They Forgot that They Forgot

I have just returned from Hamburg, Germany, having spoken at a conference sponsored by the Evangelical Free Church of Germany and doing two days of workshops. The interactions were lively and engaged as we looked at faith in a postmodern world.

Hamburg is a beautiful historic city in the north, the second largest port in all of Europe. It is prosperous, cosmopolitan, and influential. The Beatles became a real band in the clubs of Hamburg, setting them up to be discovered in England. Some of the 9/11 terrorists came from a cell based in Hamburg.

The city is 1,200 years old, but a large part of the city was destroyed in bombing in WWII. It is a place of many contrasts.

Here, as in much of Germany, the free churches seek to keep gospel work alive in a society that is post-Christian. As someone told me, for those people who have not had Christian belief for many generations, it is not that “they forgot” faith in Christ. It is that “they forgot that they forgot.”

We talked about the possibilities of vibrant spiritual influence in this kind of world. It seems as though with every group I am with there is one particular idea that gets batted around. This time it was the idea of “partial ideas finding partial ideas.”

From Spiritual Influence: the Hidden Power Behind Leadership

In his book Where Good Ideas Come From, Steven Johnson challenges the stereotype of the lone genius in whose mind brilliant ideas arrive full-form. In his study of science, discovery, and innovation, Johnson shows that some of the greatest ideas are the result of mistakes and diversions. He also describes a process he calls the slow hunch in which a great idea, sometimes a revolutionary idea, only gradually emerges and is recognized as a great idea through social connections. Johnson also describes how different people will have partial ideas which, when connected, merge into fully formed concepts. The ongoing information and communication revolutions of the twenty-first century give an opportunity for partially great ideas to find other partial ideas and to coalesce into exciting innovation. The implication for leadership is that we need to keep all networks alive and active so that our partial ideas can combine with other ideas and emerge as truly influential forces. Our ideas are always looking to find mates.However, chaos can break out if we are not careful about the ideas we choose to assimilate and use to influence the lives of others. So we must begin with a core of ideals found in the Bible, which is the framework for rational faith. We must absorb the great narrative arc of Scripture, which goes from creation to fall to redemption to glory. We must champion the great ideals that are rooted in God’s own nature, like justice and love.

We live in a time of incredible flow of ideas—some terrible, and others life-giving. We can stand by passively and assimilate the ideas that flow our way. Or we can work at choosing what we read, what conversations we have, what conferences we attend, and what networks we tie into. Leaders often make the mistake of choosing the conduits of ideas that others impose. If others are “successful” because they read “those” particular authors and attend “that” conference and belong to “those” associations, then perhaps we ought to as well. But a more courageous approach is to make our own choices. Leaders who think outside the boxes other leaders live in will discover truly fresh ideas and introduce them into the flow. They will float the truly innovative concepts, the ones that sound crazy and unrealistic. They will influence because they believe there is gold to be mined, and they are not hesitant about swinging the pick.

If this is correct, that the very best ideas are always the combination of partial ideas by people who find each other, then the question of the day is whether we are fully utilizing our connections with each other, watching for that great new innovation just around the corner.