So lieutenants in the military have an interesting reputation, and have many reputations, one of which is that they’re typically college-educated, twenty-something-year-olds with little to no life experience. Little experience or no experience in the army, that come to take charge of a forty-man platoon, at least in the Infantry where I came from, and try to boss everyone around, including the platoon sergeant, who often has twelve to fifteen years of experience in the army alone. So this makes for an interesting first encounter, with your crusty old Sergeant First Class platoon sergeant. And I remember exactly when I as a lieutenant met my platoon sergeant for the first time.
It was in the jungles of Hawaii, and we took our platoon through this jungle school, we were the first company through that school since Panama in the ’80s. Twenty-one days of straight rain, carrying our rucksacks, our machine guns, ammunition, full combat load, trying to trudge along through the mud in this jungle environment. You know, high stress, we had a couple of broken arms, tailbone injuries (from falling), trench foot from the rain, and hypothermia (even though you wouldn’t think so in Hawaii), but yes, from being wet for so long. So, some good times.
And me and this platoon sergeant, we just butted heads. Like from day one, we just butted heads. You could hear us on the radio yelling back and forth at each other, him at the back of the formation, me in the front, and we really got at it. You can ask any of our guys. There came a point we were at a halt. Because I thought we needed to go left on our route, and he thought we needed to go right. And we went back and forth at it, we weren’t going anywhere in the rain, and everyone just wanted to move, and get out of there. So eventually he said: “Sir, I’ve been in Hawaii for over half my of my Army career and we need to go this way.” And what do you think I said? I said “The hell…,”, no, I’m just kidding, I said “OK”, I said “OK, I trust you,” and eventually we made it to our objective. And we were good to go.
Even out of the field environment we still butted heads. I had multiple opportunities to assert my Army-given authority over him and say, “Nope, this is how we’re doing it”. But you know, nine times out of ten that’s not what I did, maybe even ten times out of ten. And I still saw things I didn’t agree with, but I deliberately made a decision that I was going to focus on the strengths of this individual in my platoon. Yes, I had doctrine on my side, had the regulations on my side, but I knew I wasn’t going to win that fight. I wasn’t going to win the heart of the platoon that way, or my platoon sergeant. Wasn’t going to win the respect that way. And you know, we’d keep butting heads. Two months in, my company commander calls me into his office and says “Dan, how is the platoon?”.And I looked at him and said “The platoon is great, soldiers are fit, they’re in shape, tough. The platoon sergeant is extremely knowledgeable, we just butt heads a lot.” And he looked at me and said: “Well, whatever you are doing, keep doing it. Because the previous PO really clashed with him, and they had a lot of issues.” And that was news to me, I thought I was messing the whole thing up.
So to this day, we had a year together in that platoon, and I deliberately chose to focus on his strengths, and draw those out, give him praise for that, give him opportunities to function in those strengths, incredible strengths that I couldn’t have done. He’s a great coach and mentor, and went on to do great things for the Army. coaching all Army teams, and stuff. But to this day, we are still great friends, and he still calls me regularly, and we talk about God and life. I didn’t realize until this sharing, but a lot of soldiers from that platoon still call me, and just want to stay in touch. And a lot of them told me that, me and that platoon sergeant, were their favorite leadership combo they’ve had in the Army. I know, I’m as amazed as you guys are.
Why am I telling you this? Well, we’re in the leadership conference, are we not? And yet every teaching, and sharing that I’ve heard so far is centered around love. I firmly believe that you can’t have leadership without love, and that people need love before they need truth. So you can’t beat people into submission to Christ. It has to be that change of heart. People need love, they need love and truth; but they need love first. And you may be thinking, “Well, me speaking the truth to them is love,” But to that I say, the verse is “speaking the truth in love,” not speaking the truth is love.
And you may be thinking, well, that the Word never returns void, right? And to that I say, it is the goodness of God that leads to repentance (Romans 2:4). So I’ll close out by saying this, the Army has slowly realized that you don’t win the war by winning all the battles. Killing all the bad guys no longer defines victory. Why, because you can’t stop an ideology or movement of the heart with bullets. In the same way you can’t kill sin in someone’s life by throwing truth grenades at them, and duck for cover, right?
There has to be a change in heart, and that comes through repentance, which comes through love. So I just want to encourage you guys to continue loving people in the right direction. Something my dad always said that means you can choose to see strengths in someone that they aren’t even operating with yet. You have incredible ability to see the Christ in someone that hasn’t even developed yet. And also love sees less, because love covers a multitude of sins. So, God bless you guys.
Lead others the way Christ leads you, with patience, with compassion, when they least deserve it, and keep loving people in the right direction. God bless.
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