Week 1: Introduction — The Emotionally Unhealthy Leader

1.Scazzero opens by describing leaders who are outwardly fruitful but inwardly depleted — busy, driven, and privately struggling. How much of that description resonates with your own experience of leadership, past or present?

2.The author makes a sharp distinction between secular leadership and Christian leadership. In his view, what is the defining difference, and why does he believe Christian leaders too often default to a secular model even with Christian vocabulary layered on top?

3.Scazzero introduces the concept that "who we are" (our being) must precede and shape "what we do" (our doing). Where have you seen the opposite assumption at work — either in yourself or in leadership culture around you?

4.He argues that emotionally unhealthy leaders tend to share predictable characteristics: they are driven by external results, avoid personal pain, and keep their interior life compartmentalized from their public ministry.

5.Scazzero writes that we cannot give what we do not possess. Think about the last season of your leadership — what were you asking your congregation, team, or organization to experience that you were not personally experiencing yourself?

6.The image of John 15 — abiding in the vine — sits beneath the whole book. What does "abiding" look like concretely in your current life, and how would you honestly evaluate how much of it you are actually doing?

7.Scazzero draws on his own story of near-collapse at New Life Fellowship to establish credibility and urgency. How does knowing this material was forged in genuine crisis rather than academic research affect how you receive it?

8.What is the one sentence from the introduction that landed hardest for you — and what does your reaction to it tell you about where God may want to do work in you through this study?