a.k.a. Lost, an interview with Jim Henderson
By Jason Evans |
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[27-1:left][This interview was originally posted on Jason Evans' blog, as-it-is.org] A few years ago, I met Jim Henderson at a conference of sorts and knew immediately he was someone I wanted to learn from. I like Jim because he doesn't beat around the bush. He says what he believes and isn't afraid to make mistakes. Jim and his lovely wife live up in Seattle and when not painting houses he runs Off-The-Map.  A couple of times, he has invited friends of mine who don't follow Jesus to be interviewed during the workshops he does at various conferences. I have even more respect for him because of how he has befriended and honored my friends. Jim's first book was recently published. Not long ago, we started having an e-mail conversation that I've decided to post here.
 JE: Awhile back, we had this conversation about leadership going on over at my blog. I want to get your feedback on this subject. What do you think about leaders in relation to a faith community?
JH: Leaders can "use" people or "develop" people. Most of the people you and your friends have been exposed to are leaders who "use" people. Not all, but most. They learned to do this by those who trained them (used them). I think the issue of leaders is a hot topic among young male evangelicals because they "naturally" associated it with prestige and pay. Now, when they tear it down they undermine the value system that fed them and don't know what to replace it with. Young people intuitively know that using people to "fulfill their vision" is bogus and bankrupt but aren't sure what to do in its place. They feel caught in a double bind and think that the only way out is to drop out or sell out. I have a suggestion: Drop the money and the titles (if need be) and go lead anyway. The vast majority of pastors today ought to have day jobs (by the way, most black pastors and even some 'bishops' do). Limited time forces you out of the philosophical and into the practical. You'll have to choose which people to invest in and since you can't do everything and will probably be too tired to, you'll have to get your ideas done through other people. I know that terminology irritates some young and inexperienced leaders but face it --- where is the payoff for leading when you remove money and titles and "security"? The payoff is seeing if your idea is God's idea. The payoff is seeing whether you bump into your idea and God's idea while you are talking to someone else about their idea. The payoff is collaborating with others (who often lack confidence) and seeing them take God's idea and making it their own. We are following Jesus, not a church, religion, denomination or seminary. He is the founder of our family business. He doesn't owe us a thing - no name, no money, no prestige. I get the feeling when I talk with many young (and old) leaders that this is news to them.
JE: Do younger leaders ask you questions about leadership often?
JH: I am amazed at how infrequently young and inexperienced leaders ask me what I think or ask my other experienced leader friends. They like to tell me their ideas and want me to listen and ask questions (all of which I thoroughly and genuinely enjoy) but I am always watching to see if or when they will ask a truly thoughtful question about leadership, life or even the Bible. It is so rare that I have stopped expecting it. I've asked my other "older" leader friends and they report the same phenomenon. And when I do answer, I watch to see how long it will take before they lose interest in "hearing something they don't want to hear" and switch the conversation back to themselves - It happens conservatively about 98% of the time I interact with them. This practice of being non-inquisitive to those who have gone before is to me far and away problem #1 for young leaders.
JE: Why do you think this is?
JH: This is my best guess. This generation of younger leaders has had to face a constant public mockery of all kinds of leaders. Most of which was deserved simply because these "user" leaders were actually often closet (not very well I might add) narcissists, addicted to having people fawn over them, say their names and see how far they could push the boundaries of propriety and trust. This of course was most clearly observed in our former President, Bill Clinton, who found the thrill of trying to "not have sex" with an intern in the Oval office too seductive to pass up. Another Boomer bites the dust. Unfortunately, he had religious role models all of whom were drunk with power and were doing their own version of "not having sex" . Secondly, (and this is just my theory) having grown up in a fatherless home (he left when I was 10 never to return) before it was "cool " or "normal" I think there is a backlash of trust for authority figures who got to walk away from their responsibilities (many of your friends resonate) but still want us to follow them. All of which adds to the confusion for young people and disheartens them toward leaders. These two influences are a resonable start as to why young people today are less inquisitive. I really don't think it's because they are "know-it-all's" in fact they often seem uncertain and insecure to me. I have learned to not interpret the silence so much as non interest but non trust.
JE: You mentioned earlier that most black pastors are bi-vocational. One thing I have noticed about the 'emerging church' is how homegenous it often seems. Why aren't more black pastors and church leaders of other ethnicities contributing to this "conversation"? Do you think this is a problem? [I asked Jim this question before reading the insightful conversation on this topic here. I encourage you to read through the comments.]
JH: I think it is a problem in that it exposes our arrogance as white people to "not see" what black churches have done over the past 25 years or so. Black churches are in a world of their own and are largely unaware and/or completely disinterested in our philosophizing about postmodernity and 'emerging' churches. Not all of them, but a signifcant number of them are too involved in helping people survive and get ahead practically that they don't have time to care about our pseudo-intellectual conversations. They also feel that young leaders are simply following in the footsteps of the elders they so vehemently criticize for being "modern" by not inviting them into the conversation. We need to go see what they are doing in places like Chicago and Atlanta and other inner cities if we want to move past rhetoric and into action which leads me to my next point. I am suspicious if young leaders actually want to do something different in fact other than talk about it. Because in the final analysis it is all about cost --- like, you had to pay a price to get into the neighborhood you are in so you can connect. Others will need to do something similar or if not accept that they are not going to do that and get on with their lives in the suburbs and learn to love the spritually poor who will be surrounding them there. All I am asking for is reality. Quit faking it and start doing what's do-able. I also think we need to learn from people like Sunil. We need to stop going to countries like India to "minister" and start going to learn what the future will look like in 15-20 years. That's why I am planning to take a learning group to India next Fall to spend time with people like Sunil and others I have met to learn from them about social spirituality, political activism and remaking Christianity from being about serving ourselves (heaven, things and degrees) into being about serving others (housing, education and advocacy).
JE: What do you mean by "doing what's do-able"?
JH: Doing what's do-able means coming to terms with our limitations. One time I asked a friend how far I should run each day as part of yet another committment to exercise, he asked me, "What can you see yourself doing in 5 years?" I knew immediately, "Not Running!!" I stopped running and started doing what I could do: walking. Since then I have never given into the temptation to run, but I have done a lot of walking. Christians as a people group are generally "addicted to the dramatic and allergic to the ordinary." Years of unrealistic preaching have left us feeling that nothing in our ordinary lives actually counts. The only way we seem to be able to make God (and preachers) happy is to do something big, sacrificial or out of the ordinary like feeding the homeless for a day or traveling to Mexico for a weekend to build a building in an orphanage. Even questioning these activities makes me sound like a heretic among run-of-the-mill evangelicals. It also makes me sound bad to young people who are endued by God with an unusual amount of idealism and believe that one day they will actually move down to Mexico or move in with the homeless but eventually they have kids and buy houses and the vision for living in the inner city gets rolled over by the steamroller called life. So, doing what's do-able means we stop pretending and start getting real. Most of the people who read your blog are the product of white middle to upper class homes . Most of them have been educated and are permanently in a position to change their circustances anytime they decide to get more education. Most of them will end up buying homes in surburbs and affordable starter communities and most of them will want the same privileges for their children. All poor people would trade places with any of them in a heartbeat as well. That being the case --- the sooner they can come to terms with that reality the better. The question is how will they maintain their passion for connecting with the people Jesus misses most as they head into life. I suggest by doing what's do-able: Major in the ordinary and minor in the extraordinary. Give Jesus the 5 loaves and 2 fish or your lives and he can make a big deal out of what feels like to us is almost nothing. Learn how to practice free attention giveaways---even rich white folks need that. Practice being unusually interested in others and practice being yourself. It will intrigue people and they might want to know where you got the courage to do that. Remember, Jesus walked on water once but most of the time he took a boat.
JE: You have a book out now, right? Tell us a little about the book and what you hope to accomplish with it
JH: Thanks for asking. I never thought I would write a book and am still surprised that it actually exists and will be put on bookshelves. One other comment I want to make is that writing a book and probably more importantly getting it published vs. self-published somehow gives you an official title "author" or even "writer" and provides you an identity that makes professional Christians comfortable that you are someone. Basically, it is like having a drivers license. The license gives you permission to drive but essentially says nothing about your intelligence, creativity or effectiveness. Basically wrting a book opens doors for speaking gigs for authors, thats why most writers like them. Books don't make you any money. OK, enough of my cynicism. I don't know why your blog brings this side of me out to play so often. The book tells the story of my search for non-wierd ways to do evangelism. I like it when people join up with Jesus. I still believe that Jesus is God and there is none other but since I can't prove it I am open to listening to other peoples positions, ideas and insights and basically trying to create and lead dialogs on practical spirituality. So the book talks about how I do that with others and how my little organization, Off The Map, takes that story public. Evangelicals will be of two minds about it. On one hand it will bring them relief on the other it will make them afraid. Essentially, we have come to the conclusion and this is a main point of the book: that evangelicals need to "switch majors". We need to drop majoring in conversion and make that our minor and start majoring in connecting. We need to create new ways of counting what truly matters. We call it Catch, Blame and Tell. We catch people doing the right things (say, practicing free attention giveaways [see the OA Blog for ideas of what this looks like]). Then we blame them for doing the right thing ("Wow! How did you think of that? Do you think you could do it again?") and then we tell on them. See the book for more on this. We practice making evangelism normative for ordinary Christians. That's what the book is about. I hope to contribute to a larger movement of making spirituality practical and do-able. Where evangelism will be back on the list of spiritual practices like reading the Bible and praying and whole new forms of connecting with missing people are brought to the evangelical marketplace in the same way Bible translations are today.
 Jason Evans was editor of Next-Wave from Sep. 03-Sep. 04 and leads the ecclesia collective in San Diego. You can find his blog here >>>. |
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