Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

“The student is not above the teacher, nor a servant above his master. It is enough for students to be like their teachers, and servants like their masters. If the head of the house has been called Beelzebul, how much more the members of his household!

• Matthew 10:24-25

Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him.

• John 13:16

Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave—just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

• Matthew 20:25-28

Jesus said to them, “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those who exercise authority over them call themselves Benefactors. But you are not to be like that. Instead, the greatest among you should be like the youngest, and the one who rules like the one who serves.

• Luke 22:25-26

“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.”

• John Quincy Adams

It seems like in a land far, far away, I committed myself to become an officer in the U. S. Army.  I had a low lottery number, and they were doing away with the college deferment.  I would rather serve as an officer, so I thought.

But as the next few years taught me, I could not stay in step while marching, and when it came to strategy and tactics – the military stuff – I was average at best.

So, I felt that I really wasn’t good officer material.

While the post title is about a leader and the John Quincy Adams quote is about a leader, I thought of my Army days.  The Army defined a leader as a person who leads the others into battle or in a project that needs to be completed.  Some people of higher rank are considered commanders.  They command others to do the work, while they sit back and watch, or as one commander I had did, lock himself in a closet and suck his thumb.  Okay, I have no idea what he was doing.  I was the one who carried out his commands by supervising the company while he was “absent,” but I have confirmation that he would lock himself in a closet for the entire workday.  He held those outside the closet responsible in never telling anyone, yet another command.  Once he was shipped back to the U.S.A., they felt their vow of silence had expired.  Thus, he was a true commander, in that he commanded but he could not lead a horse to water.

So, my mind went into a dark place when I read the J.Q. Adams quote – a saying in a Figgerit puzzle.  Figgerits have nothing but blanks, spaced appropriately.  Then there are clues, with blanks and numbers.  As you answer the clues, you transfer the letter to blanks with that number.  I have two word puzzles that I do daily and three number puzzles, just to keep sharp.  But when this saying was revealed, it got me thinking about being a leader.

I served in peace time, the Cold War in Germany mostly – which at times was tense, but no weapons were fired at the other side or at us.  I became an excellent manager and an okay negotiator. I would have done well in the commander role, but I would be more hands on.  I cared about the soldiers.

My platoon sergeant and his wife became friends.  My wife invited them to dinner on a few occasions.  On one occasion, my platoon sergeant announced that one of the soldiers, an excellent carpenter, had gone back to his native Connecticut.  He had gone back to college on the G.I. Bill, and he had joined ROTC.

I asked, out of curiosity, “Did my leadership have anything to do with it?”

By this time we were friends, the sergeant said, “Yes, Sir, he wrote in his letter that if that yahoo could be a leader, anybody could do it.”  There was an uncomfortable quiet in the room.  His wife, who was French, becoming an American by marrying her soldier, gave her husband a look that said that he might not live through the night.  My wife gave me a similar look, meaning I was dead if I replied in anger or even suggested that the sergeant’s comment was insubordination under UCMJ (Uniform Code of Military Justice).  I was teetering between agreeing with him or getting angry.  Then he burst out laughing.  He then said, “Sir, your men would run headlong into battle for you.  They respect and trust you that much.  But that might not always be a good thing.”

I learned the most from my parents.  They had me in those years when I learned the most.  I think C.S. Lewis wrote that he thought that if a human thought at all, they probably did most of their thinking before the age of fourteen.  But I would place my platoon sergeant close behind my parents.  I have had a couple of others of note.  And all the men on this short list performed actions that inspired me to dream, learn, do, and become more.

And that is why I loved being an industrial trainer.  The quote above could be my job description.  An engineer made the equipment run, run better, or run more safely.  But an engineer could do that from an office and never see the person that had to work with the equipment, but I did.

I thought of myself as a failure concerning being a leader.  I repeated my successes as a manager, again someone working with other people.  And I did as Jesus taught, serving others.  And maybe that is where president J.Q. Adams was coming from.  In serving others, we find our true light of leadership.  Leadership is never about the leader; it’s about the others.  And for those who love God, we lead to shine the light back toward God.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.