A blueprint for holding power

I am so excited to end the year on this topic: A new idea I’ve been pursuing this year. If you’d like to collaborate let me know 💚 …

While preparing for Esther’s keynote at Progress Summit, she sent me a draft of a chapter from her upcoming book Term Limits: Time and scale in the age of AI. The chapter is a meditation on how money and power distort leaders. As I read it several times, it pushed me to reexamine myself, bringing me back to Eugene Peterson.

The Setting

Eugene Peterson and Pat Robertson met in seminary in New York and became good friends. After graduation, their paths diverged markedly. Pat became a famous televangelist and builder of big institutions that helped establish the evangelical movement as a formidable political force. Eugene chose obscurity: grad school, a quiet marriage, a small church in Maryland, and a lifetime of intimate listening, mentoring and writing.

Today, I’ll share what I’ve learned from reading Eugene closely, and suggest that his bottom-up model of power offers something valuable for mission-driven founders seeking contagious influence that drives enduring social progress at scale.

The Philosophy

Mission-driven founders need clear, congruent mental models for wielding power. Without them, influence erodes judgment, power distorts purpose, and founders risk harming their employees, customers, key partners, themselves, and the society they set out to serve. 

Peterson Leadership Framework

I began reading Eugene’s books in 2017 when trying to make sense of the politics of religion at that time. I have enjoyed rereading to explore a framework for power. Eugene would likely resist this framing: he believed life could not be packaged into neat frameworks and bullet points. He was known for refusing to give advice and for rejecting easy conclusions.

I’ll take a stab anyway.

Eugene’s model of power rests on a few enduring commitments.

A. Knowledge and love of self

Eugene didn’t try to reinvent or fix himself to an ideal. He focused on being fully grounded in the reality of who he was and what is and to align it with his faith/values. And when there was deviation he sought and offered grace to find greater congruence.

Grounded in place: Raised in Kalispell, in rural Montana, Eugene spent long stretches in solitude and nature. These roots shaped his character: seriousness without fanfare, comfort with silence, and a commitment to unhurried progress. He returned to Kalispell at the end of his vocation, living quietly until his death in 2018.

Confident in self: Eugene’s mother was a pastor and his father a butcher. From his mother, he learned storytelling and from working in the butcher shop, he learned hard work and service. Eugene was intimate with the details of his family’s story; migration from Norway, his grandfather and Uncle Sven’s alcoholism. He learned early to accept life’s messiness and to flourish in complexity.

Vulnerable: Eugene practiced radical candor in his relationships. He journaled and shared with incredible honesty on his occasional struggles with alcohol, on the impact of a distant relationship with his father on his own parenting, on challenges in his marriage, and the persistence of impostor syndrome throughout his career.

B. Elimination of abstraction

Eugene left no room for the ideal. Spirituality had to be lived through the present moment. In bringing attentiveness and dexterity to relationships, every encounter became sacred ground for spiritual practice. Spiritual growth was simply the cumulative of these small, faithful acts.

Getting it lived: When pressed for a grand vision for his congregation, Eugene refused. To imagine what things ought to become, he believed, was to rob what was happening now of its reverence. Eugene wasn’t against growth and progress. He just believed it was impossible to achieve them without participating fully in the present moments that made them.

Direct relationships: Eugene avoided the efficiency of scale, preferring instead to pursue people individually and specifically, building deep relationships of discipleship and accountability. He took spiritual growth seriously, was sometimes intrusive, but always with patience and care for the complexity of every individual context.

A Bayesian mindset: Eugene resisted theological dogma. He read scriptures to enter into the characters’ stories with anticipation, humility and an open mind, trusting new revelation to emerge. And when it did, he updated both his theology and practice.

C. An active imagination

Eugene’s imagination was grounded in confidence that came from a deep command of self and theology. This allowed him to operate from first principles. He was secure to follow and to live truth, not feeling the need to control it.

Words matter: Eugene used concrete, earthy language - true to his Montana roots - to capture lived experience. His bible translation, The Message was an invitation into a richer imagination, where words were the passage to a deeper spiritual reality.

Congruence: A central theme in Eugene’s life was the pursuit of alignment between lived and espoused values. Eugene’s mission for relationships was to help others achieve proficient practitioners of spirituality in their ordinary lived experiences.

Authenticity: In his final interview, when asked whether he would officiate a same-sex marriage, Eugene answered “Yes.” The backlash was immediate. His willingness to cross the establishment reflected humility and courage to live the truth as the divine revealed to him.

What’s Next?  

Eugene inspired a generation of leaders formed in the depth of knowledge, a sustained presence, and lived conviction. These concepts are remarkably difficult to master, but Eugene also preached patience and grace; a concept he termed “a long obedience in the same direction”. I continue to struggle with consistency and projecting into the future when practicing presence, and I sometimes find the emotional dynamics of vulnerability in deep relationships to be overwhelming. But in moments it clicks, it’s magical. My hope in sharing is to encourage mission-driven founders to invest in doing the shadow work that builds the inner fabric required to hold power without being distorted by it.

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas, a joyful holiday season, and a prosperous New Year 💚 Mark your calendars to get Esther’s book!