March Madness is upon us. The NCAA Division One men’s and women’s basketball championships await the frenzy of their respective Final Fours this weekend. All the broken brackets and bad bets hang in the balance and the excitement and unpredictability of the tournament are charged with the competitive spirit of a nation obsessed with the fun of it all. What a perfect time to read a book given to me by my son, Tim.
Timothy is the Regional President for the Orlando, Florida region at Brasfield & Gorrie, LLC, a construction management company with the home office located in Birmingham, Alabama. One of his significant responsibilities is the development of a positive culture for leadership priorities and skills among key personnel on his team. The company values and insists upon an aggressive and effective effort and provides resources for the execution of the plan. Tim kindly includes me in the bibliographic aspect of the program, sharing the books they use for their leadership seminars. The most recent book is Legacy: What The All Blacks Can Teach Us About The Business of Life by James Kerr. The ‘All Blacks’ of New Zealand is a rugby team, one of the most successful sporting teams in the world. Legacy was first published in 2013 and again reissued in 2023, reemphasizing fifteen powerful and practical lessons for principled leadership. Bloomberg says that the book is “Unputdownable.” Is that even a word?
Word or not, Legacy is unputdownable. Page by page, chapter upon chapter it offers quotes and insights that are of inestimable worth and inspiration. Kerr covers issues such as the importance and meaning of character, humility, integrity, responsibility, authenticity, sacrifice, and the idea of legacy itself. One page reached out and grabbed me, especially against the backdrop of ‘March Madness’ and its championships. I include it here.
New Zealand vs. South Africa, Carisbrook, Dunedin,
28 August 2005
The anthems are over, the crowd quietens.
They know it is time.
The All Blacks cluster together, creating a wide scything
arc across the field. A lone voice cries out.
It is Tana Umaga, the first Polynesian to captain
New Zealand. A man of great mana. (charisma)
Taringa whakarongo!
‘Let your ears listen!’
In unison, his team crouches behind him. Umaga paces, his
chest out, the silver fern, the black jersey, the chant continuing,
Momentum building.
Kia whakawbenua au I abau!
‘Let me become one with the land!’
The team joins the challenge.
Ko Aotearoa e ngunguru nei!
‘New Zealand is rumbling here.’
The team, advancing, advancing, stand tall and draw their
thumbs across their throats.
A new baka is born. ‘Kapa o Pango’. A new legacy.
Au, au, aue ba!
It’s our time! It’s our moment!
And the All Blacks win, 31-27.
I love that line!
“Au, au, aue ba! It’s our time! It’s our moment!
Senator Corey Booker delivered a filibuster speech in the Senate chamber on April 1, 2025. It lasted more than eighteen hours and unlike others, that was the actual length of the speech. It did not include the reading of Dr. Seuss, War and Peace, or an encyclopedia. The most memorable line was:
“These are not normal times in America, and they should not be treated as such,” he said. “This is our moral moment. This is when the most precious ideas of our country are being tested…. Where does the Constitution live, on paper or in our hearts?”
I long for such a moment for all of us, when we might draw together and give birth to the reality of a new legacy, for ourselves, our nation, and our church.
“It is our time, our moment, our moral moment!” Will our precious purpose, virtues and highest aspirations be on paper or in our hearts?
I mentioned earlier that Legacy identifies fifteen powerful and practical lessons about leadership, but it also offers up lessons about the “business of life.” The chapter that got my juices flowing the most was the one on ‘purpose’ and the question - ‘Why?’ Kerr writes:
Purpose: As New York Times columnist Daniel Pink explains in his book Drive, “Humans, by their nature, seek purpose- a cause greater and more enduring than themselves… Pink argues that ‘purpose maximization’ is taking its place alongside ‘profit maximization’ as an aspiration and guiding principle for businesses around the world…. In order to find a purpose, one must answer the question “Why?” As
Nietzsche said:
He who has a ‘why’ to live for can bear almost any ‘how.”
(Kerr, p. 36; p. 40)
In addition, quoting the Canadian neurologist Donald Calne, Kerr includes the following: “Reason leads to conclusions; Emotions lead to action. If you want higher performance, begin with a higher purpose. Begin by asking, ‘Why?’ (Kerr, p.39)
Tim also gave me the book by Simon Sinek, author, motivational speaker and the acclaimed host of a popular TED TALK, START WITH WHY: How great leaders inspire everyone to take action. (Portfolio, an imprint of Penguin Random House, Inc. 2009) Interestingly. one of his most inspirational comments is in the form of a confession and can be found in his Acknowledgements:
There is nothing that brings me more joy and happiness in this world than waking up every day with a clear sense of WHY- to inspire people to do the things that inspire them. (p. 227)
He relies on what he calls THE GOLDEN CIRCLE, three concentric circles with WHY at the center. WHAT is in the second circle and HOW in the outer circle. (I know- Who’s on first!) Playfully, Sinek explains it this way:
It all starts with clarity. You have to know WHY you do WHAT you do. If people don’t buy WHAT you do, they buy WHY you do it, so if it follows that if you don’t know WHY you do WHAT you do, HOW will anyone else?
Finally, Sinek introduces us to Ben Comen who is a cross-country runner for Hanna High School and whose story had me close to tears. Sinek writes:
“As with any race, in a short period of time the stronger ones will pull ahead, and the weaker ones will start to fall behind. But not Ben Comen. Ben was left behind as soon as the starter gun sounded. Ben’s not the fastest runner on the team. In fact, he’s the slowest. He has never won a single race the entire time he’s been on the Hanna High School cross-country track team. Ben, you see, has cerebral palsy.” (p. 222)
In that day’s race, which was not unlike any other race, the account reads as follows:
“Something amazing happens after about twenty-five minutes. When everyone else is done with their race, everyone comes back to run with Ben, Ben is the only runner who, when he falls, someone else will pick him up. Ben is the only runner who, when he finishes, has a hundred people running behind him.
What Ben teaches us is special. When you compete against everyone else, no one wants to help you. But when you compete against yourself, everyone wants to help you. Olympic athletes don’t help each other. They’re competitors. Ben starts every race with a very clear sense of WHY he’s running. He’s not there to beat anyone but himself. Ben never loses sight of that. His sense of WHY he’s running gives him the strength to keep going. To keep pushing. To keep getting up. And to do it again and again and again. And every day he runs, the only time Ben sets out to beat is his own.” (223-224)
The business of life, that is, living our best life, is about the clarity of our WHYs- those purposes to which we are devoted and enable us to wake up every morning with anticipatory joy and happiness.
David Brooks of the New York Times recently published an extraordinary opinion piece, in which he refers to the same Nietzsche quote I used earlier in this blog post:
He who has a ‘why’ to live for can bear almost any ‘how.”
Brooks article is titled: “A Surprising Route To The Best Life Possible,” New York Times, March 27, 2025. Let me just say, this is a must read. Please find it and read it.
Brooks concludes his remarkable reflection with the following:
People tend to get melodramatic when they talk about the kind of enchantment (Kerr’s and Sinek’s WHY) I’m describing here, but they are not altogether wrong. The sculptor Henry Moore exaggerated but still captured the essential point: “The secret of life is to have a task, something you devote your entire life to, something you bring everything to, every minute of the day for your whole life. And the most important thing is — it must be something you cannot possibly do!”
Could this have been the way it all began for the disciples? Jesus offered them their WHY, their WHAT and those who listened, believed, and followed became their HOW?
The Gospel writer, Luke, gives this account:
5 Once while Jesus[a] was standing beside the Lake of Gennesaret and the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God, 2 he saw two boats there at the shore of the lake; the fishermen had gotten out of them and were washing their nets. 3 He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. 4 When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.” 5 Simon answered, “Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.” 6 When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to burst. 7 So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink. 8 But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’s knees, saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” 9 For he and all who were with him were astounded at the catch of fish that they had taken, 10 and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Then Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” 11 When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him. (Luke 5:1-11, NRSVU)
Might they have known that this was their time and their moment? A former Chaplain at the University of Connecticut, Father Richard Chilson wrote this meditation-like reflection. Our office at First Church printed and thumb tacked it to the message board in the office.
“Follow Me”
No greater introduction than that.
A hint of something better down the road.
An Invitation to adventure.
An offer of a new purpose in life, hazy.
No money-back guarantees, no assurances,
No display of credentials as to why we should trust him.
Just that call breaking into our fishing.
That’s often how it comes. Out of the blue, yet curiously close to us,
Touching our deepest yearnings.
No time for careful consideration and weighing the alternatives.
Just that dare to follow.”
Richard W. Chilson, Yeshua of Nazareth.
“Follow me” is our call to our time, our moment, the ‘once’ while Jesus stands among us on any ordinary day, out of the blue, yet curiously ever so close and touching our deepest yearning for purpose, the WHY to which we can devote our whole life. And there it is! He speaks. We listen: Come, follow me.”
Au, au, aue ba!
It’s our time! It’s our moment!