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Thanksgiving 2005.

It had been a tough year. We were in the middle of the transition from First Baptist Church to RidgePoint Church, and I was not a popular guy. I had been forced to make some tough decisions that went over like a lead balloon. I was paying the price. True, I had some faithful supporters, but at that moment the only voices I heard were the naysayers. And there were a lot of them.

Because, like you, I like to be liked. I want to believe that everyone takes the time to understand where I’m coming from and empathize with the difficult choices I’m forced to make. But it doesn’t usually work that way.

So Miranda & I flew to Philadelphia for vacation. I’m a history buff, mostly about our country’s origins, and Philly played a huge role. We saw the Liberty Bell, and the Museum of Art, and the houses of Ben Franklin and Betsy Ross. We took walking tours of several city blocks, and a bus tour. We ate at the City Tavern. I saw the Rocky statue, and stood where he did at the top of the steps at the museum. But it was in Independence Hall that my leadership life changed.

I don’t know if you’ve ever read the Declaration of Independence, but it was the document that started it all. Beautifully written. Precisely worded. And inevitably damning. Once the signers placed their John Hancocks, they were aligning themselves with treachery. There was no turning back. Theirs was an unpopular choice here as well as in England. But they did what they knew what was right, and damn the consequences.

I’m not a mystical guy (I usually laugh at them), but in that room where the declaration was signed something happened to me. I became overwhelmed with a sense of what those guys must have felt when they chose to sign that document. They’re heroes now, but they weren’t then. I think more than a few of them were scared of the consequences. Just like me. But they somehow found the courage to do the unpopular thing because they knew it was right. They were just scared leaders with a cause so important they refused to give up on it.

I realized then that fear doesn’t make me a bad leader. Inaction does. And sometimes when you do the right thing it doesn’t feel right in the moment. You’ve got to do it anyway.

So I keep a copy of the Declaration of Independence on the wall in my office. Because I’m a history buff. Because it’s an amazing document (you should really read it sometime). But mainly because I sometimes need a fresh infusion of courage to do the right thing, even when it’s hard. And I can’t look at it without going back in my mind to the room where it all started. For them and for me.