insights might you glean from your reflection on the devotional materials in this workshop?
4. Reflection papers are to be written in accordance with APA Guidelines (7th ed.) including format guidelines. Papers must be logical, well organized, grammatically correct, and have correct spelling and sentence structure. Write in complete paragraphs.
