Off the Agenda: Conversations for Building Church Leaders

Excuse me? Lee was fighting against the U.S. government (thus the charge of treason) and for slavery. So what if his argument for surrender was on a "higher plane." Would we hold up a Taliban leader as an example of leadership if he chose surrender for the same reasons as Lee, versus continued guerilla warfare?

Convicting and true. Thanks, Marshall.

Steve, do you mean: would we honor a person who put the well being of society over a petty need to get back at someone else? If that's what you mean, then yes, we would honor a Taliban leader who exercised a measure of selflessness.

Your criticism doesn't work. Anyone can attack a person 150 years removed from that context. Lee lived in a tragic era in which most Christians thought that God approved of slavery and that statehood was more important than nationhood. We can abhor slavery and still learn from a great leader who, by the grace of God only, was most likely a genuine believer.

And you wonder why Sunday morning remains the most racially segregated time of the week in America?

Whatever leadership qualities Lee may have had in his time, he nonetheless chose to join and prolong a bloody and horrific war of rebellion against a legitimate nation state (see Romans 13:1-5) in order to preserve a society in which there was a vast disparity of wealth and human rights, including outright oppression and slavery. That he chose to surrender and not prolong the inevitable when outnumbered more than five to one shows common sense, but hardly rises to the level of great leadership. Christian history is replete with far better and more visionary examples of leadership than this, from Polycarp to Athanasius to Wesley to Tyndale, to Livingston to Hudson to Eliot and thousands of others (many of them, not coincidentally, martyred). Please, please, CT, you can do better than this.

We all have things that we are not proud of, were pointing out Lee's but a little known fact is that Grant's wife owned slaves and were not condemning him or her. President Lincoln first wanted to set up a country to send the slaves to when they were freed. I think we need to search our heart and do whats right when we make a wrong move like Lee did, as a Christian this is our goal to repent daily and learn from our mistakes.

Isn't the point here that those of us who serve as leaders have to rise above strong opinions and do what is best from "a higher plane"? I think there's a good lesson here, but I'll admit that its hard to learn from someone whose values are so opposite my own.

YOU GUYS WITH THE NEGATIVE COMMENTS HAVE NO IDEA WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT.YOU ARE TYPICAL OF NORTHERN BIGOTS.
READ THE HISTORY WITH YOUR EYES OPEN. TAKE OFF YOUR BIGOT LENSES.
I END WITH THIS EULOGY ON A TOMBSTONE IN A CEMETERY IN LEXINGTON, VA. WHERE STONEWALL JACKSON IS BURIED. (AN OWNER OF SLAVES) READ HIS LIFE AND SEE WHAT HIS SLAVES THOUGHT OF HIM.
"WILLIAM S NEWMAN BORN 1830, SLAIN NEAR WINCHESTER VA.SEPT. 19, 1864 DEFENDING THE SACRED SOIL AND THE CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS OF HIS NATIVE STATE, VA.

Well said, Steve and Danny as well. I hear that a lot, to this day!, that "oh, that was the times". Yeah, but what about those that chose to rise above the social norms and look in their hearts, not their leaders, to judge what is right. I could be wrong but didn't the Baptist church over the issue of slavery?

My critique was more about using Lee as an example of leadership than whether or not he actually was an effective leader. As the nature of the other comments bear out, the example has too many cultural undertones and subtexts, and so is too divisive to be used effectively to make clear what Shelley was trying to explain. In that regard, I think Barbara hit it on the head. A good communicator needs to be very aware of the implications of their examples and allusions, so that their key message isn't usurped by those implications. At the same time, however, I have to say that I disagree with Shawn who says that we'd honor a Taliban leader who exercised a measure of selflessness. Would we acknowledge that he (or she) had done the right thing? Sure. But "honor" them?

Speaking from another perspective all together... As a Canadian, i find it interesting that we see the State as holy, yet the men in it as misguided and unholy. It is only in godly men that we can have godly States, Provinces or Countries.

I believe that many godly people died on both sides of the American Civil War. That is both sad and enlightening... we all could learn from that. In Illinois, at it's highest elevation just north of St. Louis, there is a cemetery in which whole families are buried. In one plot, there are grandfathers, fathers and sons...some fought and died for the south...some for the north.

How i wish they had died for Christ instead. But the same applies to us here in Canada...and anywhere else for that matter. Nationalism is not the essence of Christian faith. The essence of Christian faith was the start of a nation. Men like Lee had genuine faith in Christ, a culture in which to live out that faith, and a Holy Spirit to direct them. And a compassionate God who will sort out, and judge all their actions. We too have that same privilege... to meet God and have our actions judged.

John L., your sentiment is deeply felt, but as a Civil War buff, I can definitively tell you you're wrong to think Lee fought for slavery. He actually fought because Virginia seceded from the Union, which all the Confederate generals felt, and had sworn loyalty to, as West Point graduates. He was actually quite torn over the decision, as were most of those who'd served honorably for years in the US Army.

In that era, the people felt high loyalty to their individual states, as they were leery of the federal government, thinking their home states were far wiser than the behemoth that they were a small part of. Lee was indeed a Christian, as were most in that era, and he agonized every time he lost a battle, not for the Confederacy's future, but for the lives of his men. He was a great military strategist, and tremendous leader, despite the colors and side he fought for, quite valiantly and wisely, I might add.

I'm saddened but not surprised to read the comments by those who refuse to benefit from the maturity and leadership of Robert E. Lee just because he chose to fight for the "wrong" side of the war.

The inability to see past a person's flaws and misjudgments to recognize the more significant elements is a sign of myopia of the heart.

Thank you BCL and Mr. Shelley for demonstrating that wisdom doesn't mean having to agree in every detail--or even the necessity of being right in all our judgments. It's the ability to think clearly in ambiguous circumstances, and to exercise a generosity of spirit even when people want you to be narrow and mean-spirited.

I agree. There is little to compare Lee with enemies of America today, like the Talaban. Yes, there was differences between the North and the South. And, most will find it impossible to argue that Slavery was not the primary, if only, issue; however, it is also a reality that there was racial bias in the North on an equal plane with the aristocracy of the South.

The truth we have today has brought us far, and we have further to go, in seeing equality of race in America and the world. But to compare the military leaders of the South to the enemies of America who terrorize the world and hate democracy is not a clear picture of the past.

Yes, Lee, was a Believer and yes he fought for a government that believed in the perpetuation of Slavery, but he, like so many other Southerners, fought for their State over the founding of a new nation. Before the American Civil War all language in written form referred to the US as the United States of America are, but after the war the language changed to the United States of America is. The Civil War changed much.

I agree with Shelley.