12/18/2020
I love this story!
It teaches us the simple lesson that leaders are not the ones running around looking for the most advantageous place for themselves. No, they are the ones who choose to dig in where they are at and by doing so create a safe place for others to rally to. Communities form around leaders and leaders are simply those who decide to stop being afraid and to teach others by their example.
As this story goes, the infantryman tells the tanker to pull in behind him because "... this is as far as the bastards are going." Leaders make "foolhardy" statements like this because they sense that something bigger is going on. So, unlike the rest of humanity who holds their heads to the ground, straining to hear some tremor of a positive movement; these individuals look up (Ps. 121:1-2). While looking up they find a sense of what they need. This holy sense is called hope, and when man finds it they are inevitably led to duty.
So, with a little faith (the duty that comes from hope), that leader resigns himself to the notion that while he could not pick the circumstances of the fight he is now involved in, he can plant a standard where one never flew.
Truth: 2020 was one of the greatest gifts we have been given. It was an opportunity to stop being afraid and build a real community. I hope you took advantage of it. If not, you still have a few weeks left.