We know very well that it is not sufficient just to begin well. If I were to ask who was the outstanding leader of all time, using external criteria of wealth, wisdom, grandeur, as well as avowed desire to obey God and to be His instrument, instinctively we would answer Solomon. And toward the beginning of his reign, this would seem to be correct. Looking at Solomon’s heart attitude as he expressed to God at the beginning of his reign:

“LORD my God, You have now made Your servant king in my father David’s place. Yet I am just a youth with no experience in leadership. Your servant is among Your people You have chosen, a people too numerous to be numbered or counted. So give Your servant an obedient heart to judge Your people and to discern between good and evil. For who is able to judge this great people of Yours?” (1 Kings 3:7-9)

Describing his intended reign, he said in the third person:

“…he will rescue the poor who cry out and the afflicted who have no helper. He will have pity on the poor and helpless and save the lives of the poor. He will redeem them from oppression and violence for their lives are precious in his sight.” (Psalms 72:12- 14)

In retrospect, perhaps no leader in history had more going for him to be a great leader. However, if we take a snapshot later in his reign, we see a different picture:

King Solomon loved many foreign women in addition to Pharaoh’s daughter: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women from the nations that the LORD had told the Israelites about, “Do not intermarry with them, and they must not intermarry with you, because they will turn you away from Me to their gods.” Solomon was deeply attached to these women and loved them. He had 700 wives who were princesses and 300 concubines, and they turned his heart away from the LORD. When Solomon was old, his wives seduced him to follow other gods. His heart was not completely with the LORD his God, as his father David’s heart had been. Solomon followed Ashtoreth, the goddess of the Sidonians, and Milcom, the detestable idol of the Ammonites. Solomon did what was evil in the LORD’s sight, and unlike his father David, he did not completely follow the LORD.” (1 Kings 11:1-6)

In Solomon’s case, the temptation he gave into was satisfaction of fleshly desires. Not only did Solomon fail in his personal life, he destroyed the kingdom God had given him. It was immediately divided after his death, and then the larger of those two divisions disappeared for all time. It cannot even be traced today. The temptation Solomon gave into is just one of many possibilities available to us. Nevertheless, it presents a vivid example.

The root of Solomon’s failings began at the very beginning of his reign as can be understood from these words:

“Solomon loved the LORD by walking in the statutes of his father David, but he also sacrificed and burned incense on the high places.” (1 Kings 3:3)

The latter was warned against and forbidden by God (Deuteronomy 12:2) and was an act of disobedience toward Him. Solomon held back part of his heart for himself rather than giving it all to his Lord. And it was this holding back from wholehearted obedience that placed him on the slippery slope to failure. I do not believe he intended to fall. However, beginning with a small step of disobedience that he allowed himself, he took one step after another that led to his complete failure.

As the Apostle Paul is about to be put to death, he wrote regarding one of his co-workers:

“Demas has deserted me, because he loved this present world, and has gone to Thessalonica.” (2 Timothy 4:10)

Demas had risked his life during the years Paul was imprisoned in Rome. He publicly identified with Paul throughout, when to do so was extremely dangerous. Finally, this devoted follower abandoned Paul and the Lord, never to be heard of again in Church history. My speculation is that he did not make a decision to turn evil, selling himself to the devil. Rather, I believe he began with one small step of disobedience in his thought life, which made it easier to take further steps in disobedience.

The exercise of office provides many temptations for us. The temptation(s) Solomon gave into are just some of the many possibilities. Our loving Father, knowing our nature warned us against this and provided an antidote.

The first step is to for our minds to be immersed in God’s Law. God instructs the head of government, presumably required of everyone operating under delegated authority from the head of government:

“It (God’s Law) is to be with him, and he is to read it all the days of his life so that he may learn to revere the LORD his God and follow carefully all the words of this law and these decrees … and turn from the law to the right or to the left.” (Deuteronomy 17:19- 20)

The more we look into the Law of God and into God’s face, the more we will recognize the temptations we may be subject to. Based upon the power of God available to us, we must actively take victory over those temptations as explained by the Apostle Paul:

“…for if you live according to the flesh, you are going to die. But if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” (Romans 8:13)

The source of the power for the victory in our lives is: “…by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body”. We cannot even achieve this victory ourselves. We need the power of God. We are to depend on the power of God’s Spirit to put to death the temptations we face. We must immerse ourselves into God’s Word so that we can clearly see when temptation is luring us. Then, we must invoke the power of that same loving Father to put to death our intent to give into that temptation. We must invoke that power each moment as Paul described elsewhere:

“I have been crucified with Christ; and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” Galatians 2:19-20)

We have been called by our Heavenly Father to be Statesmen. And we have been given the resources to succeed in that calling if we will faithfully use them. Let us not fail as Solomon did, or slip into a life without significance as Demas did, by carelessly walking away from all our Lord has for us. What Paul instructs the follower of Jesus Christ has all the more significance for the Statesman:

“Set your minds on what is above, not on what is on the earth.” (Colossians 3:2)

The Government decision-maker must set his or her mind on God and His principles. The lives of too many are at stake in the decisions we make to allow one’s mind to be distracted by anything less than the highest aspirations.

Set your minds on what is above, not on what is on the earth!

The post Regression from Statesman to Politician appeared first on CENTRE FOR STATECRAFT.

I believe it is essential for those serving in Government to continually reflect on what motivates us and what we hope to achieve with our lives. Let me pose these questions: What kind of a leader do you wish to be? And how do you want to be remembered? During a debate in the European Parliament in 2015 focusing on the Greek debt crisis, Guy Verhofstadt, the former Belgian prime minister, bluntly asked the Greek Prime Minister, Alexis Tsipras: “How do you want to be remembered? As an electoral accident who made people poorer or as a revolutionary reformer?” Verhofstadt was asking the question we are asking, “What kind of a leader do you wish to be? And how do you want to be remembered?”

More than ever, people all over the world are pleading for their governing officials to be visionary leaders who care about them and use the authority of office to help them reach their God-given potential, as opposed to being politicians that care more about their own personal aspirations while in office. Instinctively, there is the conviction that they are entitled to better leadership than they are experiencing.

I am borrowing terminology used by others in the past and tightening up its definition. Hence, I am defining the kind of leadership the governed are looking for as statesmen, in contrast to politicians. Several analysts have pointed out that there is a major difference between being a political figure absorbed in personal aspirations and being a statesman who will leave our nations better than we found them. We have heard voices defining the issue as follows:

James Freeman Clarke:

A politician thinks of the next election, a statesman of the next generation. A politician looks for the success of his party; a statesman for that of his country. The statesman wishes to steer, while the politician is satisfied to drift.

Ord L. Morrow:

The difference between a politician and a statesman is that the politician sees which way the people are going and tries to stay ahead of them, whereas the statesman sees what is best and right and does that even if no one follows.

Edmund Burke, the British political figure in the late eighteenth century:

The great difference between the real statesman and the pretender is that the one sees into the future, while the other regards only the present; the one lives by the day, and acts on expediency; the other acts on enduring principles and for immortality.

Burke brought this issue to our attention in the 18th Century, Clarke in the 19th Century, Morrow in the 20th Century, and it has now been publicly asked of the Greek Prime Minister in the 21st Century. The issue is timeless and it seems destined to remain with us permanently! Five years ago, I addressed this topic at a gathering of 400 political and community leaders. Afterward, one of the organizers of this event commented: “Everyone present was a politician. Not one was a statesman.” There are precious few statesmen. In a recent discussion on the topic with a European official, he commented that he could not identify a single statesman within Europe today. I have since become more optimistic as I have been privileged to know and appreciate a number of leaders who have the hearts of statesmen.

At issue is the motivations/intentions on the part of governors, but, just as importantly, where they obtain their direction for their decisions. As I began to study this topic, focusing on the lives of those generally recognized as especially good leaders, I noticed one common denominator in the lives of many but not clearly all cases: faith. As a scientist, which I am by professional background, I am part of a school of thought influenced by the philosopher of science, Karl Popper, who argued that one should state one’s conclusions and hypotheses so strongly that they invite further investigation, including efforts to refute them, all in an attempt to arrive collectively at the truth. What I am sharing reflects this approach. I challenge you to explore with me the hypothesis that obedience to God is an effective step in becoming a statesman.

There is a Creator who has designed the world, plus every person who lives in it, and several institutions for the healthy running of this system. He has revealed His intents and instructions to us as a human race in the Bible. Even if you disagree with my understanding, I challenge you to explore the implications with me. What do you have to lose? I am convinced there is much to gain, and nothing to lose. My hope is that you will embark on this journey with me and that it will be as revolutionary for you as it has been for me.

Hence, I am convinced that understanding the concept of statesmanship requires first understanding the purpose of our Creator in designing our world. God has made it abundantly clear that He is the One who designed and created our world and superintends it. Furthermore, He has made it clear that He has established three institutions (Family, Religious Institution, Government) for the purpose of bringing well- being to each member of His creation. He has made this truth clear throughout His instruction book for us. Jesus, as God, summarized this when He said: “I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance” (John 10:10). As a consequence, we must understand that He intends for every decision in Government to bring well-being to the people. Hence, we must understand that He intends for every decision in Government to be statesmanlike and, therefore, for every official to be a statesman as we have previously defined.

God has instructed us through His servant, the Apostle Paul:

First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men, for kings and all who are in authority, so that we may lead a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity. (1 Timothy 2:1-2).

God is informing us here that it is His intent that governing officials at all levels will produce, as a result of their official decisions, a good quality of life ─ a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity. This again defines the quality of life that our Creator desires for every man, woman and child on the earth. Further, this defines the nature of every decision to be made within government. We must recognize that the quality of life described by the Apostle Paul is identical with what would be achieved by statesmen. And He intends for every decision on behalf of the people made by every official at every level to support this quality of life.

In summary, there are three important truths that we learn here:

1. God defines the quality of life He intends for every man, woman and child as a tranquil and quiet life in all godliness and dignity.
2. God defines the quality of life He intends to result from decisions made by officials, which are also those of statesmen.
3. This makes it clear that our Creator intends for every governing official to be a statesman as we are defining here.

This is consistent with Government being a God-ordained institution for the purpose of providing an orderly society within which the individual can reach his/her full, God-given potential, as I argued in an earlier treatise.

Hence, if we have any sense that we must please God, our Master, while serving in Government, we must take every step to serve as a statesman.

How do you want to be remembered as a leader? As a Politician or a Statesman? And how may I help you?

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