CHAPTER 10
Summoning Courage
Courage is the first of human qualities because
it is the quality which guarantees all the others.
WINSTON CHURCHILLLeaders are on the point. Out in full view, each one becomes a
target, and each must anticipate being shot at. Sudden shifts in
events, jarring betrayals by allies, or decisions gone awry make
any leader feel fear and often confusion. Leaders must sense the
challenge to rise above the natural reactions to lash out or shrink
back, to summon courage and tenacity to lead when the stakes
are high and the results could be failure or humiliation.
Billy Graham has been out on the point, highly visible in the
press, every statement and response and off-the-cuff comment
evaluated and major decisions assessed. He has often found him-
self in the bull’s-eye in a great many ways.
In fact, sometimes a literal bull’s-eye. All through the decades
of his ministry, Billy has had to live with the constant awareness
that at any time he could get shot at with real bullets. Hate mail
would arrive at his office. The FBI and police would inform him
about death threats. He was always in the public eye, knowing
that at any moment some crazed person could shoot at him—as
they did John and Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr., John
Lennon, and Ronald Reagan.
One man called Billy at his hotel and told him, “Mr. Graham,
some of us are going to kill you before midnight tonight.” We can
imagine how that would affect his ability to go to sleep that night.