We're back with Dr. Albert Moeller, the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville and the author of the book, The Conviction to Lead, 25 Principles for Leadership that Matters. Dr. Moeller, in the book you wrote this, "In the secular world, leaders worry about the judgment of stockholders and stakeholders.

Politicians worry about the verdict of history. As Christian leaders, we know that we will face nothing less than a divine judgment on our leadership." Those are strong words. Explain this. How important is the final judgment in the life of Christian leadership? Well, it goes back to what we were talking about in terms of why what we do here in this life is important.

It's not important because it's the end of all things. If it were the end of all things, we'd be in trouble because we would have to find all life and meaning and rescue and redemption and salvation in this life, and it's not here. This life is important, and so what we do in this life has a dignity to it and a purpose to it that explains why, for instance, the career we have, the profession that we've been called to, the particular responsibility given to us is important, and the vision of where these things are going is that, for instance, the secular world, he says, we're doing this in order to get to the next quarterly report, to the next annual review, perhaps to the next 10-year plan.

The Christian does not have no concern at all for those things, but the Christian understands that we are citizens of a heavenly kingdom. Our most important existence is not in this life. We're not going to try to get all our joys in this life. Satisfaction is found only in Christ, and that will be given to us only as Christ brings His kingdom in fullness, but in the meantime, we can do great good, and we're called to do great good, and we can change lives.

We can influence many, and what a great and glorious thing that God has given us this opportunity. Yeah, amen. That is glorious. And to influence many, leaders must use authority and power. Authority and power, of course, are loaded terms today, and really anyone with authority or power is held in immediate suspicion.

How does a leader lead, knowing that the folks he may be leading are suspicious of him merely because he's leading? Well, we live in an anti-authoritarian age to only a very limited extent. It is interesting that you have Theodore Adorno and others who back especially after the Second World War said, "We have to get rid of all authority.

Authority itself is bad because it's always misused." And the problem is we can't live without it. God has made us also to desperately need structure, to need authority. That's true in the church, and it's also true in the society at large. Romans 13 tells us that God himself has put governing authorities in power because there is something worse than a tyrant, and that's anarchy.

And it turns out that human beings actually long for that kind of authoritative leadership. Now, that doesn't mean that it's the wrong and abusive understanding of authority, and that's where Christians also have to understand that our stewardship is always on behalf of another. And so any authority we have is a delegated authority, and we have it always as long as we have it, and we have the stewardship of it so long as we have it.

And so it's kind of like fatherhood, Tony. The last thing we need are fathers who don't father. And certainly there are horrible models of authoritarian fathers who didn't love their children, were abusive to their children, and we recoil in horror at that. But the last thing we need then, on the other hand, are fathers who sit around looking at four-year-olds and saying, "Okay, what would you have us to do today?

What would you have to be our goal in life? How would you discipline yourself?" It just doesn't work, and we know it. And so everywhere you find a great leader, you find the exercise of authority, but we're all judged on that exercise of authority. And of course, the most important authority is that of influence.

If it comes down to the fact, just like if the father is always having to say, "You do this because I said so," we've got a problem. Now, the child should do it because the father says so, but more than that, the child should want to do it because the father has influenced the child so that the child has intuitions and inclinations to eagerly do what the father suggests.

And so I think when we look at words like "authority" and it gets tied to "leadership," we have to understand that honesty compels us to say there is no leadership without some form of authority. Because by the way, when you have people talk about authority, they're often thinking merely about positional authority, but there's the authority of influence, there's the authority of charisma, there's the authority of personality, and there's the authority of opportunity.

So we just have to be honest and say, "Wherever you find a leader, there's some kind of authority. The question is whether it's being exercised faithfully or not." Yeah, amen. The title of your book is "The Conviction to Lead." Leaders have conviction, and that means they need some level of self-confidence, for lack of a better word.

Where do we draw the balance between bold confidence or self-confidence and a humble correctability on the other hand? Another great question, but I think it's implied in the title of the book, "The Conviction to Lead." I am doing my very best to redefine leadership in terms of conviction that is shared with others and then leads to right corporate action.

And the fact is that if the Christian leader understands that the conviction to lead means to lead with conviction, then we understand that this is not being done in our own name. This is not self-confidence because we're so confident in ourselves. We're absolutely confident in truth. We're absolutely confident.

One of the things I point out is that convictions aren't merely the things you believe. They're the beliefs that possess you, that define your life. And if you lead that way, you're going to understand that our first confidence is in truth. That means for the Christian, our first confidence is in the God of all truth, the God who revealed truth and in Jesus Christ, the way, the truth, and the life.

And thus, our confidence is in the fact we really do know the one true and living God. And we really do know the purpose of life. And we really do know what it means to find salvation in Christ and then to follow him as his disciple. We really do know right from wrong.

We really do know a value system that the world does not understand. And based on those convictions, we do have a certain amount of self-confidence. The last thing you need is a leader that gets up there and isn't sure. But again, the issue is we should be sure of the convictions.

That should produce the confidence. That was Dr. Albert Moeller by phone from his office. He serves as the president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, and he is the author of the book, "The Conviction to Lead, 25 Principles for Leadership that Matters." Moeller is a master of media, print, digital, social media, video, and audio, you name it.

And tomorrow I'll ask him about the role of reading, writing, and blogging in leadership. I'm your host Tony Ranke, and I'll see you tomorrow.