Eugene Peterson says that the vision has two functions. One is to train our perceptions so that we will never again overlook the nature of spiritual conflict and the reality of evil. The second function is to raise our adrenaline level so that we bring our energetic best to the high spiritual drama that we participate in every day. We are motivated to join the armies of heaven. We cannot be naïve about the enemy of our souls and think that we can take him lightly.

Nicholas Murray Butler, a former president of Columbia University, said, “There are three kinds of people in the world – those who don’t know what’s happening, those who watch what’s happening, and those who make things happen.” Though leadership maybe hard to define, the one characteristic common to all leaders is the ability to make things happen. We set the tone for the community in which we live.

Thomas Nagel, Professor of Philosophy and Law at New York University, who is an atheist, is a critic of fellow atheists who argue for a materialistic and reductionist explanation of the mind. He maintains that many atheists who maintain that life can be explained purely in physical terms are afraid of religion. He writes,

After the supper in the upper room Jesus led his disciples to the Mount of Olives. He told them that they would leave him that very night. Peter protested that he would never fall away from Jesus or disown him. All the other disciples said the same. Jesus took them to Gethsemane and left them to pray. He took Peter and James and John aside and said to them, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.”