Leadership For Service
Ambition Must Get Its Satisfaction by Serving Humanity
The Kingdom of God was an ideal.
If it was to be turned into concrete realities, it
would encounter the recalcitrant and stubborn instincts
of human nature and the conservative forces of society.
Where did Jesus locate the obstacles? At what
points was he aware of resistance? Did he realize
the force of ambition and the love of power? Did
he gauge the pull of the property instinct? Did
he feel religion as a help or a hindrance in realizing
the Kingdom of God? These questions we shall follow
up in three lessons.
DAILY READINGS
First Day: The Trustee
And Peter said, Lord, speakest thou
this parable unto us, or even unto all? And
the Lord said, Who then is the faithful and wise steward,
whom his lord shall set over his household, to give
them their portion of food in due season?
Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he
cometh shall find so doing. Of a truth I say unto
you, that he will set him over all that he hath.
But if that servant shall say in his heart, My
lord delayeth his coming; and shall begin to beat
the menservants and the maidservants, and to eat
and drink, and to be drunken; the lord of that servant
shall come in a day when he expecteth not, and
in an hour when he knoweth not, and shall cut
him asunder, and appoint his portion with the
unfaithful. And that servant, who knew his lord’s
will, and made not ready, nor did according to
his will, shall be beaten with many stripes; but
he that knew not, and did things worthy of stripes,
shall be beaten with few stripes. And to whomsoever
much is given, of him shall much be required:
and to whom they commit much, of him will they
ask the more. Luke 12:41-48.
The preceding verses -40) dealt
with the faithfulness of the rank and file; this parable
deals with the responsibility of official position
and sketches the alternative of selfish and serviceable
leadership. The head steward had charge of a
great estate, directing the labor of workmen and maids,
dealing out supplies, and controlling the welfare and
happiness of all. The absence of the master made
his authority for the time absolute. Would he
use it for the good of all? If so, wider scope
and higher honor would come to him. Or would
he become intoxicated with power, take things easy,
boss his fellow-servants around, and become a petty
tyrant? If so, he would get what was coming to
him. Every man’s duty is measured by his
knowledge and by his power. If, therefore, a man
rises to leadership, and finds his elbow-room enlarging,
let him stiffen his sense of duty to correspond, or
there will be trouble. Degeneration by power is
written all over history.
The functions of a head steward belong
to the age of great landowners. How would you
modernize this parable to express the same ideas?
Second Day: Preparing for the Use of Power
Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit
into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil.
And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights,
he afterward hungered. And the tempter came and
said unto him, If thou art the Son of God, command
that these stones become bread. But he answered
and said, It is written, Man shall not live by
bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out
of the mouth of God. Then the devil taketh
him into the holy city; and he set him on the
pinnacle of the temple, and saith unto him, If thou
art the Son of God, cast thyself down: for
it is written,
He shall give his angels charge
concerning thee: and,
On their hands they shall
bear thee up,
Lest haply thou dash thy foot
against a stone.
Jesus said unto him, Again it is written,
Thou shalt not make trial of the Lord thy God.
Again, the devil taketh him unto an exceeding
high mountain, and showeth him all the kingdoms of
the world, and the glory of them; and he said
unto him, All these things will I give thee, if
thou wilt fall down and worship me. Then
saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for
it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy
God, and him only shalt thou serve. Mat:1-10.
The baptism of Jesus was an act of
dedication to the coming reign of God, and it brought
him a deep spiritual experience. He came out of
it with the sense of an immediate mission, of being
called to a supreme leadership, and with the consciousness
of power to correspond with his destiny. At once
he confronted the question: How would he employ
his Messianic power? By what means would he obtain
leadership? In the desert his mind was concentrated
on these problems. This story displays the temptations
of a leader, and sums up his settlement on three points:
first, he realized that he must not swerve aside for
personal gratification, but must serve the will of
God only; second, he must not debase his power by playing
for popularity by means of spectacular, miraculous
display; third, he must not win his leadership by
methods that would mortgage him to the prince of this
world, for instance by the use of force.
How would these points apply to a
young man seeking political office, intellectual eminence,
or artistic achievement?
Have we ever had a time of religious
concentration to consider the problems of our future
leadership?
Third Day: The New Principle of Leadership
Then came to him the mother of the sons
of Zebedee with her sons, worshipping him, and
asking a certain thing of him. And he said unto
her, What wouldest thou? She saith unto him, Command
that these my two sons may sit, one on thy right
hand, and one on thy left hand, in thy kingdom.
But Jesus answered and said, Ye know not what
ye ask. Are ye able to drink the cup that I am
about to drink? They say unto him, We are
able. He saith unto them, My cup indeed ye
shall drink: but to sit on my right hand, and
on my left hand, is not mine to give; but it is
for them for whom it hath been prepared of my
Father. And when the ten heard it, they were
moved with indignation concerning the two brethren.
But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Ye know
that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them,
and their great ones exercise authority over them.
Not so shall it be among you: but whosoever would
become great among you shall be your minister; and
whosoever would be first among you shall be your
servant: even as the Son of man came not
to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give
his life a ransom for many. Mat:20-28.
This passage is fundamental for our
subject. It is the clearest formulation of the
social principle involved in leadership. It contrasts
two opposite types of leadership throughout human history.
Salome and her sons thought Jesus was going to Jerusalem
to inaugurate his Kingdom. They asked for an
advance pledge assuring them of the chief place.
Jesus replied that that place would not go by favoritism.
There is a price to be paid for leadership in his
reign, and God alone will allot the final honors.
He felt in their request a relapse into conceptions
that he detested. In all political organizations
he saw the tyrannical use of power over the people.
There must be an end of that in the new social order.
Ambition must seek its satisfaction by distinguished
service, and only extra-hazardous service shall win
honor. He himself proposed to be a leader of
that new type, and to give his life as a ransom for
the emancipation of the people.
Our Master here offers each of us
the conscious choice between two principles of action.
Have we made our choice?
He offers a norm for estimating the
real value of men in public life. Have we ever
tried to apply it?
Fourth Day: The History of a Governing Class
Hear another parable: There was
a man that was a householder, who planted a vineyard,
and set a hedge about it, and digged a winepress
in it, and built a tower, and let it out to husbandmen,
and went into another country. And when the
season of the fruits drew near, he sent his servants
to the husbandmen, to receive his fruits.
And the husbandmen took his servants, and beat one,
and killed another, and stoned another. Again,
he sent other servants more than the first:
and they did unto them in like manner. But afterward
he sent unto them his son, saying, They will reverence
my son. But the husbandmen, when they saw
the son, said among themselves, This is the heir;
come, let us kill him, and take his inheritance.
And they took him, and cast him forth out of the vineyard,
and killed him. When therefore the lord of the
vineyard shall come, what will he do unto those
husbandmen? They say unto him, He will miserably
destroy those miserable men, and will let out
the vineyard unto other husbandmen, who shall render
him the fruits in their seasons. Jesus saith
unto them, Did ye never read in the scriptures,
The stone which the builders
rejected,
The same was made the head
of the corner;
This was from the Lord,
And it is marvellous in our eyes?
Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall
be taken away from you, and shall be given to a
nation bringing forth the fruits thereof. And
he that falleth on this stone shall be broken
to pieces: but on whomsoever it shall fall,
it will scatter him as dust. And when the chief
priests and the Pharisees heard his parables,
they perceived that he spake of them. And
when they sought to lay hold on him, they feared the
multitudes, because they took him for a prophet. Mat:33-46.
A delegation of the chief priests,
lawyers, and elders challenged the authority of Jesus
to act as he did. He replied by challenging their
authority to act as they did. The vineyard parable
sums up his view of the moral history of the governing
class in his nation. It was like a group of men
who had rented a vineyard on shares, but took advantage
of the owner’s absence to embezzle his share,
insolently to beat up his representatives, and to
put themselves in possession of the farm. Every
demand of God for righteousness in the history of
Israel had been resisted by those in power. What
title, then, did they have to the rights they claimed?
Unless they fulfilled the function of true leaders,
why should they not be put out of power and brought
to justice? In this passage, then, we have a
characterization of leaders who take the profits and
honors of leadership, without performing its higher
duties to God and humanity.
Is there any connection between this
challenge of Jesus, and the functional theories of
society and the evolutionary conception of history?
Fifth Day: An Indictment of a Governing Class
Then spake Jesus to the multitudes and
to his disciples, saying, The scribes and the
Pharisees sit on Moses’ seat, all things therefore
whatsoever they bid you, these do and observe:
but do not ye after their works; for they say,
and do not. Yea, they bind heavy burdens
and grievous to be borne, and lay them on men’s
shoulders; but they themselves will not move them
with their finger. But all their works they
do to be seen of men: for they make broad
their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their
garments, and love the chief place at feasts, and
the chief seats in the synagogues, and the salutations
in the marketplaces, and to be called of men,
Rabbi. But be not ye called Rabbi: for one
is your teacher, and all ye are brethren.
And call no man your father on the earth:
for one is your Father, even he who is in heaven.
Neither be ye called masters: for one is your
master, even the Christ. But he that is greatest
among you shall be your servant. And whosoever
shall exalt himself shall be humbled; and whosoever
shall humble himself shall be exalted.
But woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees,
hypocrites! because ye shut the kingdom of heaven
against men: for ye enter not in yourselves,
neither suffer ye them that are entering in to enter. Mat:1-13.
The invective against the scribes
and Pharisees (Mat is a characterization of
selfish leadership in the field of religion. Its
fundamental elements have remained the same in all
religions and through all history: fine talk
and little action; religion turned into a law and a
burden, in order to hold the people in obedience to
the interests of the leaders; pride and ambition exploiting
religion to get honors. Jesus tells the people
to revolt against the titles in which this domination
had found decorative satisfaction. He demands
democracy, humility, brotherliness.
Does this description justly apply
to the Christian ministry today, or has there been
a great historical change by which that profession
has become a profession of service?
Where in modern social life would
the invective of Jesus against selfish leadership
still be true?
Sixth Day: The Lost Leader
And in these days Peter stood up in
the midst of the brethren, and said (and there
was a multitude of persons gathered together, about
a hundred and twenty), Brethren, it was needful that
the scripture should be fulfilled, which the Holy
Spirit spake before by the mouth of David concerning
Judas, who was guide to them that took Jesus.
For he was numbered among us, and received his portion
in this ministry. (Now this man obtained a field
with the reward of his iniquity; and falling headlong,
he burst asunder in the midst, and all his bowels
gushed out. And it became known to all the
dwellers at Jerusalem; insomuch that in their language
that field was called Akeldama, that is, The field
of blood.) For it is written in the book of Psalms,
Let his habitation be made
desolate,
And let no man dwell therein:
and,
His office let another take. Acts
1:15-20.
The character and motives of Judas
remain an unsolved riddle. The Gospels leave
no doubt that money played a part with him. But
could a man whom Jesus selected and trusted be actuated
by so sordid a motive alone? Was he perhaps embittered
because he had staked his ambition on the Galilean
Messiah and Jesus failed to act the part assigned to
him? Was he hoping to force him to revolutionary
action? We may be sure that Judas was no slinking
thief only. In Rubens’ picture of the Last
Supper at Milano Judas has a strong and noble face,
but troubled and restless eyes, telling of a hurt
soul. The other disciples were deeply impressed
by his betrayal of the Master and of the common cause.
Judas is the type of the lost leader. “Just
for a handful of silver he left us, just for a ribbon
to stick in his coat.” Some leaders blunder
and learn better; some sag to lower levels but plod
on; some sell out. Judas could not bear to live.
Read James Russell Lowell’s “Extreme Unction.”
Have you known of cases today of men
who have abandoned or betrayed a cause to get office
or income? Any who abandon humanity itself to
get thirty pieces for themselves?
Seventh Day: The New Order of Leaders
And Jesus went about all the cities
and the villages, teaching in their synagogues,
and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing
all manner of disease and all manner of sickness.
But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with
compassion for them, because they were distressed
and scattered, as sheep not having a shepherd.
Then saith he unto his disciples, The harvest indeed
is plenteous, but the laborers are few. Pray
ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he
send forth laborers into his harvest.
And he called unto him his
twelve disciples, and gave them
authority over unclean spirits,
to cast them out, and to heal all
manner of disease and all
manner of sickness.
Now the names of the twelve apostles
are these: The first, Simon, who is called
Peter, and Andrew his brother; James the son of Zebedee,
and John his brother; Philip, and Bartholomew; Thomas,
and Matthew the publican; James the son of Alphaeus,
and Thaddaeus; Simon the Cananaean, and Judas
Iscariot, who also betrayed him. Mat:35-10:4.
We have studied part of this passage
before as an expression of the social feeling of Jesus.
Note now that it was their leaderless condition which
impressed him. Plenty of priests, lawyers, and
experts on the Bible, but no friendly shepherds for
the people. When he created the apostolate, he
initiated a new order of leadership, a band of men
who would serve and not exploit. Read the instructions
he gave them (Cha, and see how carefully he
fences out selfish gain. Service versus exploitation,
that is one of the tests of all who claim leadership
in his name. We realize that in the field of
religion. But why should not the same test be
made in professional, political, and business life?
Predatory action may not be as glaringly shameful
there, but is it any the more moral?
Now what about you and me?
Study for the Week
I
The desire to lead and excel is natural
and right. Because men are gregarious, they need
leadership for their social groups, and social progress
depends largely on securing adequate leaders.
Those who have the natural gifts for leadership and
also those who merely think they have usually
have a keen desire for its satisfactions. College
life is a miniature world of criss-cross ambitions
and of contrivances for trying out leaders.
Jesus did not demand self-effacement
and the suppression of ability. He welcomed evidences
of noble self-assertion. His own Messianic call
was a summons to the highest leadership. His
temptations were the settlement of leadership problems.
His final lament over the city of Jerusalem was a
burst of sorrow because he had failed to win his people
to follow him.
Now, in moving about among men to
win them for the Kingdom, Jesus encountered the leaders
who were on deck before he came the wealthy
men who controlled the economic outfit; the official
groups who held what political power was left to the
Jews; and the lawyers, theologians, priests, and zealots
who dominated the religious life of a very religious
people. These classes overlapped; together they
constituted the oligarchy of his nation. Both
sides soon realized that there were fundamental antagonisms
between them. The conflict grew acute, until it
headed up in the great duel of the last days at Jerusalem.
His experiences in this conflict with hostile leadership
are recorded in the passages which we have studied
and others like them.
II
In the fundamental reply to James
and John he formulated his observations in a great
political generalization: “Ye know that
the rulers of the nations lord it over them and their
great men hold down the rest by force.”
In its earlier and cruder forms, the State is a contrivance
of a victorious group to hold down the conquered,
and exploit them. If anyone has not yet read
political history as an account of systematic exploitation
of nation by nation and class by class, he has some
education still coming to him.
Even where political leadership has
not been plainly predatory but rested on real service,
humanity has often had a heavy price to pay for it.
Successful military leaders were able to perpetuate
a royal dynasty and perhaps fasten a race of hereditary
incapables on a nation, to be maintained in royal
splendor. The feudal nobility performed useful
work in the earlier, turbulent times, but it continued
to take rent and tribute for centuries after its useful
functions had lapsed. Modern business men who
have organized public service corporations have often
served the nation well, but they now own the highways
and fundamental outfit of the nation, and if their
descendants or assignees collect tribute, perhaps on
inflated capitalization, for generations to come, it
looks like rather costly service. The obligations
of power have a curious way of getting lost in the
shuffle of time, but titles, rank, legal privileges,
rent, and interest are carefully groomed. If
one man loses them, some other man nurses them, and
the people always pay.
The Kingdom of God sets a fraternal
and righteous social order against the predatory and
unrighteous order which humanity has inherited from
the past. The new order must have a new dynasty
of leaders, for every social order has its own kind
of aristocracy. Jesus does not propose to abolish
leadership, but he proposes a new basis for greatness
which is sharply opposed to the old: “Whoever
has ambition to be a great man among you, let him
be your servant; and whoever is ambitious to rank first
among you, let him be your bondservant. Just
as the Son of Man did not come to have others serve
him, but to render service and to give his life as
a ransom for many.” Ability and ambition
are still to lead, but they are to be yoked to the
service of all. Not he who kills and subjugates,
but he who makes life safe and happy, shall have the
statue set up in his honor. Not the great warrior
and killer, but the great healer and the man who multiplies
the blades of grass and the ears of wheat and the size
of potatoes shall be the great names treasured.
The higher the honor craved, the more strenuous must
be the service; if a man wants first prize, he must
get down to voluntary slavery. The old way to
leadership was to knock others down and climb up on
them; the new way is to get underneath and boost.
III
Jesus put himself under this law of
leadership. We see from his words that the cross
was the outcome of a consistent principle adopted by
him. The rules he laid down for his apostolate
were meant to bar out selfish acquisition: “Freely
ye received, freely give. Get you no gold, nor
silver, nor brass in your purses; no wallet for your
journey, neither two coats, nor shoes, nor staff;
for the laborer is worthy of his food.”
It is a significant fact that again and again religious
leaders who really cared for the condition of the
people, have tried to create a genuine leadership
for them along the same lines; Francis of Assisi gathered
his “little brothers”; Peter Waldus his
Bible teachers; Wycliffe his “poor preachers”;
John Wesley his local preachers and itinerants; William
Booth his ensigns and captains with the big bass drum;
and the entire foreign mission propaganda calls for
leaders who will go to the people and offers them
nothing but enough to live in health. Today practically
the entire Christian ministry, one of the most important
bodies of men, has come under the law of leadership
for service. It was once, at least in its upper-class
sections, rich with unearned incomes, pervaded by graft,
and domineering in spirit; it is now a clean and plain-living
profession; whatever its shortcomings, graft and extortion
are not of them.
The question is now, whether other
professions will go through the same historical process
of cleansing. The religious spirit has pioneering
qualities; under its impulse men blaze the trail which
broad social movements or historical developments
follow later. Greedy leadership first seemed
intolerable in the Church; after a time it may become
intolerable in politics and business. The trend
of civilization is toward intelligent service on plain
pay. Educators, judges, scientists, doctors are
on that basis now. It has become dishonorable
for them to use their positions for a holdup.
The great discoverers in the line of sero-therapy
might have taken toll in golden streams, but they
did not. It would have been contrary to the ethics
of their profession. That means that their profession
is on a Christian basis. Where graft is taken
out of politics, officials become devoted public servants.
The reproach has been made against a man of great
ability that at the end of his life his name is not
connected with any great cause or measure for the welfare
of the people. Whether the judgment was just
or not, that point of view is the one to take.
Can business be brought under the
law of service? Or is commerce constitutionally
incapable of it? There are many indications that
a conscious spiritual change is coming over those
men in business who have enough intellect and character
to look beyond immediate needs. The type of business
leadership which took millions out of filthy factory
towns, wore out women and took the youth out of children,
cleared twelve per cent from slum tenements, kept
men and women from marriage by underpayment, and kept
the cradle empty by high prices and fear of the future this
type of leadership is antiquated. It belongs
to a pre-Christian and pagan age. It is only
a question whether business leaders will voluntarily
turn their back on such misuse of power or have a
change forced on them. Those who mark time on
the old methods will become moral derelicts, and their
wealth will not forever screen their moral obtuseness.
The nation needs leaders who will
persuade conservative farmers to use scientific methods;
who will teach our wasteful people the value of self-restraint,
and the beauty of cooperative buying and selling; who
will teach our communities that it is a sin to rob
our own children by leaving soil, water, and forests
poorer than we found them; who will give the people
good housing without taking the unearned increment;
who will organize the dangerous industries for safety;
who will place the relations of leaders and workers
in industry on a basis of justice and goodwill so
that industrial peace can be attained. Is such
an object satisfying to a young man of business capacity,
or does he want to build a million dollar house and
populate it with one child? It is confessed that
civilization has been succeeding on the technical
side and failing on the ethical. The more the
machinery of life is concentrated in the hands of a
limited group of business leaders, the more important
does the social enlightenment and moral objective
of these leaders become to society. To which of
the two types do we belong?
IV
Will a life of service satisfy the
capable and call out their best powers for the service
of humanity? Men will play the game according
to the rules of the game. If humanity changes
the rules, its strong men will still let out their
energies, because they can not help it, and they will
like themselves all the better for being on the side
of their fellow-men. There is no pleasure in
being isolated, eyed with resentment, and conscious
of hardness. If ten per cent net means long hours,
low wages, and repression, and if six per cent would
mean good will and contentment, it might pay the leaders
of industry to take less in dividends and take it out
in the higher satisfactions.
For men of great ability this is the
chance for enduring fame. Who will remember the
men that did nothing but amass wealth? Who of
our presidents are remembered and loved? Those
who suffered with and for the people.
The leadership of service validates
its rightness by its intellectual results. Predatory
and parasitic classes become intellectually sterile
and ignorant of real life. A man who wants to
serve men, must get close to them. If we carry
a load uphill, we have to choose our footing, and will
perforce become intimately acquainted with the law
of gravitation. Nothing develops the intellect
like heading a just cause and fighting for it.
Here, then, we have another social
principle of Jesus. The ambition of the strong
must be yoked to the service of society. Power
and honor must be earned by distinguished and costly
service. Progress along this direction marks
the progress of the Kingdom of God. Extortionate
and domineering leadership must be superseded where
the Kingdom of God moves forward.
V
Does the life of our colleges and
universities square with this principle? College
men and women crave honor from their fellows, or their
fraternities crave it for them vicariously. How
do the “big men” in college win it?
Do they win it by raising the standards of intellectual
work for all? By making fun clean and honorable
through the power of a clean public opinion?
By creating a college spirit which will put manhood
into every generation of Freshmen that plunges into
it? Or do they win honor by organizing parties,
by intoxicating themselves and others with frothy
“social” successes, by acting for the gallery
to see and applaud, and by wasting the dynamics of
youth on shooting rockets that look like stars and
come down like sticks? Such men are essentially
selfish; even their service is self-seeking and deserves
no honor from others. The more talented and attractive
they are, the more damage do they do. They perpetuate
their kind. If fraternities or honorary societies
honor and reward that sort of leadership, they force
individuals into futility, and reenforce the natural
temptation to shallow work and display by the powerful
pressure of socialized public opinion.
What has just been said applies to
the inner life of the college group during its brief
command over young men and women. But meanwhile
the outside life is waiting for them. Society
creates and finances the colleges and universities
from the social fund created by those who work.
A college man who toys with his work and fights those
who want to make him work, ought to be demoted and
his chance given to some workingman who has intellectual
hunger and would use it. But even of the able
and efficient college men society has a right to inquire
whether it is training enemies and exploiters or friends
and leaders. This question will be asked more
and more insistently by democracy as it becomes intelligent.
Christianity anticipates this inquiry by its appeal
to the individual conscience. Every college man
and woman should choose the principle on which he proposes
to exercise leadership in case he wins it. Are
we willing to gain wealth by impoverishing others?
Are we willing to get pleasure by degrading others?
Are we willing to gain power and freedom for ourselves
by making others powerless and unfree? Jesus
distinguishes three kinds of men who are interested
in the sheep the robber, the hireling, and
the shepherd. You can tell the presence of the
robber by the death of the sheep; the hireling by
his cowardice; the true leader by his valor and love.
A special word should be said to college
women. In her book on “Woman and Labor,”
Olive Schreiner has pointed out that as families rise
to wealth, the women slip into parasitism more readily
than the men. They cease to do productive work,
accept the luxuries of life as their right, and fall
in with upper-class pretensions. The means of
leadership time, wealth, social resources are
at their command. How will they use them?
The number of women with unearned incomes is increasing
rapidly in America. Now, if much is given them,
much will be required. Can they produce enough
social values to justify what they consume? The
least we can do is to give as much as we get.
Anything less is immoral.
What kind of influence do college
girls exert on able young men who turn toward them
in love? Nothing will shrivel the idealistic conceptions
of life in a young man as thoroughly as love for a
selfish woman. The world is full of eyeless Samsons,
grinding the money-mills, and whipped to a quicker
pace by smiling grafters who would not recognize
this description of them if they saw it.
Suggestions for Thought and Discussion
I. The Need of Leadership
1. Does the need of leadership
diminish with the spread of democracy? With the
growth of education?
2. Do we need leadership more
or less in America today than fifty years ago?
II. Jesus on the Problems of Leadership
1. Give proof that Jesus consciously
confronted the problem of social leadership.
2. What elements did he condemn
in the old leadership of his nation?
3. What principle of leadership
did he lay down for the new social order?
4. What body of leaders did he
create, and what standards of special honor did he
impose on them?
5. What do we think of the historic
effectiveness of the leadership he created? What
is the true interpretation of Judas Iscariot?
6. What evidences are there in
Jesus’ career that he was true to his ideals
of leadership?
III. The Problem of Leadership in History
1. How have the great leaders
in the field of religion attacked the problem of leadership
in the Church? What does the Protestant Reformation
signify from this point of view?
2. How have the landed aristocrats
of the past met the Christian test of leadership?
3. Give examples from history
and from modern life of men who exercised power in
the way Christ condemned. Give examples of others
who exercised it according to Christ’s law.
IV. The Problem of Leadership in Modern Life
1. In what professions is ambition
now securely tied up with service, so that a man must
serve well in order to rise?
2. In what positions can a man
still gain power and wealth by exploiting society?
3. Is the consciousness that
they are public servants spreading among business
men? If so, to what is this due?
4. Is society paying too big
a price for the leadership of the industrial aristocracy
today?
5. When the interests of the
stockholders are set over against the health of women
and children, and the safety of employes, which consideration
determines the wages paid?
6. How have the social leaders
of the past mortgaged the economic resources of nations
to their own families? To what extent is this
true of our country?
7. How can society protect itself
against exploitation under present conditions?
V. For Special Discussion
1. A corporation has averaged
24 per cent to its stockholders. It pays twelve
dollars a week to its ordinary workmen. Would
you call this predatory leadership? Where do
you draw the line?
2. Does the salary of teachers
in our country indicate that we give honor according
to service rendered?
3. How does the increasing size
of business undertakings and their importance for
public welfare emphasize the ethical importance of
right leadership?