Spiritual Life and Leadership

David Zahl is founder and director of Mockingbird Ministries and the author of Low Anthropology: The Unlikely Key to a Gracious View of Others (and Yourself) . One of the hardest lessons I’ve had to learn is that people are not always going to look out for what’s best for one another--or for me.  In fact, sometimes people are going to outright try to tear each other down.  But our expectation is o...

Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson discuss this quote from Michael MacKenzie in Episode 122: Burned Out and Broken . “Success is more dangerous for the human soul than failure.” Ep. 122 is a conversation about Michael MacKenzie's book,  Don't Blow Up Your Ministry . Send me a text! I’d love to know what you're thinking! Click HERE to get my FREE online course, BECOMING LEADERS OF SHALOM...

What do you do when you’re set up to be the successor of the lead pastor of one of the biggest and most well-known churches in the world and suddenly everything comes crashing down?  What do you do when it becomes clear that the beloved pastor you were meant to follow has been found to be abusive toward women—and the church’s leadership fails to take responsibility for the systems that allowed tha...

Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson discuss this quote from Ian Morgan Cron in Episode 121: The Story of You . "All transformation begins with story transformation." Ep. 121 is a conversation about Ian Morgan Cron's book, The Story of You . Send me a text! I’d love to know what you're thinking! Click HERE to get my FREE online course, BECOMING LEADERS OF SHALOM .

Lisa Lamb is professor of preaching and theology at St. Paul’s Theological College and the author of Resonate: How to Preach for Deep Connection . Sometimes I wonder how effective sermons are.  As a receiver of sermons, I probably don’t remember 99% of the sermons I’ve heard. At the same time, some sermons I’ve heard have been life-changing for me.  The question for us preachers is: How do we prea...

Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson discuss this quote from Scot Mcknight in Episode 92: Against a Culture of Abuse . "A tov pastor, tov leaders, a tov church does not abuse power, does not sexually abuse women, does not sexually abuse children....  Tov people don't do these things." Ep. 92 is a conversation with Scot McKnight and Laura Barringer about their book, A Church Called Tov ....

Matthew Lynch is associate professor of Old Testament at Regent College and the author of Flood and Fury: Old Testament Violence and the Shalom of God. In this episode, helps us understand how biblical stories of violence fit into the grand arc of the biblical narrative, as well as how these stories inform our work as ministry leaders. THIS EPISODE'S HIGHLIGHTS INCLUDE: Matthew Lynch is assoc...

Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson discuss this quote from Tom Sine in Episode 118: Forecasting and Innovation . “I ache because churches rarely even look over the fence in their own communities to the new innovation going on.” Send me a text! I’d love to know what you're thinking! Click HERE to get my FREE online course, BECOMING LEADERS OF SHALOM .

Steven Garber is Senior Fellow for Vocation and the Common Good at the M.J. Murdoch Charitable Trust and author of The Seamless Life . In this episode, Steven Garber helps us reflect on some important leadership questions.  What does it mean to live a life of deep coherence?  What does it mean to live a life in which every part of our life is a reflection of and an expression of our whole life?  A...

Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson discuss this quote from Make Work Matter , by Michaela O'Donnell. "I am not on a solo mission from God.  I am part of a larger collective of people who get to join in on God’s big mission of redemption creatively working in anticipation of all that God is doing to make us new." Send me a text! I’d love to know what you're thinking! Click HERE to g...

Tom Sine’s most recent book (co-authored with Dwight Friesen) is 2020s Foresight: Three Vital Practices for Thriving in a Decade of Accelerating Change . Tom Sine has been doing future forecasting for many decades and has helped lots of churches think about what is happening in their communities now so that they can make plans as they anticipate what is coming in the next several years. Tom also t...

Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson discuss this quote from Strong and Weak , by Andy Crouch. “Flourishing requires us to embrace both authority and vulnerability, both capacity and frailty--even, at least in this broken world, both life and death.” Send me a text! I’d love to know what you're thinking! Click HERE to get my FREE online course, BECOMING LEADERS OF SHALOM .

Thom Rainer is the CEO of Church Answers and the author of many books, including I Believe: A Concise Guide to the Essentials of the Christian Faith . In this episode, Thom Rainer discusses an article he wrote in which he said we need to rethink how we categorize churches, now that the median church size is 65—meaning 50% of churches in the U.S. have fewer than 65 people in church every Sunday! Wh...

Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson discuss this quote from A Failure of Nerve , by Edwin Friedman. “In any type of institution whatsoever, when a self-directed, imaginative, energetic, or creative member is being consistently frustrated and sabotaged rather than encouraged and supported, what will turn out to be true one hundred percent of the time, regardless of whether the disrupters are supervisor...

Ruth Haley Barton is the Founder and Chief Essence Officer of the Transforming Center and the author of Embracing Rhythms of Work and Rest . There is so much to do as pastors and leaders.  And if I’m going to get everything done, there’s very little time to rest.  Or if I do take some time to rest, work and responsibility are just gonna sneak their way into that time of rest, anyway. In this episo...

How does your church attendance compare?  Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson discuss an article by Thom Rainer titled "The New Very Large Church." Send me a text! I’d love to know what you're thinking! Click HERE to get my FREE online course, BECOMING LEADERS OF SHALOM .

David Swanson is pastor of New Community Covenant Church in Chicago and the author Rediscipling the White Church . In this episode, David Swanson helps us think, first, about the challenges of leading our people toward racial healing and equity, and, second, about the kinds of leadership and practices that can help us form our people to be people of healing and equity. THIS EPISODE'S HIGHLIGH...

Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson discuss this quote from Essentialism , by Greg McKeown: “Many capable people are kept from getting to the next level of contribution because they can’t let go of the belief that everything is important. An Essentialist has learned to tell the difference between what is truly important and everything else.” Send me a text! I’d love to know what you're thinking! C...

Andrew Root is the Professor of Youth and Family Ministry at Luther Seminary and author of The Church After Innovation . In this conversation, Andrew Root, the author of The Church After Innovation , invites us to think critically about innovation.  We live in a world in which innovation is held up as almost an ethical good in and of itself.  Andrew helps us think about where the drive to innovate...

Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson discuss this quote from Leadership Without Easy Answers , by Ronald Heifetz: "In a crisis we tend to look for the wrong kind of leadership...in short, someone who can make hard problems simple. But problems like (we have been facing) are not simple.... Making progress on these problems demands not just someone who provides answers from on high but changes in ou...

Beth Birmingham and Eeva Sallinen Simard are the authors of Creating Cultures of Belonging: Cultivating Organizations Where Women and Men Thrive .  In this episode, we discuss what it means for churches and organizations to develop cultures of belonging.  Not just cultures of inclusion, but cultures in which those who tend to be on margins actually have the opportunity to shape the church or organ...

Tod Bolsinger is the Executive Director of Fuller Seminary’s Church Leadership Institute and the author of five books, including Canoeing the Mountains   and Tempered Resilience . In this episode, Tod Bolsinger and Markus Watson reflect on the reality that many people have not returned to the church in our post-pandemic world.  Is there anything about how we have done church in the past that has f...

Karen Gonzalez is an immigration advocate and the author of Beyond Welcome: Centering Immigrants in Our Christian Response to Immigration .  In this episode, Karen Gonzalez, helps us understand both the challenges of immigration and how we, the church, can love and bless those who have immigrated in ways that are healthy and lifegiving for everyone.  THIS EPISODE'S HIGHLIGHTS INCLUDE: Karen G...

D. Michael Lindsay is the author of Hinge Moments: Making the Most of Life’s Transitions and the president of Taylor University in Upland, Indiana. In this episode, D. Michael Lindsay unpacks the seven stages of transition and helps us understand how to navigate those stages well--both personally and corporately. THIS EPISODE'S HIGHLIGHTS INCLUDE: D. Michael Lindsay is the author of Hinge Mom...

Sarah Bereza is the author of Professional Christian: Being Fully Yourself in the Spotlight of Public Ministry   and directs a music program at United Methodist Church. It can be really challenging to really be yourself when you're a pastor or ministry leader.  There is a pressure to perform and to present yourself in an ideal sort of way.  But putting on a false front can be exhausting. In t...