Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.
Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
—Matthew 5:11–12
Thelma and I recently headed the African-American Leadership Initiative, a fund-raising branch of the United Way in St. Louis.
A minimum $1,000 contribution qualified a donor to be a member of the Chapman Society, and those who gave $10,000 became members in the Alexis de Tocqueville Society.
In total, the campaign raised $1.45 million, making it the largest African-American Leadership Initiative unit in the country.
There were thirty-five donors in our unit who contributed $10,000 or more.
Throughout the campaign, my wife and I spoke at many fund-raising events, and as we commonly do, we quoted biblical scripture and praise.
We also mailed letters containing passages from the Bible.
Our messages expressed what we believe.
We conveyed that much is required from people who have received much.
We reminded them that it is more blessed to give than to receive, and we talked about stewardship.
While the campaign raised a record amount of money, we received one letter that criticized us.
The writer stated that business professionals should not cite scripture or give prayer because it could offend non-Christians.
The letter specifically stated I should have been more sensitive to those people in our audience who were Jewish, Muslim, and Hindu.
I read the letter to our Doing Business by the Book Sunday school class.
I told them, “There are times when you’ll be criticized for spreading the Word of God, and some people won’t like you for doing it.
But that’s okay.
We believe others will benefit from learning biblical principles and our message will enrich their lives.”
I then added, “God blessed us with a successful campaign that helped many people.”
Certainly, our intent wasn’t to offend; we wanted to serve as an inspiration and share the Word of God.
God is with us twenty-four hours a day, and Thelma and I never tune out his presence.
Some people think their spiritual beliefs should be separate from their business and public lives.
We never leave our beliefs at home.
As it turned out, only a handful of the people involved in the United Way campaign felt affronted.
Just the same, Thelma and I would never deny our conviction.
How could we, knowing example after example of courageous people in the Bible who refused to compromise their beliefs, even in the face of torture and death.
What we did palls by comparison.
The vast majority commended our boldness in saying what was in our hearts.
And how many times did Jesus demonstrate his faith in God, refusing to renounce his beliefs.
For example, in Mark 14:57–65 there was the time when Jesus was brought before the high priest, all the chief priests, the elders and scribes.
This scripture recounts the way Jesus reacted, knowing that the outcome of the trial would determine whether he received a death sentence.
False testimony was given by some who said they heard him say that he would destroy the temple and in three days build another, one not made by hands.
The high priest asked Jesus to speak in his defense, but he remained silent.
When the high priest asked him, “Are you the Messiah, the Son of the Blessed One?”
Jesus said, “I am; and you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.”
The high priest said to the court, “You have heard his blasphemy!
What is your decision?”
All of them condemned him to die.
Some spit on him.
They blindfolded him and struck him, shouting, “Prophesy!”
The guards beat him.
In the face of death, as he did many times throughout his brief life, Jesus was unbending, refusing to deny his convictions.
Recall the story of Job, who refused to deny his faith in God, even while being subjected to severe pain and loss of his vast wealth.
Likewise, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego would not bow down to a statue of a gold god, knowing that the penalty meant being burned alive in the king’s furnace.
One of my favorite passages appears in Matthew 14:3–8 and tells about John the Baptist’s refusal to deny his beliefs when imprisoned by King Herod.
John had been imprisoned because he stated that it was unlawful for Herod to be with his brother Philip’s wife, Herodias.
The ruler wanted to execute John, but feared how the crowd would react, since they regarded John as a prophet.
At a banquet to celebrate Herod’s birthday, the daughter of Herodias danced, and she pleased the king so much that he promised to grant her whatever she might ask.
Prompted by her mother, she said, “Give me the head of John the Baptist here on a platter.”
John the Baptist had known he risked punishment for speaking out against the king’s indiscretion.
He was right because Herod had John beheaded.
Still another story, known as “The Good Samaritan,” that illustrates conviction appears in Luke 10:27–37.
Here, Jesus told a group of people that they should love their neighbor “as yourself.”
A man asked, “Who is my neighbor?”
Jesus answered with a parable about a man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho, who is attacked by robbers.
The robbers stripped him of his clothes, beat him, and left him on the road half-dead.
By chance, a priest on his way to Jericho passes by, but when he sees the dying man, he goes to the other side of the road to avoid him.
Likewise, a Levite passes by and also avoids the dying man.
Next a Samaritan passes by and is moved with pity.
Stopping to aid the dying man, he pours oil and wine on his wounds and applies bandages.
Then the Samaritan puts the dying man on his mule and takes him to an inn for further care.
The next day the Samaritan gave two denarii to the innkeeper, and said, “Take care of him; and when I come back, I will reimburse you for your expenses.”
After completing his parable, Jesus asked: “Which of the three men was a neighbor to the distressed man?”
Answering his own question, Jesus continued, “The one who showed him mercy.”
After a pause, Jesus said, “Go and do likewise.”
The priest and the Levite avoided getting involved, because doing what was right meant taking risks.
But the stranger stood by his convictions, doing what he knew was right, even though he placed himself in peril.
The stranger set an example for each of us to follow.
To this day, a person who performs a good deed for a stranger is referred to as a Good Samaritan.
Today, life and death situations rarely test our convictions; nonetheless, day-to-day challenges in business put us to the test.
During an economic downturn, for instance, belt-tightening may be the order of the day.
It’s always hard to let people go, but sometimes it must be done.
If a company doesn’t cut back, an entire organization can be placed in jeopardy.
In such a scenario, a strong leader must make brutally difficult decisions, because the first obligation is to protect the whole organization.
Decisions of this nature are unpopular and certainly not an easy route to turn a business around.
This lesson appears in Leviticus 25:3–4: God said to Moses: “Six years you shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and gather in their yield.”
Certain branches of a tree must be chosen for pruning so the tree can thrive; similarly, senior management must prune so that their companies may grow stronger.
Pruning may also be required with marginal customers.
A company may spend too much time with a small account relative to its sales volume, and as a result, neglect major customers.
So again, necessary pruning can restore an ailing company to good health.
When people are involved, nobody looks forward to pruning; it takes strong conviction to do what’s in the vital interest of the organization.
The media seems to thrive on reporting about the greed and corruption of America’s business leaders, and while the acts of such individuals are utterly inexcusable, this behavior is not the norm but does make for a titillating story for the evening news.
As somebody once said, a man can rob a bank on Main Street and it makes the front page, but nobody ever hears about the sweet old lady on Elm Street who bakes an apple pie for her next-door neighbor.
There are, however, thousands of American CEOs who give themselves pay cuts and refuse to take an annual bonus during hard times.
Likewise, they don’t “cook the books” to meet earnings expectations on Wall Street.
Nor do they decrease employee health coverage when premiums skyrocket.
These selfless business leaders go to work every morning with a mission to serve their employees, customers, vendors, and shareholders.
What’s more, contrary to what the news reports, there are thousands of contractors who win low-bid government contracts without compromising the quality of the work they perform.
And there are publishers who stand behind a quality book with an important message, knowing it will never be a best seller, and more probably a financial bust.
Also, there are newspaper publishers who delay going to press with a breaking story because it hasn’t been accurately fact-checked.
There are actors and actresses who turn down parts that pay multimillion salaries for roles that require them to smoke or do nude scenes.
Likewise, there are honest auditors who refuse to give a favorable auditing opinion at the risk of losing a corporate client that generates tens of millions of dollars in fees.
And attorneys who won’t represent an unscrupulous client.
These are all examples of men and women with strong conviction—you just never hear about them because they simply do what they’re supposed to do and that doesn’t sell newspapers.
As we look for people who have conviction in what they do, we can sometimes weed out the undesirable by viewing job histories.
For instance, for a few years in the late 1990s, in the search for people with strong IT backgrounds, demand exceeded supply.
As a result, to be competitive in the job market, companies had to pay sizeable sign-on bonuses.
Some IT people took advantage of the situation, jumping from company to company, collecting one sign-on bonus after another.
News of this prompted us to be on the lookout to avoid hiring a “jumper.”
So our search emphasized loyalty and team spirit, excellent qualities to look for when interviewing job candidates—and that ruled out the jumpers.
One job candidate told me, “I know it was wrong to accept so many sign-on bonuses, but you have to realize what it was like back then.
It was part of the IT craze—everybody was doing it.”
“Everybody does it” is always a feeble excuse.
People with strong conviction stick to their principles and defy conventional thinking.
As Jesus tells us in Matthew 5:11–12: “Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.
Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.”