ETC 4420 Day 6 (7pm)
Ephesus
Show attribution
wikicommonsA summary of the situation facing the church, as they hear from the Risen Jesus and respond to him, and as they seek God’s wisdom to engage well with a further issue among them (that we have imagined), that has now been strongly and respectfully expressed.
A story from Canada about culture and leadership in Kenya
Ruth Anaya wrote an excellent dissertation on Culture and Leadership in Kenya.1 I have enjoyed reading and learning from her work. She now teaches at a Christian university in Canada.
She asks: What sort of leaders do Kenyans prefer, in their physical, political, commercial and cultural contexts? She knows that everyone minds the gap between leadership as it and leadership as it should be. She takes up a tool for thinking about expressing preferences for different dimensions of leadership across cultures. She uses the tool to analyse and articulate leadership preferences among Kenyans, as opposed to other cultures, at the time when a group of Kenyans working in different sectors were asked about their leadership preferences.2
Show attribution
wikicommonsA tool for thinking about culture and leadership
The GLOBE studies of leadership across cultures involved 150 countries, and almost 500 researchers, exploring cultural practices and preferred patterns of leadership across cultures. For our purposes three leadership theories and the GLOBE cultural and leadership dimensions offer valuable ways to think about the human dynamics that leadership involves in every culture and context.
Three leadership theories
GLOBE cultural and leadership dimensions
What do you think of this sketch of patterns of Ethiopian church leadership?
Mapping GLOBE dimensions onto patterns of church leadership
We will explore these areas in future sessions.
Show attribution
wikicommonsQuestions
What would you like to ask or say to the younger women in the church?
What would you like to ask or say to Tychicus?
What would you ask or say to the Risen Jesus?
What are you asking yourself as you think about the church at Ephesus, and their letter from Jesus, and the strained relationships between them?
Here are some added complications for the church leaders at Ephesus
Some church members write to their leaders using GLOBE dimensions
Here is a note about the risks and rewards of using the GLOBE dimensions
A letter to ETC students from Claude AI
Reflection
How does Mark 10.40-45 help us see what Jesus avoids and the way he speaks as he serves the church at Ephesus? How do you want to pray for the church as you think about these issues?
Show attribution
wikicommonsHomework
Write a lament for the church in Ephesus to pray. They are in serious trouble. Jesus rebukes and warns them in his letter.
They are also experiencing (as we imagine it) strained relationships between some of them women and the men among them. As you write the prayer for them to use, lamenting the reality that the Risen Jesus describes, encourage them by drawing on Revelation 2-3 and what Christ says to the other churches. Use language from any of the other letters in your prayer to motivate the church in Ephesus as they seek to hear (and obey) what the Spirit is saying to the churches.
As you write your prayer, keep Mark 10.40-45 in mind, clarify what you are not going to do, as you serve them, whose teaching and example you are following, and where your praying is heading, as you look towards the coming of God’s new creation.
Please email your response to [email protected] by 5pm before we meet at 530pm
Anaya, E. Ruth (2016) Culture and leadership in Kenya, University of South Africa, Pretoria, https://uir.unisa.ac.za/handle/10500/22073↩︎
This is a very brief and inadequate summary of a serious and careful piece of work, an example of superb scholarship.↩︎