The Power of Connection
Leadership in the 21st Century

By Jo Anne Lyon/Wesleyan Life Magazine

General Superintendent/The Wesleyan Church

I joined Facebook a few months ago. I find it interesting that when I need to confirm a friend, the language is inviting and signed, “The Facebook Team.” One gets the feeling the team knows you and somehow derives happiness when you connect with your friend. I must admit, when I get a note from a friend that automatically transfers to my Blackberry my heart is warmed.

We live in a networked world.

At our recent General Conference, minute-by-minute reports were going throughout the world via text messaging. Pastors are blogging about their sermons and laypeople are connecting through Twitter.

Connection is the bottom line; technology is just one of the means by which we do so.

Together

Much of leadership has to do with being connected. Good leadership today revolves around community, collaboration, and self-organization that strives toward the common vision empowered by the Holy Spirit. Perhaps that is what the writer of Proverbs meant: “Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed” (15:22). People in this century call for a flattened organization, which keeps the leaders near the grass roots. People don’t want distant managers; they want to be involved at a significant level. They want to be connected.

Biblical language for being networked would be Paul’s image of the “body of Christ.” Jesus’ words at the Last Supper certainly are connectors: “This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19). Another powerful image of people connected comes from the writer of Revelation: “Before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb…[crying] in a loud voice: ‘Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb’” (7:9–10).

Opportunity

We, in the 21st Century, with all our connecting tools, have the opportunity to create a global community. Yes, I mean us—The Wesleyan Church. Our theology, history, tradition, and flexibility are foundations for connectedness to bring healing to a broken people and our world.

The words of Samuel Chadwick, British Methodist pastor and author in the early 1900s, are still relevant to us today: “The Church has lost the note of authority, the secret of wisdom and the gift of power through its persistent and willful neglect of the Holy Spirit of God. Confusion and impotence are inevitable when the wisdom and resources of the world is substituted for the presence and power of the Spirit of God.” *

After Pearl Harbor it was the clergy who called the nation to prayer. After 9/11 it was Oprah Winfrey who called the nation to a type of muted prayer. Who’s calling the nation to prayer today?

Greater Things God

Chadwick’s words give me pause, but I am not wringing my hands in despair. I am encouraged by the desire I sense throughout The Wesleyan Church for a hunger to be holy and active in being part of the future Kingdom of God. The Holy Spirit is at work, and new gifts of leadership are evident around the world.

When I read the words of the prophet Joel, as repeated by Peter on the day of Pentecost, I am compelled to consider again what the Holy Spirit wants to do in each of us. The very Spirit of God—the third Person of the Trinity—promises to give guidance, comfort, power, wisdom, desire for God, heightened prayer, conviction, as well as the gifts and fruit of the Spirit. What more is needed to be effective leaders in this world?

In the 21st century, the measure of power is connectedness. While nations are measuring military strength and economies, the church has a clear advantage of leadership in connectedness. Solutions to issues and challenges are discovered through people with like passions. Rick Warren recently said, “The only thing big enough to solve the problems of spiritual emptiness, selfish leadership, poverty, disease, and ignorance is the network of millions of churches all around the world.” The Wesleyan Church has the opportunity to shape the 21st century through its global connectedness by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus’ words are always a challenge. “I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father” (John 14:12 NIV).

— Jo Anne Lyon, General Superintendent, The Wesleyan Church

* Samuel Chadwick, The Way to Pentecost, (Fort Washington, Pa.; CLC Publications, 2000), 17.