Earlier in the year, The War Cry interviewed national advisory board member Rev. Dr. Nicole Massie Martin about her newest book, Nailing It: Why Successful Leadership Demands Suffering and Surrender. The book has been widely praised by many Christian leaders, including Christine Caine who describes it as “The most helpful, practical, challenging, inspiring, and empowering leadership book I’ve read.” The War Cry asks Martin about her motivation for writing the book and what she hopes her readers will gain from it. Rev. Martin engages in this dialogue in her characteristically winsome manner, compellingly detailing the message of Nailing It and its purpose. 

Rev. Nicole Massie Martin holds degrees from Vanderbilt University, Princeton Theological Seminary, and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. She is the chief operating officer at Christianity Today and founder and executive director of Soulfire International Ministries. She is an accomplished writer and author, serves on various boards and councils, and leads the Grow Ministry at Kingdom Fellowship AME Church in Maryland. She and her husband, Mark, are proud parents to two amazing daughters. She currently serves on The Salvation Army’s National Advisory Board.

The War Cry (WC): This is your third book, Nailing It: Why Successful Leadership Demands Suffering and Surrender. Writing a book, let alone three, is a huge undertaking. What motivated you to approach a new book?

Rev. Nicole Massie Martin (NM): I started this book in 2019, before the world changed. And at that time, it stemmed from a desire to shape a form of leadership that I hadn’t seen as much of or read as much about. For me, leadership was never just about the up and up and up. Your traditional leadership suggests that you move from one success to another and then to another success. I don’t think that’s what my experience was. And it certainly wasn’t what I believed Scripture says. Scripture gives us a view of Jesus who doesn’t just go up, up, up. He goes up, and then it’s down, and then it’s up. And then he again faces another challenge.

When we only focus on leadership that’s just always about success after success, then we miss the times of crucifixion, the times of the valley, times of shaping that really make us the leaders that we are today. I wrote the book out of a desire to surrender those principles that I felt were harmful to Christian leaders. Principles like power; we need to reframe power so that we can really see Christ illuminate a good, healthy version of power; Principles like ego and so on. The book stems from my own experience. It stems from a desire to see a new way of leading, and it stems from a desire to stop having to tailor leadership books to fit me. I wanted to write a book that felt like this was the type of leader, not just that I want to be, but the type of leader I want to serve as well.

WC: The way you frame the book is across three major components: the problem, the progression, and then finally the promise. There is a lot that could be said about the heart of your book, the progression. But I wonder if you could give us a cursory outline of what the progression involves?

NM: The idea of a progression stems from the fact that true leadership is not just, as we’ve said about victory, it is not just this illuminated version of resurrection, but true leadership is about being with people who are suffering, being able to lead teams who are burdened and stressed and being able to acknowledge how triumphalism can absorb us so much that we lose the victory of the cross. There’s great victory in the cross. Once we embrace that, that I need to lead differently, then we can go to the progression. I suggest just a few things that may need to be crucified so that what is resurrected through us might glorify God. It’s not an exhaustive list. These were just some of the principles that I felt really strongly were very prevalent secular principles that had to be reframed through the cross. 

The first principle is power and reframing a sense of power so that what we gain in Christ is not just power hoarding but power distribution, empowering others to see and become all that Christ wants them to be. The next part talks about ego and right balancing of our ego. Sometimes we think to lead, we have to let go of our sense of self. We just have to be so humble that we are nothing. And then other times we think to lead, well, we have to be everything. We must be the center of everything, and we have to be the best and the greatest. But when we right size our ego in the love of God, then we recognize we are both deeply loved and valued and have confidence in that and that that love allows us to have a humility and a recognition that that’s not just about us. We are not the centers of God’s story. God is the center of God’s story, and he allows us to be part of it.

So, we talk about ego, we talk about power, and we talk about performance — this idea that leadership is to be played out on some stage, and we’re always supposed to be perfect all the time. We talk about perfection. We talk about scale, this idea that if you have something good, it’s supposed to be expanded exponentially to a better, faster, cheaper model. None of that exists in the gospel. All of that can be reframed in the cross. And I suggest what we get when we reframe this is not just a mediocre product of weak leadership. We get this beautiful, incomprehensible understanding of what it looks like to lead like Jesus. Then I go on to talk about speed and what it looks like to set our clocks to God’s timing. I talk about loyalty, what it looks like not to surround ourselves with people who like us, but people who actually make us better for the gospel. And then we close out with a vision of what it could look like to lead in a way that is redemptive and gives glory to God.

WC: Wow. There’s so much there that each one of those components could be its own book. It’s all so rich. I was particularly drawn to this issue of scale, because I think for people in ministry, that becomes this thing that just hangs over you, that you’re in a ministry that’s not as big or as grand as something that you see down the street or online, and you get the sense of failure because you’ve not been able to scale up to whatever it is that the world or the broader culture is saying you should be able to achieve. And yet the gospel and the New Testament shows us that the beginnings of a church were small and not massive multinational ministries. You have Jesus and the 12. So I find so much of what you’ve shared so very refreshing and so helpful and encouraging.

NM: Thank you. And I mean, just on the point of scale, we get so caught up in what we think we ought to be doing and where we think we ought to be. And we lose sight of the basic principles of Scripture, like faithfulness, like stewardship, like waiting on the Lord. I mean, all of those things are critical to Scripture, and Scripture is so countercultural to what the broader society says leadership should be. I have not arrived in any of this, but I do think there’s something that happens when we can work through together the principles of Scripture that are different from the principles of the world. 

WC: Yeah, do you find that sometimes in the church leadership can become something of an idol? That we talk about leadership in a way that doesn’t really have a whole lot of gospel in it?

NM: Yes. I mean, look at the analogies that we use when we talk about leaders in the church. I’ve heard it said when you’re referring to the pastor or the leader that this is the angel of the house. Well, then what are the rest of the people? Are they the human beings and you’re the divine one? I’ve heard analogies of leaders as shepherd and their people as sheep, but that creates a biological difference between you and the people you lead. God is the angel of the house. God is the shepherd, and we are the sheep. What does it look like to lead as a sheep among sheep? When we locate ourselves with the people that we lead, I think we get a more accurate biblical view, but unfortunately the church is not immune from the pressures of the world. Pastors and leaders want platforms just like secular leaders want platforms. Pastors and leaders want wealth and fame and influence just like the rest of the world. So the question is, how do we cling so deeply to the cross that we recognize that those things don’t matter as much as our clinging to the cross? As much as our fellowship with the sufferings of the Savior matter to us? That is what should matter more than anything else in the world. 

WC: Just the way you’re refocusing this is really important. I find that a lot of what we talk about oftentimes in the church and in churches today is leadership. I mean, it’s just such a huge topic and the way you’re refocusing it upon the cross is again so refreshing and so very vital. I think it’s transparent that we need to have this important conversation. People are hungry to become better leaders and to know how to lead well in their homes and their communities and church, but it has to begin and end with Jesus. And I love what you say about participation in his suffering and that being really the core of our being Christian leaders. The book is about this topic of Christian leadership, but it also has a fair bit of you in it as well. How did your own journey prepare you for writing this book?

NM: My journey into leadership was, as I continue to reflect on it, a series of God opening doors, a series of God making room for gifts, some of which I didn’t even know I had at the time, and of God allowing me to experience both leadership from a position of leadership and leadership from a position of influence, but also receiving great leadership. As I trace my own leadership journey from consulting through church leadership to nonprofit leadership I can see this strain of God both building my skill set and building my dependence on him. I think that’s another tension of the cross there. There’s a tension between being equipped for the calling that God has for you and laying it all down at the cross, knowing that your skills are great and your gifts matter. But also, the anointing of God matters more than any of that.

I think it was just as I described in the beginning; it’s like the ebbs and flows. You get a degree, you’re like, I’ve arrived. And then you fail your first assignment, and you’re like I don’t know what I’m doing. Or, you know, I got through my doctoral program only to realize just how much I do not know; Just how very much of an expert I am not. So, the journey of leadership has been one full of grace. And I think part of me writing this book was just to remind other people that it’s actually not about your resume; It’s not about you first starting as a shoe salesman and then you owning the shoe store. It’s actually about you started and you failed. And here’s what you learned in the failure. You grew a little and then you got a setback. And here’s what you learned from that descent, that setback, because whether we like it or not, the greatest leadership lessons are not learned from the mountaintops. They’re learned in the valleys. So how do we start to embrace this valley-like feeling of leadership so that that becomes normalized and not just picture ourselves on the mountaintops all the time, longing for visibility and fame and applause when that’s not what the gospel is about?

WC: Amen. And speaking of the gospel, the gospel is the crucifixion, but it’s also, of course, the resurrection. And that’s how the book ends, with the promise of resurrection, the promise of healing and of hope. And you really do a wonderful job of both leading us to Calvary through the course of the book and all the implications of that, but then also finishing there at that empty tomb. And you write in that chapter, “The way to give yourself fully to God through the crucifixion of what you see is to embrace the dream of a resurrected life to lead in ways others have never seen. It takes courage to dream because dreaming sets you apart from what others believe is possible. While dreaming is necessary for life and for leadership, the truth is, dreaming is risky.” While the chapter is so elevating and hopeful, you don’t shy away though from the risks that are involved, that are inherent in that kind of dreaming and hoping. I wonder, maybe you could just describe the risks that are inherent there and the tension of that?

NM: Yeah. The risks in leadership aren’t that different from the risks of discipleship. And this is, again, a pain point. Somehow in the progression of faith — specifically in America, but I know it’s not exclusively in America — Somehow in this discipleship journey, we’ve begun to believe that you can be a disciple without cost, that you can follow Jesus and it won’t cost you anything. You don’t have to let go of anything. You can just come, and you can do everything that you feel is right and just follow Jesus, and there’s no cost, and there’s no risk. But nothing that’s valuable is risk free, nothing. If it’s really valuable, if it’s really worthwhile, it will cost you something. As I was thinking through that chapter, I remember writing it, and I remember thinking we all have a vision of eternity with Christ, where Revelation says, wipe every tear from our eyes, and there’ll be no more sorrow, and there’ll be no more death, and we will be with the Lord forever. We all have that vision. But the way that we get to that vision, Revelation also says, is through a war. We get things through war. The way we get to resurrection is through crucifixion. So either you’re going to be so afraid of what it’s going to cost you that you say, I don’t want it. It’s too high of a cost. Or you say, “I long for that vision so deeply that no matter what it costs me, no matter how long it takes, I’m going to fight for that.” And the best good news for us is that Christ already did the work. I am not fighting for my own salvation. He already fought for my salvation. I am not fighting against the enemy on my own. Jesus already fought the battle. I will not preach the sermon to you today, but there is this glorious view of cost that nothing in a life with Christ will cost you more than Christ has already paid. So yeah, it’s risky, but he already absorbed the risk. It’s costly, but he already paid the cost.

Like, what are you waiting for? Are you afraid of losing followers? Are you afraid of losing money? Are you afraid of losing what you think you used to be? Well, I say have at it because I want to lose who I used to be so that Christ can make me who I could be. That’s the goal. I need a vision of what following Christ looks like that supersedes the vision of a life I can do on my own. And I prayed that for the church. That’s what I was trying to create. Let’s close our eyes and dream of something we’ve never seen before so that we can have the courage to let go of what we have already seen. Because what we’ve seen is just all right. But what is unseen is absolutely amazing. 

WC: And in talking about hope and aspirations, the epilogue is this really poignant message that you write for your children, for your daughters. And I thought that was so touching, so fitting. You described us being at this point in the life of the church where really, if we don’t fight, if we’re not willing to risk something, if we’re not willing to live a crucified life, then the church doesn’t have much of a future ahead of her. We know, obviously, the promises of Scripture are that there will always be the bride of Christ, and that Christ will come back, and there will be that great wedding feast of the Lamb. But are we going to be part of that? Are we going to continue? Are we going to leave something better for our children? A legacy for them in the church? So, I found that your letter to your daughters was again so poignant, so fitting. And I wonder if we, as we come to a close here, if you could just speak to where your hope for your children comes from and what gives you hope and what dreams you have for leaders in the church, what you hope people will come away from this book having experienced and having learned?

NM: At the end of the New Testament, John writes to a series of people. He says, I write to you, dear children, because you’ve overcome the evil one. I write to you young men. I write to you, fathers. There’s a sense, and he says it, it’s like repeated. I write to you, young people. I write to you fathers. I write to you. And it seems so poignant that there is no real leadership without legacy. You can lead as well as you think you want. But if you’re not leading in a way that leaves a legacy, then what is the point? We can be wonderful disciples, but discipleship is about disciple-making. It’s not just about disciple being. And my hope for my girls is that with all of the pressures facing them, with everything that comes against the younger generations today, my prayer is that they would see something in us worth following, that they would see a faith in us, a determination in us, a crucified living in us that would make them say, I want to follow that. And I know there are no guarantees. We as parents can raise our children in all the ways we think they should go. And because of the grace of God and free will, they will make their own decisions. But as I was writing that epilogue, I found myself echoing the words of John saying, I really do see you. I see how God has graced you and gifted you and anointed you to do things that I will never do. And I just pray that you hold onto the cross. 

In all the things my daughters have learned from me, whether they pick up mommy’s book or not, my prayer is that they would cling to the cross and they will find a way to do that, not just for their own lives, but for the generations that come after them. Another kind of reason why I wrote that, I have this image on my desk. It’s my great-grandmother Estelle Cartledge. I don’t know if you can see this. My mom gave us this image. But this is Estelle Cartledge. She had a third-grade education. She was the first born free from her family. Her mother and father were slaves. At that time, she, I’m told, would pray, even with very little education, even with not as bright of a future, she would pray every single day, “God bless the seed of my seed of my seed.” God help them to know you. And I thought to myself as I was writing that part, that’s the prayer we’re missing. Lord, bless the seed of my seed of my seed. Help the children of my children of my children to know you, whether I’m single or married, whether I have children or not. Lord, let your gospel so infuse the next generation that at least when I’m gone, there will still be a remnant who know you and love you and call you Christ. That’s what I want.

Photo via nicolemassiemartin.com.