What does redemptive leadership mean? In modern society, we are inundated with constant messaging, rules and tips for influencing others and rising to the top of our companies and at our careers—and rarely encouraged to act selflessly on our way up. As Christians, we have a unique calling: not just to lead, but to serve. What does this look like in today’s culture, and how can we serve as leaders and foster an environment of abundant grace and joy wherever we are? In this online conversation, Dr. Nicole Massie Martin helps us to understand how we can nail outdated models of leadership to the cross, and what it will take to replace them with Biblical ones.

This transcript may contain errors and should not be used as an authoritative source. 

Tom Walsh: Hi everyone. A very warm welcome to today’s conversation. We are so grateful for each of you and for your time and interest. So it is great to have you with us today. Uh, if you’re new around here, a quick introduction. What is the Trinity Forum? We are a community of people engaged in a common effort to keep the historic Christian intellectual tradition alive in our time, to foster renewal of that tradition and to make it available to everyone. Many of you are part of this work as members of the Trinity Forum Society community, and we are so grateful for you. Thank you. And today, I’d like to give a special thanks to David Campaigne with BlueTrust for sponsoring the conversation, and also to IVP, the publisher of the book, who are co-hosting with us. What we try to do in these conversations is to provide a hospitable place to engage the big questions of life in the context of faith, and ultimately to come to better know the author of the answers.

Tom Walsh: Our theme today is one we’ll be touching on in several conversations this spring and summer: Leadership. Whatever our individual callings, most of us will be called to lead in various ways at various times. And of course, all of us have the experience of being led. Our society inundates us with rules for molding others to our agenda and rising to the top. Is that all there is? What is distinctive or should be? When we lead as Christians, what is the path to becoming the redemptive leaders we sense are needed? Our guide today is Reverend Dr. Nicole Massie Martin. Nicole is the chief operating officer at Christianity Today. She’s also the founder and executive director of Soulfire International Ministries, with which equips pastors, churches and younger leaders. She serves on boards and councils for the National Association of Evangelicals, Fuller Theological Seminary, the Salvation Army, and the Center for Christianity and Public Life. Nicole holds degrees from Vanderbilt, Princeton Theological Seminary, and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. She’s the author of three books, most recently the one we’ll talk about today, Nailing It: Why Successful Leadership Demands Suffering and Surrender. And Nicole is joining us today from Charm City, Baltimore, USA. Nicole, welcome.

Nicole Massie Martin: Thank you so much, Tom.

Tom Walsh: So I will get us started with some questions and I hope our audience will add theirs in the Q&A box. I think I think some already are, so please do that as we go along. So my very first question, Nicole, is who did you have in mind in writing this book?

Nicole Massie Martin: I am, first of all, I’m so grateful to be here, so grateful to see so many names in the chat that I know so many friends and colleagues. So thank you all for joining today’s conversation. I think, you know, if we’re really honest with ourselves as authors, who did you write the book for? It’s some version of me. I wrote it for me. I wrote it for the younger leader in me that was looking for direction and couldn’t find it. But more importantly, I wrote it for you. And for you. I mean people who were longing for new ways of being and leading in times we’ve never experienced before. Um, specifically younger leaders who are looking for new models, seasoned leaders who are looking for new dimensions, and Christian leaders who want to find ways to live more faithfully according to the cross.

Tom Walsh: Well, let’s focus a bit on the moment we’re in. So what is new or different in the environment for leaders? In all spheres of of life, but maybe especially in churches or Christian organizations? Yes. In this era that we’re all now living through.

Nicole Massie Martin: Yeah. I mean, what isn’t new? It’s like it feels it’s overwhelming. I was, uh, talking to a friend who described this season as the uncanny valley. It seems that we’ve entered a space where everything has demonstrated that it’s malleable, and this puts a lot of pressure on leaders, because now we have to make some hard choices. Do we continue to lead in new times with old principles? I think the answer is no. And do we continue to lead in spite of our teams, or do we choose to lead with our teams? I think the answer is with your team. But then that’s where the complications come in. People in general are more stressed, more burdened, more overworked, more overwhelmed than they’ve ever been before. People are in more homogeneous circles than they’ve ever been before. Every report we’ve seen so far demonstrates the division of our lives is more entrenched now than before. We are also just in terms of family systems, caring for a wider span of generations. We have more people caring for parents and children and themselves at the same time. We’ve got still the effects of Covid, as much as I and many people would love to just be over with Covid, let that be a blip on the scale and let’s move forward. We’re still experiencing the effects of Covid, the social discomforts, the challenges of education and health care. And when you compound all of these issues together, I would hope, certainly I came to this conclusion, but I would hope many of us are coming to the conclusion you can’t do the same thing. Isn’t that the definition of insanity? If you do the same things over and over and expect the same results, that you’re pretty much not going to get them? So we’re in new times, which means we have to become new people, which will also cause us to lead in new ways.

Tom Walsh: Well, becoming new people sounds easy! We really need a whole book.

Nicole Massie Martin: Yeah, exactly right!

Tom Walsh: Well, let’s focus a little bit on this issue of stress. Because it’s one that you delve into in setting the stage for this. And you talk about empathy and some of the myths that you feel those who have leadership roles may embrace, perhaps unconsciously about empathy and kind of what, what’s the right amount of empathy and what’s unreasonable to ask or to expect of leaders. So what are some of the myths leaders, you know, buy into, perhaps? And what difference can it make if leaders are wise enough to avoid buying into them?

Nicole Massie Martin: Well, I remember when I was doing my doctoral program, I was really excited about this book on high-powered teams, high-performing teams. And the general premise is that you can have a really high-performing team if you, you know, drive the team well and have all of the things in place to drive the team. So this premise of a high-performing team suggests that you have to get rid of the weakest link. There’s a sense if I am empathic, if I display empathy towards someone on my team who is really struggling right now, I will slow my team down. Another myth is if I show empathy in my leadership, then I will show my own weakness. Because there’s a premise in secular leadership that you have to demonstrate power and strength at all times. Another myth is, if I make room for empathy in my teams, we won’t meet our goals. We won’t meet our missions. We’ll never become a high-performing team. But I think Scripture reminds us that not only is this not true, but the greatest calling of our lives is to be with people. This is the African proverb that you can go far by yourself. But what is it? You can go fast by yourself, but you can go far with a team.

Nicole Massie Martin: Empathy to me, with your team looks like assessing the condition of the people that you lead. It’s the process of paying attention to where God is moving in your team, regardless of whether or not you’re leading in a Christian context or not. If you are a Christian leader, you ask the question, what’s the condition of my team? And I think while the world would say having empathy suggests that you are weak, or that your team is weak or that you won’t achieve. I think having empathy actually means that you will achieve. The last thing I’ll say about this is I heard a phrase from my colleague Russell Moore, where he talked about Theistic Darwinism. And in this kind of Theistic Darwinism, there’s a sense that only the strongest in Christ will survive. Only those who are most capable are the eligible ones to be a part of the team or to lead the team. But that is not the model of Scripture. That’s the model we’re using. We would have counted Jesus out. So empathy has to be part of our leadership, because it’s a part of what it means to be a believer in Jesus.

Tom Walsh: Well, connecting to that, I know you’re perceptive on generational dynamics. I’ve heard you speak on it in other context, but you touched on it in the book as well. So what are some of the dynamics around the rising generations that Christians in leadership who are perhaps not themselves, other generations need to grasp?

Nicole Massie Martin: I smile when you ask that question because the differences are very strong. They’re very clear. And actually they’ve been kind of touted on social media and some really funny ways. So I remember seeing this spot where it was like a guy bumps into a door as a boomer. He bumps into the door. He like, brushes it off and keeps moving. Then you have like a Gen Xer bumps into the door and he’s like, oh, that hurt a little, but keeps moving. Then you have a millennial bumps into the door and falls down. Like what? Why is that door there? And then you have a Gen Z who bumps into the door, falls down and pulls out their phone and takes a picture. It’s a comedy. It’s a parody of generations. But as we think about the composition of teams, I think what that parity is trying to suggest is every generation feels stress differently. Older generations tend to assume that stress is a part of life. They absorb that stress and they may or may not ever address it or deal with it. So for older generations, you know, this idea of coming into positive mental health is a very new thing for them. It’s something that they wrestle with. Do I need to acknowledge I’m having a bad day, or do I need to just press forward? Younger generations, by and large, have been raised in an understanding of what healthy mental health looks like. In fact, younger generations will leave a job if they don’t feel supported by a manager. They will walk away from a wonderful opportunity that might make them tons of money. If they don’t feel that they can maintain healthy strategies for their own mental health. So I see that playing into teams. And the question is, again, in leadership, are you the kind of leader that’s going to ignore what your team needs, or are you going to understand it. Make room for what your team needs and then see some different type of flourishing. And I’m trying to advocate for the latter.

Tom Walsh: You talk in the book about, well, you refer to trauma and that the idea that a lot of younger generations have experienced trauma and, that, you know, a lot of the research on the effect of technology on young people. Is it, can it be a source of that or at least an amplifier of it? So particularly for those who have teams where people have really experienced trauma. What are some of the things that need to show up or ways in which people show up with empathy?

Nicole Massie Martin: Yeah. Sometimes I have heard leaders say when teams or individuals on the team have experienced trauma, that they just kind of need to get a new, another job, or maybe you’re not fit to work because you’ve gone through a distressing time. And I just, I have seen God show up in my life personally and on my teams when we’re able to acknowledge each other’s pain. I remember when I was going through the death of my father, this is 2022. I was actually at American Bible Society. And the gift of the team to say, hey, we hear you, we understand what happened. Take the time that you need. And in saying take the time that you need, there was an understanding that you are not your work. You’re not only a composition of a doing, you are a being. 

And when we make room for the traumas that others experience, we’re not giving them a pass. We’re not telling them, go find a new job. And yes, there are times when certain traumas prevent people from working. And that’s why we have HR resources and other things in place to help support those individuals. But by and large, when a pet dies, when a loved one passes, when you’re going through a difficult time or struggling with depression or anxiety, these are not people who are incapable of working. These are people who need leaders who are able to see and understand and make room for these situations so that the team can thrive. And what we’ve learned is when you can pay attention to one person on the team and what they may be going through, the rest of the team is watching, and now you’re building a healthy environment for the team that says, we are a team that does work together and we care for each other. This is not easy stuff. It’s not easy, and there’s no one way to deal with trauma on the team, but it is necessary.

Tom Walsh: So for those who haven’t had a chance to read the book yet, your basic structure is to address a number of things that you feel Christians and leadership need to crucify. That’s where this phrase “Nailing it” comes from. So I thought I’d ask you questions about some some of these as we go, but I also want to invite people in the audience when if you have questions about other ones that perhaps we don’t mention or that aren’t raised in the book, that you feel free to pop them in the Q&A box and we’ll try to get to them. So, one that’s related to what you were just talking about is performance based leadership, like you talk about crucifying performance, which, by performance based leadership, I think you’re talking about focusing on outcomes to be delivered by those responsible for them. And I think many will wonder, what are the kind of is there like, is that what leadership means? So can you unpack it a bit?

Nicole Massie Martin: Yeah, one thing that I did intentionally in each chapter is I tried to reframe these necessary elements. So I’m not saying we don’t need power. We don’t need ego, we don’t need, you know, performance. What I’m trying to say is we need to nail to the cross what is a very secular understanding and definition of these things, so that what is resurrected through Christ might be redemptive and bring glory to God, and good to the people that we lead. When it comes to performance, I was trying to unpack just how entrenched entrenched performance can be in our everyday lives. We can start to see our lives as things lived on a stage, and our society and technology doesn’t make that any easier. I mean, we start to see ourselves as actors on the stage. And when you are driven by performance alone, then you are hyper attentive to your outcomes and your outputs and what you do almost and sometimes at the expense of who you are. And that’s why I’m suggesting one of the antidotes to trying to over obsess on performance is presence. And presence doesn’t have to be a ceasing of performance. It doesn’t have to be. I’m not going to do anything at all, though. There are times for my overachievers who may be listening when God does tell you, you need to not do a few things. But that aside, this idea of presence takes another turn on performance and it can show up even in the organizational values.

Nicole Massie Martin: So, for example, if you’re leading a Christian organization and your values are not just we will strive to be the best in the field, we will always give the best customer service. We will always pick the best, most talented people. Perhaps also part of your values are we will create environments where we care for one another. We will take time to have a Sabbath. We will care for our souls and our families as we do this work together. And when you build presence what it means to be present into your values, now you can build them into your performance review. And now in a performance review. I’m not just asking how well did you do? Did you meet your goals? But I’m also asking, how are you? How are you doing? And you know, there was a time when I would hear leaders say, like, that’s the role of the church. It’s not your boss’s job to ask how you’re doing. But we’ve got institutional trust decreasing in churches. Fewer people are actually attending a weekly church service. Could it be that God placed you, Christian leader, in a space to be one of the only people to ask someone, how are you doing? This is what presence looks like. And I think that’s how we start to build an environment where it’s not just how you perform, but also how present you are in the moment.

Tom Walsh: Thanks for that. So another of the things you talk about crucifying in another chapter is perfection. But I think you’re mainly focusing on perfectionism, which can be a subtle and very deep-seated thing in an organization, but also in ourselves as individuals. So, and it often works in a sense. Like we’re often accomplishing, achieving through perfectionism. So why is it worthwhile to go after it in the way you talk about? And how do we?

Nicole Massie Martin: Oh, my goodness. Okay, so another disclaimer here. I have not written this book from a position of having arrived. I am not like your resident expert on having crucified all these things and I’ve done it well. This is a journey that we’re all on. And I remember, I went back and forth on how to start that chapter, and I decided to start with my earliest memory of my own perfectionism. And it was with my hair. [Laughs] I was, you know, I’m showing my age here, but it was like, you know, in the 80s when the big bangs were a thing and you had to have bangs. Exactly right. It was like half up with the little wave and you had to have it down. I don’t know if guys know what I’m talking about, but it was a thing. Like every famous person I knew had these bangs, and I was late to church and got in trouble because I wanted the perfect bangs. And I walked out the door and forgot there’s wind. There’s wind, and this small story as I remembered, it reminded me that perfection and perfectionism is built into our DNA at very young ages. For some people, it’s imposed on them, by others, by parents or guardians or teachers who say, no, you’ve got to be but that’s not good enough. For other people, it’s kind of in you. They’re the ones who will stay up late at night trying to get it right. And for others, there’s a pressure that leads to that perfectionism. I see what’s happening, and I want to be like everybody else. But in none of those cases does this come from Christ. In Christ, he is the only perfect one. And the perfection that Christ calls us to is perfect union with him. It is not independent perfection. So this is why I’m trying to say, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to be right. Nothing wrong with this desire to get it right, to cross our t’s and dot our I’s. But where’s the motivation? Where’s the source? If my source is from my independent perfectionism, I will fail every time because there is wind. But if my source of perfection rests in the perfect one, and if my desire with Christ is to have perfect union with him, then here’s the best part: I won’t just get my level of perfection. I get to see what God can do, and what God can do will be far better than anything I could do for myself.

Tom Walsh: So one of the other things you discuss crucifying is power. It’s a pretty foundational concept, reality of the world. And so you talk about the different kinds of power that we all have, whatever our situation. And the temptation we all experience to use that power, selfishly contrasting it with empowering others as God intends. So maybe in a practical vein, what could it mean in practice to restore God’s power, in particular leadership situations we may find ourselves in?

Nicole Massie Martin: I think very practically it is the recognition that restoring power to God means owning the power that you have, that you have been given by God and owning your power base. And I talk a lot about the various power bases from which we sit. There’s, you know, we have informational power at times where we know certain things that others need to know. We have expert power. We have legitimate power where we sit in a particular seat, where we’re sitting in a particular position of power. So we’ve got to own that, and then we’ve got to own how privilege plays into our power that because we’ve been at the organization a long time, or because we’re of a preferred group of people, we have to own those things because God made us who we are, and we cannot change that. And none of us should try to deny that Christ has given us power. But the question is, have you been given power so that you can be powerful? Or has God given you power to empower others for his glory and our good? And I keep saying that phrase over and over for God’s glory and our good, and I believe that people who embrace their power from whatever avenue they have it, when they start to distribute that power, to disseminate that power, that’s when you start to recognize this is God’s work.

As a leader, our greatest joy should come not just from our own sense of power and our own sense of clout. Our greatest joy ought to come from seeing our teams operate in the fullness of power that we can give to them. It’s asking a question instead of making a demand. It’s having the team help shape the vision and mission instead of setting the vision and driving there ourselves. Power is given to us to be distributed through us. Jesus had all power, rose from the dead with all power in his hand. And then he turned around and says to us, the same power that raised Jesus from the dead lives in us. So that is the goal that God has given us power to give to others for his glory and our good.

Tom Walsh: So I think some one of the things that I enjoyed in that chapter and would recommend to people, uh, in the book is you talk about some just concrete examples.

Nicole Massie Martin: Yes.

Tom Walsh: In private planning, in group meetings, in person, in conflict. What does it mean to do what you’ve just been describing? Do you want to give one example of one of those, just to make it real for people?

Nicole Massie Martin: Sure. Throughout the book, I talk about how Jesus distributed his power through surrender, surrendered words, surrendered, will surrendered works. So this can look like before I walk into a meeting. “God, I have an agenda. I know which way I believe we should go, but I surrender this agenda to you. And I ask that you would guide me, guide us in a way that’s pleasing to you.” That is, surrendering my will. Surrendered words could be in the heat of conflict, which we don’t talk enough about. Because if you’re a leader worth your salt, and if you’re a true follower of Jesus, you will have conflict. But it might look like in the midst of hearing someone maybe yelling at you, or maybe someone else is in a very tense place. It’s in that moment saying, “God, I surrender my words to you. I surrender my posture to you. I surrender my offense to you.” And asking God to fill you with the right words. And there is no such thing again as perfection in this. But there is such a thing as surrender and then surrendered works could be God, we’ve got a work to do. We’ve got a task to accomplish. I think I know how I want this done, but Lord, just replace my how with your how and help me to see what you want me to see. It is so simple to pray. It is so hard to surrender. And yet that is the invitation of the cross.

Tom Walsh: That’s really helpful, I think. So focusing on another of the issues you raised, let me cite some folks favorite Bible verse: move fast and break things.

Nicole Massie Martin: [Laughs] That’s right.

Tom Walsh: So how do we escape the compulsion for speed that has now been placed on leaders in church and pretty much every other setting. What are we missing? And frankly, is it even possible to be countercultural in this area anymore?

Nicole Massie Martin: Yeah, I know anymore. So the chapter on speed. I was very intentional not to demonize moving fast. There are times in Scripture and we can cite them when God calls people to move quickly. You know, it’s the Israelites fleeing on the night. You know that Jesus—well, we can argue Jesus is in the Old Testament—but God calls the people of Israel out of Egypt. I mean, that was, you have to pack up so fast you can’t even wait for your bread to rise. There are times when God does accelerate us, and there are times when God slows us down. The point that I’m making in the speed chapter is, are you driven by your clock and your sense of speed, or are you driven by God’s? And I am trying to do this every day. And I am urging leaders to do this as well, to resist the urge to be on the world’s clock, the world’s clock. You’ll never have enough time. You will always feel behind on the world’s clock. You’ll always feel like you’re aching for something that you can’t quite grasp. But when we set our times, our organizations, our own lives according to God’s time, then we know we can afford to wait and see how this plays out. We don’t have to rush. We can move quickly because we feel that God has put things in place so that we can move quickly, but this requires discernment and relationship with Christ to be able to hear and discern, sometimes individually, sometimes collectively, what time it is according to God and not just our own sense of time.

Tom Walsh: And a related concept, I think, that people who are in organizational leadership really feel is the concept of scale.

Nicole Massie Martin: Yes.

Tom Walsh: More. More is better, right? Bigger, more eyeballs, people in pews, whatever it is. And so you talk about crucifying that. And so for people, I think for many in this, in this conversation that will cut close to home something of value. Of course we want to grow, don’t we? So what are the questions we should be asking of ourselves as we pursue scale?

Nicole Massie Martin: Yeah. Well, the primary question is who. Who’s driving your growth? Because if it’s us, then yeah, we can scale. Anyone can scale. But you want scale that lasts. You want scale that doesn’t kill you. You want scale that happens at the pressing and the will of God, not scale because we think every good thing should be huge. I had a friend who was starting to roast coffee beans and decided one year, once she got it to a place that she liked, she was like, I’m just, I’m just going to share this with some friends for Christmas. So she started giving small bags of roasted coffee beans to her friends and everyone loved it. She found joy making these beans, these coffee beans for people she loved. But there was so much demand and so much pressure that she started to feel guilty. Well, maybe I should go bigger. Maybe I should do what everyone is telling me to do. What the quote normal path would be for a good roasted coffee bean. So she did. She started selling her coffee out of different stores.

Nicole Massie Martin: She started working with other coffee shops locally and before she knew it, she had not only burned out, but she lost her passion for what she started. And while there is nothing wrong with scale, God does scale us. The gospel is a grand experiment in scale. The question. The core question is motive. Is your motive to scale because you want to be like everybody else? Is your motive to scale because you want to be great and have a great name? Or is your motive to scale so that God might be glorified through what you do and you feel God driving you to scale? Not every good thing has to be scaled. There are some churches that don’t need multiple services. There are some institutions that don’t need a location in every place on the continent. Sometimes it just looks like faithfulness where you are. And my friend hasn’t gotten back into roasting coffee beans, but I do pray that she’ll reset and get back to what she loves because she was called to it, not because she was pressured.

Tom Walsh: Well I’m going to ask one more question of my own. And then I see questions pouring in from people, which is a good sign that you’re getting to some real, some real concerns people have. So one of the ones that I thought was a little surprising was, um, loyalty and crucifying loyalty. And we all like to think of ourselves as loyal. But you talk about freedom from loyalty. So what are some unhealthy expressions of loyalty in our leadership culture would be better?

Nicole Massie Martin: Yeah. I felt I had to talk about loyalty, because this is one of the enabling factors to some of the most public falls from grace that we’ve experienced. And when you do an autopsy of each of these major falls, whether it’s a pastor or an organizational leader or the like, you’ll see at the core they surrounded themselves by people who were loyal to them. And when you unpack that layer of loyalty, it often means this is a leader who did something for them, provided a job when they had no job, provided some kind of income when they didn’t have it, provided some type of cover or prayer or protection when they needed it. And that leader, if they’re not healthy, can toy with that, manipulate that, that kind of a transactional relationship to draw people around them that like them. And sooner than later we become like the Emperor with no clothes. Toxic leaders—and nobody sets out to be a toxic leader. It’s not your fault if you’re recognizing that this might be the case for you, but once you recognize it, it’s up to you to change it. So it looks like if everyone in your circle feels compelled to agree with everything you say because they fear being blacklisted, then that’s a sign.

Nicole Massie Martin: That’s a sign you. You might overemphasize loyalty. If people feel like, um, they have opinions or other ideas, but they can’t voice them because they’ll get on your bad side and whatever that looks like, that’s a sign you may be valuing loyalty over other things. But if we can release this need to be liked by the people we serve, and if we can release ourselves, cut or release ourselves from this transactional “I did something for you. Now you serve me,” Then we’ll start to value other things over loyalty. Like innovation, like creativity, like positive skill sets. And then we can create room for people to say, “You know, I don’t necessarily agree with that and have space to disagree without feeling like if I share another idea, I’m going to lose my job.” And I hate to say, but a lot of Christian organizations overvalue loyalty, and we get people who are not as qualified and not as called, but they are always the ones who, quote, have our backs almost at our expense, at the organization’s expense, and at their own expense as well.

Tom Walsh: Well, let me let me choose a question from the audience here that I think follows on with that nicely. So this comes from Robert Mayer, who says many larger congregations are now bureaucratic in nature with larger staffs. How can senior leaders avoid soul-killing practices that oftentimes are hidden under a spiritual veneer that brings deep harm and cynicism to staff?

Nicole Massie Martin: That’s such a great question. I hope that’s Doctor Mayer from Gordon Conwell. He’s a fantastic historian. Uh, he could probably answer this question himself. Um, but, you know, in an effort to simplify. Leaders have to understand the condition of their own soul before they assess the soul-killing practices of the church. Part of why I wrote this book is because I’m not confident that enough leaders—and I would put myself in this category at times—I’m not confident that we have enough vulnerability and authenticity and transparency with ourselves in order to lead people well. And I have seen these kinds of institutions, whether it be the church or others, and more often than not, the leader has protected themselves, has put a callus around themselves to believe that they don’t have to do the hard soul work. They don’t have to listen to God, because God is speaking in the number of people that come to my church. I don’t have to listen to God because my business is growing and we’re bringing in the dollars. But this is actually not as much about leadership as it is about Christian living. The call of Christ is never to insulate ourselves and hide behind our successes. It is to dedicate ourselves so clearly to the cross that our motives, our desires, our ideas of success will pale in comparison to what we want most, which is just to follow and please God. So the short answer is we have to, as leaders, learn to pay attention to our own souls. That sometimes looks like counseling, looks like accountability. It looks like real soul work. It looks like tending to our wounds. But it has to start with us.

Tom Walsh: Yeah, I’m glad you added that bit at the end, because I think the temptation to self-delusion and to just, you know, everything is great. Look at how much everyone’s smiling at me all day long is a strong one. So we really need some practices to get us beyond that, don’t we?

Nicole Massie Martin: Yes we do, yes we do.

Tom Walsh: So I’m going to take two questions here that have come in that are thematically linked. And so maybe you can address them collectively. One is from Josephine Liu who asks, “How do you submit to a leader who is not nailing it? How might generational differences affect how we assess and submit to our leaders?” And a question from J.R. Briggs. “I’m curious, how do we live faithfully and courageously in spaces where at times the leaders who are in charge are those who lead with the complete opposite posture from what you present in your book?”

Nicole Massie Martin: That is so true, and I’m glad that those questions were asked, because more often than not, we’re on teams or are part of teams where you have to submit and figure out what’s going on. I have learned personally that every job I take, every role I fulfill is as unto the Lord, and my ultimate submission is to Christ. When I know that I am ultimately submitting to Christ, then I give myself room to figure out what does submitting to Christ look like for this particular leader? In some cases, because I want to honor God, I’ve got to speak truth to a leader. That might be hard. It might cost me something, but my submission to Christ is so great that I can’t not speak up. And I’ve been in situations where that has been the case where your silence is complicit and you have to say something. There are other times where submitting to Christ means just go with it and let God deal with who God will deal with. Because, oh by the way, I’m not God. I can’t, I heard Steve Cuss. He’s a renowned organizational psychologist. He said the other day, you can’t worry yourself into someone else’s change. I can’t obsess over a boss that won’t change, and then think that my obsessing over their not changing is going to change them. I have to let God be God, and if my submission to Christ reveals that I need to stay on this job, on this team, with this leader, then I’ve got to find ways to do that in a way that lets God be God for that leader, and lets God show up through me in a way that helps me to be authentic in the roles that I lead. But more often than not, we are submitting to leaders that may have some work to do. All of us have work to do, but maybe even we maybe lower on the totem pole can model for our leaders what submission to Christ looks like.

Tom Walsh: Here’s a question that really focuses on secular workplaces, and I think it’s an interesting one from an anonymous attendee. In a world increasingly worshiping mammon and its related god, productivity, rather than God and God’s will for us to flourish, I wonder about how to foreground ethics over, say, risk management as a boundary guarding against the mechanization of humanity. How may Christian leaders, particularly those in secular settings, lead by ethical example rather than just by so-called best practices?

Nicole Massie Martin: Hmm. That is a fantastic question. I think the question might make an assumption that might be one to kind of drill down on. The assumption is if I do lean on ethics, if I do follow a Christlike way of being in a secular space, then I’m modeling something that’s not effective; that may not get the same results. That won’t be a demonstrated way of moving forward. And this is where I hope we can kind of lock in on the stories. I have been so encouraged by stories of Christian leaders in secular spaces who have said, I have said, “I’m not going to go your path. I want to show you another way of being. And God, by his grace, has blessed that way. Isn’t this the story of Daniel and the and the, you know, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, when they’re going first into Babylon, didn’t they resist the king’s diet? And didn’t God bless them to prove that God’s diet actually was more effective than that of the King? I would argue that the same God of Daniel is the God of today. We can demonstrate that Christian ethics actually have a role in secular societies. And no, it is not worshiping mammon. And no, it is not driving toward this constant productivity in the same way. But it does reap benefits and it can be effective. And I think the more Christian leaders actually believe that the Bible works, the more people in the world will have to say at times, you know what the Lord’s diet actually might be worth something. So maybe there’s a chance to bear witness there as well.

Tom Walsh: So here’s a question that really zooms out to a very big picture of the impact of Christians on the broader world, from Andrea Rogers. When you look at the history of the church, which probably during the dark ages up to the High Renaissance, and the impact that that point in history has had on not only the church but on the civilization, it was based on extraordinarily hard work, sacrifice. And if that had not been in place, the church would not be what it is, and neither would Western civilization. So based on your views, how do you think the approach that you’re describing here will impact our broader civilization and the church if it becomes more widely embraced?

Nicole Massie Martin: Oh, I would hope that this work helps to shape the condition of the heart. It’s such a human tendency, and it’s a natural, understandable tendency to want to drive toward outcomes because we have the capacity to do so. It is, you know, it’s a human tendency to say the industrial revolution exists in the New York subway system exists because people worked hard. And that’s true. But it is possible to hold two truths at one time. It is possible to hold the truth of productivity and effectiveness and generational effectiveness, because I also hear that in the question, you know, this idea of building legacy for the next generations. It is possible to hold that truth in one hand, that yes, we are called to be effective and productive, but it’s also possible to hold another truth, and that is that nothing is possible without God. Nothing. And if I believe that my productivity, the source of my productivity, comes from God, and if I believe that the source of my legacy comes from God, then I can say, “God, help me to be effective and productive, but give me the right motive to do so.”

Nicole Massie Martin: Sometimes I think we confuse productivity and contemplation as being at odds. If I am a contemplative Christian, or if I’m a cruciform Christian, a person who wants to shape my life by the cross, then I’m going to be nonproductive. I’m going to sit around in a room and pray all day, and I’m never going to do anything with my life. That is never the call of Christian, of Scripture. Christ is not calling us to be non productive contributors in our society. He’s calling us to be close to him and he’s calling us to be driven by him. So the question is, do you believe that God can work through you to leave a legacy and to be productive for his glory and for the good of society. Do you believe that? Because if you do, then I would say, hold these two truths in tandem and let the condition of our heart, which is why I’m trying to articulate in this book, let let the the crossword position of our hearts shape our activities and not the other way around.

Tom Walsh: Well, following on that, a question from another, another anonymous viewer. Um, and I appreciate the directness of some of these questions. Clearly grappling with reality, you know.

Nicole Massie Martin: Yes, yes.

Tom Walsh: As I think you are in the book. What about people on your team who take advantage of grace and empathy? What emphasis do we place on adequate performance and expected competence in the work setting versus grace?

Nicole Massie Martin: Yeah, that’s a great question. I can think of an example. This is many years ago. You know, I was trying to create a team of flourishing. So I had just read Emotionally Healthy Spirituality with Pete Scazzero, and we visited New Life Church and heard the whole staff was on Sabbath, I was like, oh my gosh, we’re going to do this on the team. So I’m telling everybody, you need to take a Sabbath and you need to take time off. And I had a person on the team that was like, um, you know, we get in a few weeks and they’re like, “I haven’t taken a Sabbath for three weeks, so I’m just going to take three days off next week.” Well, now, you know, the good thing is this is forcing a reframing of the intent of what, you know, this declaration of Sabbath meant. But it also helped me to recognize there is room for helping people to know what the standard is for the team, while also helping them to recognize standards for their wellbeing. So long story short, what came out of that was a recognition that your goals and your being part of this team, being a working, paid member of this team doesn’t change. Your care for yourself is included within those goals. So to the extent that you can achieve your goals and care for your soul. That’s what we’re aiming for. And in this particular case, that person didn’t quite fit as a part of the team. And the good thing is, because we had written everything down as our values, we were able to say, your behaviors don’t measure up with the values of the team, and we’re going to have to let you go. So I feel like I’ve oversimplified a very complex situation, and even the question itself would require a lot more time, but that’s a short version.

Tom Walsh: Here’s a question from Jeff Edelstein. I’d like to hear your thoughts on whether the only people who lead are those with teams. What about the idea that everyone has the opportunity and obligation to lead, regardless of whether they have a formal team?

Nicole Massie Martin: Okay. So this is a great question because I have wrestled even with the word leadership. I think a word that is more common in our society today might be influence. And that’s an indisputable reality. Every single person has influence, and every Christian has a call to influence the world. Behold, you have received power to be my witnesses in Judea, Samaria, and the rest of the world. I mean, this influence links with biblical witness. So yes, we can say every single individual has the power to influence the lives of others in the world in which we live. The word leadership can be a bit confining, but at the same time, I understand arguments that say, no, there are some who are called to lead teams and some who are not. And you know, if you’re not leading a team, you’re leading something. So it’s a wider conversation for another time. But I would lean toward everyone has influence and everyone has a responsibility to influence the lives of others, the culture around us, the world around us, until Christ comes for us again.

Tom Walsh: Thank you. Here’s a question from Mark Buchanan, who, like you, is a guest on one of these online conversations a while ago, which I recommend everyone to check out. Um, and it drills down on on top of the topic related empathy you raised earlier, how do leaders help their team members build resiliency?

Nicole Massie Martin: I read a statistic the other day, and I’m glad that Mark asked that question about lower global resilience, that we are in a season of life where, uh, sociologists are saying we have a record amounts of low resilience. And what they were saying is we’ve got generations of people who are very quick to quit, um, who are not able to rebound very quickly. Um, and I would say for leaders, again, it starts with you recognizing your own resilience and recognizing your own ability to press forward. But for me, part of this has to do with the lessons in the failure. Again, going back to the scriptures and to the premise of my book, part of this for me is I think we have spent too much time focused on the resurrected, glorious, victorious life at the expense of the true cost of the cross. Jesus experiences the joy of resurrection, gives us the joy of resurrection. And he says, in this world you will have troubles. So there’s a sense of what does it look like to help your team learn to take up their cross? And I would say you have to create a space and a capacity to fail.

Nicole Massie Martin: You’re not going to have good days all the time. We’re not going to win on every project. We’re not going to hit every target every time. But that doesn’t mean we’re not the right team or we’re not the right people, or this isn’t the right goal. So I think it depends on your circumstances. But making room for failure is one way to help build resilience. Normalizing tough days. Back to this mental health and the generational dynamics. Normalizing “I’m here at work, and I didn’t sleep well last night and might be a little bit of a tough day, but I showed up for work.” Normalizing that also helps to build resilience. But resilience is often built in community. So how can you build a community on your team where it’s safe to fail, where it’s safe to have low moments, but also where there’s a demonstrated pattern of pressing through that might help to build and to counteract what I think is a global trend right now.

Tom Walsh: Here’s a question, another question from J.R. Briggs of the outdated leadership practices you named in your book, which practice was or is the most difficult for you personally to nail to the cross?

Nicole Massie Martin: J.R. that’s such a great question, man. I think, I think it’s definitely power, and probably performance. For me personally, I’m, you know, for those of you, for those who are Enneagram people, I’m an Enneagram three. I’m a high achiever. I live my life by a list. I make my list every single morning. I beat myself up for what has not been accomplished from yesterday’s list. I drive myself for what needs to be done on today’s list. It’s just who I am. So for me personally, um, performance, um, power achievement, those are things that I have to regularly bring to the cross. Um, I have to recognize my penchant toward using power for my own purposes. I have to recognize that and bring it before the cross. I have to recognize my penchant toward performance. Because when I beat myself up for what I didn’t get done, I suddenly beat up my team for what they didn’t get done. And I don’t give myself grace, which means I’m not giving them grace. So I have to regularly bring that before the cross. You know, there are chapters that I didn’t write in this book that I still have to bring to God on the cross. You know, whether that is the rejection or the comparison or everything else. But if I had to pick, I’d probably say it would be between power and performance.

Tom Walsh: Well, uh, you’ve just given us a perfect segue to another question from someone. The list of issues you mentioned that need to be nailed to the cross is very helpful, but I wonder if there are other issues you wish you had included.

Nicole Massie Martin: Oh, see, this is where I wish we were in a room together and I could ask everyone listening that question. What do you wish could have been included in conversations I’ve had so far? I’ve heard, oh, it would have been good. As I mentioned before, to include something on comparison my friend Nona Jones wrote a book on killing comparison and what that looks like. So yes, comparison has to be nailed to the cross. Consumerism. I had a great conversation with Bob Dahl about this and materialism and just, you know, we’ve mentioned Mammon in one of the questions before, but I wish I had included something about a direct nailing to the cross of consumerism and materialism. There are so many, but those are the ones that come to my mind right away.

Tom Walsh: Here’s an interesting question from Jennifer McKee. I oversee a ministry within my church that relies mostly on volunteers to execute programs, Bible studies, activities, and community groups. Often they overlap in their involvement. How do I help lead these teams with compassion and encouragement, but ensure they don’t experience burnout when they’re just volunteering?

Nicole Massie Martin: You know, I have found that volunteer work can be the most faith filled work as a team leader. When you are leading volunteers, they do not have to show up. They do not have to do the work. You are dependent on their will and on their whim. When I was a young adult minister, I learned that very quickly. I had this great team of volunteers, and we planned, I remember we planned this bowling event and we, you know, all the young adults said they were going to show up. So we rented lanes for like 50 people. And then on the day of 15 people showed up and I was like, what happened? Well, it turns out there was a concert that came in town and everybody wanted to do that instead. And also my volunteers were at the concert too. So that was that. But it forced me to recognize, though: this isn’t my work. And while God invites us to his work, God doesn’t need us. So when we understand that posture, working with volunteers, that they’re working at their own whim and their own will and that, you know, it is up to us to create a compelling enough mission for them to join. But also, there might be an event or a day that we’ve planned and they don’t show up because there’s a concert in town. At the end of the day, leading volunteers is faith filled work because it requires that we trust God does the work. God does the work through the volunteers. God does the work beyond the volunteers. And when we know that, then we can set up team meetings without pressure, because now we’re setting up team meetings like, hey, what a great invitation to be part of this great work together. Look, we get to do together and not look what you have to do. And if you don’t do this, you won’t get paid.

Tom Walsh: Here’s a question that’s pretty, pretty practical. Share your three big pivots to becoming a true leader. You know, I mean, there’s a whole book I recommend to that, to Chris Thyberg, who asked the question, but maybe you could just share a few practical comments.

Nicole Massie Martin: Oh that’s great. Awesome. Thank you Chris. My three pivots were three failures. And I think this is, again, part of what it means to embrace the cross. Redemptive leadership suggests that God doesn’t just build our lives on this up and up and up trajectory, where you only build on your successes. Redemptive leadership suggests that God also builds from the lows, the moments when we didn’t achieve the goals, when we weren’t ourselves, when we didn’t get it right. And God uses those moments, not—he doesn’t push them away and say, it’s in spite of that, I’ll use you. He uses those moments and says, because of that, I’ll use you. One of my biggest moments was a young adult minister. I had planned this great revival, and it was going to be amazing. And very few people showed up. And it was at that time when I felt like I’m in the wrong field, I’m doing the wrong thing. Then my pastor at that time said, you are not your event. And that was a major turning point for me to recognize how easy it is for us to make what we do, who we are. And I had to learn very early on. I am not what I do. I’m not I’m not as good as my last sermon. I’m not as good as my last achievement. I am a believer and a disciple in Christ, and that is enough. Another major moment was when I realized I had limitations. I was working way too many hours. I was, you know, overdoing everything in every area. I was a mom of two young kids. I was, you know, my husband and I were trying to figure out working and kids and life and ministry, and I burned out.

Nicole Massie Martin: I completely burned out. And I remember in that low moment feeling like, maybe I just need to leave all of this altogether. Maybe ministry isn’t for me. I learned in that low moment that God was calling me to serve him, just not in the way that I was. I was serving on my strength, but God was calling me to serve on his strength and reminding me that I was a creature. I am but a broken vessel, so that the all surpassing power may be of God and not of me. That moment gave me a pivot from workaholism and being overburdened, to carrying Christ’s yoke, which is easy, and his burden, which is light. And then I learned how to say no, and I learned how to say, I’m not going to be able to achieve this goal, but I have a whole lot to learn from what I wasn’t able to do. So it helped me to take a lighter perspective. And then I would say another major pivot for me, and a pivot for many of us, is when your internal life is on display externally. Writing a book is a very vulnerable experience. Maybe it’s not for people on this call writing a book. Maybe it’s just leading or presenting or speaking. It’s a very vulnerable experience. But it was in that moment that I realized if you don’t have enough stuff on the inside that’s pleasing and honorable, you won’t have much to draw on when it’s time for you to “go live.” So God had to use those moments in my life to shape me, to humble me, and to help me realize it’s actually not about me. It is about God. And that’s what I want more than anything.

Tom Walsh: Thank you for that. And thank you for all of this conversation. Nicole. In a moment, we’ll give you the last word. But before then, for our viewers, immediately after we conclude on your screen, you’ll see an online feedback form. And we’re really grateful for your thoughts on how we can make these conversations even more valuable to you for taking the survey. We’ll gift you a free digital copy of the Trinity Forum Reading of your choice. We’ve published over 100 of these by now, and some feature great examples of Christian leadership like William Wilberforce, Martin Luther King Jr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. And then tomorrow we’ll send all of you who registered an email with the link to the video and some things that will help you as you reflect on it, and we hope you’ll share that onward, spread the word about this conversation. We also hope you will join us in our community, the Trinity Forum Society, and the link to do that is in the chat. And as a special incentive, if you become a member today, we will send you a copy of Nicole’s book so you can go deeper with these ideas, because obviously there’s a lot more to say. And you can join with a gift of $150, which will make you a member and will include receiving four of our readings in the mail during the year or for $100.

Tom Walsh: You can take part in our new digital membership, through which the readings will be emailed to you each quarter. Your membership and support helps keep these conversations free and together. Please help us in keeping the Christian intellectual tradition alive, renewing it for generations to come, and making it available to everyone. A word about our upcoming events, which you can register for through the links in the chat. On June 6th, we will be featuring Miroslav Wolf, the theologian and bestselling author, on his brand new book, and I do mean brand new, The Cost of Ambition. I’m guessing the cost is high, but we’ll find out together. And then on June 20th, we’ll have Uli Chi talking about humility in leadership. And later this summer, our guests will include Beth Moore on her memoir and Karen Swallow Prior on her new book On Vocation. It’s coming out in August. It’s also a good time to subscribe to our podcast. Some of the recent guests include the historian Tom Holland, speaking on his book Dominion, and Curt Thompson, and Warren Kinghorn on Christian faith and mental health. Both of those themes really tie in well to what we’ve been talking about today. With that, over to you, Nicole, for the last word.

Nicole Massie Martin: Wow, I’m excited about what’s coming up next. Thank you for sharing that. I really thank God for those of you who have tuned in. I thank God because you tuned in, because you wanted, prayerfully, something that might help you to be more like Christ. And of all of the ambitions and aims that we have, of all of the desires that we have, may our greatest desire be to know Christ. And if we really want to know him, we cannot just know the resurrected Savior without recognizing his wounds. Christ reveals himself to Thomas and says, here are my wounds. Put your hand here. Put your finger here, in my hand, in my side. Because resurrection came through crucifixion. And no matter what you are going through right now, even if it feels like a crucifying season, I want you to know that Christ is with you. He is shaping you. He is defining you. He is humbling you for his glory, but he will never hurt you. And this is the joy of the cross, that it was not intended for us to be martyrs, or to enjoy pain, or to be hurt or abused or mistreated. The cross is designed to lift and to elevate, to give us hope and a future, as is spoken about in Jeremiah, and to prepare us for the day when revelation says, God will wipe every tear from our eyes. So cling to the cross, because in our clinging we will find life in resurrection.

Tom Walsh: Amen. And thank you, Nicole, and thanks to all of you joining us today. Have a great weekend.

Nicole Massie Martin: Thank you.