If culture transformation can only occur through those with the power to make it happen, how do church leaders utilize power for the positive transformation of their culture? Stories and experiences of the abuses of power by churches and church leaders have permeated our awareness in recent years. In their previous book, A Church Called Tov, Scot McKnight and Laura Barringer honestly and lovingly diagnosed what ails and plagues the body of Christ. They called for the church to become a community of goodness that will resist abusive power and champion restorative healing. McKnight and Barringer’s follow-up book, Pivot: The Priorities, Practices, and Powers That Can Transform Your Church into a Tov Culture, offers pathways for that transformation.[1]

As the Siburt Institute exists to equip church leaders and help churches thrive, a conversation around power becomes a crucial topic for leaders who partner in God’s work of transformation. From McKnight and Barringer’s perspective of engaging with church leaders, they make several keen observations that we would like to highlight for your consideration. This overview on the topic of power comes from Part One of their book, highlighting three pivotal priorities necessary for transformation, one of which is power.  

1. Transforming a culture requires power. 

2. No culture can be transformed without access to power. 

3. Though power can be dangerous, it is not inherently evil. 

Power, in their book, is determined to be the capacity to influence people, including empowering others to do what they need to do to influence others. The capacity to do this may be God-given, or it may be seized by a power-hungry person. Power may be derived from position, skill, or money—something that gives a person the capacity to influence others and shape a culture. However, McKnight and Barringer believe that no one is more tempted to abuse power than someone who is zealous for transforming a culture or changing a group. This is because people exercise power according to their character. Therefore, it becomes all the more important to be aware of what power is, how it can be used, and the necessary postures for persons in power to seek transformation without corrupting power towards forms of abuse, and specifically spiritual abuse.

In their book, the authors discuss four principal uses of power in order to analyze it, with the single most important being a Christlike exercise of power. If transformation cannot happen without power—but power also holds the temptation to be abused—then it is necessary to wield power in ways that partner with God for the sake of the transformation of persons into the image of Christ. 

Power Over

This is domination: using strategic power over someone, or power over an organization. A powerful person may manipulate or coerce and put people in positions where resistance means getting fired, reassigned, or humiliated. What does power over look like? 

1. Power over turns other people into something less than human. 

2. The ones who power over consider themselves superior to others. 

3. Power-over leaders tell the clear truth only to trusted leaders. 

4. Power-over leaders allow their corrupted pride to rule their relationships with others. 

5. People who power over are almost always people of unusual talent. 

6. Males powering over females is systemic. 

Therefore, a question for people to ask those around them is, “Am I abusing my power?” While it is possible to abuse power without necessarily being aware, using power over others to get what we want is not Christlike. The true exercise of power argued in Pivot is to share it for the sake of others and to utilize it to empower others. 

Power With

Sharing power, or power with, transcends delegation because feedback flows in both directions. The persons under your authority know they are trusted, and that they can express what they think needs to change; you as the leader are accountable to them, as they are to you. In a church, God’s power is operating with others. The power of a group united under Jesus is empowered by the Holy Spirit to manifest spiritual fruit and exercise gifts to follow the same mission. 
Therefore, power with happens when those who have power divest themselves and share that power with others. Power with is not the absence of power; it is the distribution of power. For McKnight and Barringer, a key indicator of power with is the authentic use of the word “we,” in which “we” means a genuine sharing.

Power For

When people use their power to empower others, they unleash the power of the Spirit—and God’s power at work in us is infinite and distributable. This is power for. We become transformation-seeking persons who share power, distributing it for the sake of others. One of the ways to actively oppose abuses of power is to surrender one’s power by using it for good, sharing it with others, and utilizing it for the benefit of others.

Jesus models this power for because he used his power for others, divesting himself of it so it could benefit others, even liberate them. Richard Foster indicates seven marks of spiritual power which connect to power for—love, humility, self-limitation, joy, vulnerability, submission, and freedom. 

Power Through

As a person, a leader, an agent for transformation, you have power! The power a person has can be used over someone to accomplish what you want, or you can work with others and exercise shared power. A step further, according to McKnight and Barringer is to use your power for someone else’s good. Furthermore, this power with and for can be extended to someone else when the power, granted by God, moves through you into another so they can be transformed. The ultimate form of power is the release of God’s power to us and through us into others, to extend the mission of Jesus. 

In light of these four principles of power, here are some questions for you to consider: Am I abusing my power in any of the ways listed above? How do you distribute power at your church? How do you affirm the contributions of others? How do you use power to liberate others in your church? How does your character shape your use of power? How is the power granted to you by God moving through you to others? 

Power is an essential element in the transformation of a culture. It is robust, it is influential, and it also has the opportunity to be dangerous. May you as church leaders hold in awareness the transformative element of power, and may you embody a kind of power that imitates Jesus Christ.