Laurie and I have been in Gettysburg for the last week. We’ve got one more conference starting tomorrow. Again and again this place remains a thin place to me. The fields— like this one where Pickett’s men charged the stone walls on Cemetery Ridge—call out with Jesus’ truth that “greater love has no one than this, that someone lays down his life for his friends.” They challenge every thought I’ve ever had about leadership; they re-inspire me, as Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain writes, to live and lead, far out and on, in the life of others.
“In great deeds something abides. On great fields something stays. Forms change and pass; bodies disappear; but spirits linger, to consecrate ground for the vision-place of souls. And reverent men and women from afar, and generations that know us not and that we know not of, heart-drawn to see where and by whom great things were suffered and done for them, shall come to this deathless field, to ponder and dream; and lo! the shadow of a mighty presence shall wrap them in its bosom, and the power of the vision pass into their souls. This is the great reward of service. To live, far out and on, in the life of others; this is the mystery of the Christ,-to give life’s best for such high sake that it shall be found again unto life eternal.”–JLC