A lesson in leadership

During the season of Lent we are encouraged to deny ourselves some of the pleasures of this world. On Ash Wednesday we are reminded that we are dust and that we return to dust when we die. Denying ourselves the pleasures and nice things of this world can take other forms than fasting and abstaining from meat.

One of these forms could be denying ourselves the trappings that go with whatever positions of influence we hold in the Church or in secular society and lowering ourselves to the level of servants who serve others by doing menial jobs such as washing dishes, shining people’s shoes, or doing any humble job as Jesus did in washing his disciples’ feet. This demonstrates the spirit of servant leadership that Jesus commanded his followers to practise.

This article is based on an anecdote relating to the life of a prominent political leader, but the particular incident and the names have been fictionalised in order to make the message clear. The story takes place in Tanzania in the 1970s or thereabouts.

A well known and successful man is driving his beautiful Mercedes-Benz along a gravel road. He is well known partly because not many in the country can afford that kind of car. He comes to a swampy spot and the car skids. Wearing a spotlessly white shirt and a black tie, he gets out of the car frustrated, puts both hands in his trouser pockets and looks at the beautiful car in utter misery. Just then a jeep pulls up driven by a man in a safari suit. The driver is wearing sunglasses and is accompanied by two other men.

“What’s the matter, my friend?” asks the new arrival.

“I’m stuck here,” answers the driver of the beautiful car, his hands in his pockets and his beautiful tie curling over his potbelly.

The safari suit man, with the help of his two colleagues, starts cutting down tree branches. They remove some mud from under the car, replacing the mud with branches and leaves. He then turns to the owner of the beautiful car and says: “If you get into the car now and start the engine, we will push you from the back.” In no time the engine starts and roars and the car moves, splattering mud on to the safari suit man’s suit, hair and sunglasses. The owner drives on to firmer ground, leaves the car idling and comes back to the safari suit man. He takes out a business card and a wad of money: “I am the principal of Morogoro College. Here is my card and a small token of gratitude for your kind service.”

“Thank you for your card, sir,” says the other man, wiping his spectacles with his handkerchief. “I will certainly contact you when I come to Morogoro; but my colleagues and I won’t take the money. We only did what we had to do for a fellow Tanzanian and a fellow human being.”

“But what’s your name?” the principal asks. “My name is Julius Nyerere, and these are my colleagues, Zamani and Joseph.

It is only at this point that the principal of Morogoro realises that the man whose safari suit is now splattered with mud is the president of the Republic of Tanzania, the person who holds the highest office in the land.

The famous American businessman Robert Greenleaf says the servant leader is servant first and leader second.

Service of other people becomes more important than position or the exercise of power. The president in the story understood that his position did not make him a superior being to other human beings.

May the season of Lent remind those of us in positions of authority that these positions have been given to us not to be served, but to serve, just as the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve.