More than a decade into “emergence,” young leaders complain that old leaders still don’t get it. And old leaders who think they’re making room for young leaders operate as if it were 1999.
That’s why Jimmy Long wrote The Leadership Jump (IVP, 2009), exploring the great gulf fixed between “existing and emerging Christian leaders.” Long’s earlier works include Emerging Hope and the Emerging Culture curriculum kit to help churches befuddled by postmoderns.
Long tells real stories of pastoral teams who are trying to work it out: older leaders who want respect and younger leaders who want relationships; older leaders who want cooperation and younger leaders who want to be heard. His chapters defining change are good: decline of heroic leadership, moving from positional to earned authority, and so on. (“In this emerging culture, the more [existing leaders] are willing to give away power, the more respected they are as leaders.”)
For many, The Leadership Jump will be a well-documented travelogue of their journey over the past ten years, with quotes from a well-known cast. For leaders wondering why their younger colleagues don’t stick around, it’s a triptych of how far they have to go.
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