Vernon Grounds, president emeritus after twenty-four years as president of Denver Seminary, is now director of the Grounds Counseling Center and president of Evangelicals for Social Action. Defining integrity as “the antithesis of hypocrisy, sound all the way through, like a gold coin without alloy,” he recommends the following books.
Integrity: Let Your Yea Be Yea
by J. Daniel Hess, Herald Press, 1978
I consider this series of lectures by the professor of communication at Goshen College the best available resource for understanding the multifaceted meaning of integrity. Hess, of the Brethren-Mennonite tradition, was reared in a Christian subculture where a person’s word needed no confirmation by an oath or a signed document.
Hess devotes a chapter to each of the many facets of integrity: authenticity, wholeness, veracity, verisimilitude, reconciliation, and shalom. Describing integrity as “the stone, steel, and lumber of ethics,” Hess sums up its meaning in our Lord’s admonition: “Let your yea be yea.”
Loving God
by Charles W. Colson, Zondervan, 1983
This is an apologetic that does more than present a logically persuasive case; it shows the transforming power of the gospel. Colson tells story after story of lives radically changed. The story of Bill Bontrager, for instance, shows especially that a relationship with the Lord Jesus motivates ordinary individuals to become extraordinary adherents of justice and righteousness no matter what sacrifice is involved. Colson’s stories disclose grippingly the secret of a stubborn love for principles and persons rooted in God’s unchanging love.
In Solitary Witness
by Gordon Zahn, Templegate, 1986
A humble man who served as church sexton in a little Austrian village, Frnz Jagersttter epitomized ethical conviction and courage. When the Nazis annexed his country, he alone in his community voted nein in the farce of a plebecite the invaders conducted. He also refused military service in Hitler’s army. Arrested and sent to prison in Berlin, he remained adamant in his refusal to serve the cause of tyranny. He finally was beheaded. Don’t read this biography unless you are prepared to be morally challenged by absolute integrity.
Lying: Moral Choice in Public and Private Life
by Sissela Bok, Random House, 1979
To understand veracity, a central component of integrity, one can do no better than study this investigation of duplicity in its manifold forms. Bok, who teaches ethics at Harvard Medical School, explores the range of lying, from “harmless” falsehoods to untruth as public policy.
A person of integrity is truthful, she maintains, resolutely refusing to resort to any kind of deceit even to spare himself pain and loss. Bok raises issues that must be faced.
Honesty, Morality, and Conscience
by Jerry White, NavPress, 1978
Now the international director of The Navigators, Jerry White in this wide-ranging inquiry applies the absolutes of the Word of God to the everyday problems of Christian decision making. He does so with illustrations that render abstract principles both concrete and conscience probing. He indicates how scriptural standards, admittedly demanding, can be worked out in business, in the home, in education, and-yes!-in the church.
A Man for All Seasons
by Robert Bolt, Random House, 1966
This play dramatically retells an episode in English history that arouses powerful emotions of shame, anger, pity, and admiration. Thomas More, Henry VIII’s number one official, is an extraordinarily gifted man at the apex of political power. But faithful to the doctrine of his church, he is unable to sanction his monarch’s proposed divorce, which of course will allow Henry to remarry.
Thomas obeys God and conscience, although by so doing he arouses the king’s murderous rage. He topples from prestige into a prison cell, brings disgrace on his family, and ends up dead. With moving pathos, the play comes to a soul-wrenching denouement, leaving readers searching their own souls. How much is a person willing to compromise simply to survive?
Leadership Spring 1988 p. 67
Copyright © 1988 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.
