Category: Christian Leadership

The Genius of One

There is nothing more serious than the sacrilege of schism because there is no just cause for severing the unity of the Church. - Saint Augustine

Jesus said, “Blessed are the peacemakers…”, so it made sense with this month’s focus to take a look at Greg Holder’s book The Genius of One: God’s Answer for Our Fractured World.

Holder quotes Harvard professor Dean Williams who observes, “What we repeatedly see are systems breaking down—be they institutional systems, economic systems, political systems, or environmental systems, to name but a few—and we all frustratingly ask, ‘Where is the leadership?’”

Holder points out that it is time for the followers of Jesus to lead. With humility and courage, we must enter the chaos.  We have to admit the sad truth: we have forgotten how to get along.

We Christians are certainly a part of the problem, but we also have a unique opportunity to be a radical part of the answer—an answer that bridges the gaps of generation, denomination, race, economics, culture, and even politics.

Holder aims to encourage partnerships between people and organizations, who by the grace of God and of his Spirit working through them could still change the world!

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Kierkegaard on Purity of Heart

Purity of heart is to will one thing. - Soren Kierkegaard

What better way to explore the Sixth Beatitude—that “the pure in heart shall see God”—than Kierkegaard’s address.  Søren Aabye Kierkegaard (1813–1855)—a Danish philosopher and theologian—wrote Purity of Heart Is to Will One Thing in 1846.  It was the first of his Edifying Addresses to be translated into English and published in 1938.

Like his other Edifying Addresses, it was never spoken aloud to an audience. Instead, it was written for men and women to speak aloud to themselves.  The address was aimed at an audience who read and who pondered what they read. Kierkegaard’s own life-long practice of reading sermons aloud to himself convinced him that there was no more effective way to engage with them.

Eduard Geismar, a Danish scholar of Kierkegaard studies, wrote of Purity of Heart Is to Will One Thing: “It seems to me that nothing that he has written has sprung so directly out of his relationship with God as this address. Anyone who wishes to understand Kierkegaard properly will do well to begin with it.”

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