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At a civic luncheon in Denver in 1987, Southern Baptist minister and evangelist Billy Graham delivered a speech on the qualities necessary to lead others effectively.

The straightforward list of top leadership attributes, recounted in a blog at The Billy Graham Library, is perhaps so simple that it’s profound.

1. Integrity

Graham asked, “What must be the character test of a true leader in the modern world?”

The first quality such a leader must possess is integrity, he noted in his speech.

“Integrity has to do with soundness, completeness, unity and consistency,” Graham stated. “When we speak of integrity as a moral value, it means a man is the same on the inside as he claims to be on the outside. There’s no discrepancy between what he says and what he does; between his talk and his walk.”

2. Personal security

Graham was quick to note to his audience of civic leaders that he wasn’t talking about job, financial or physical security – but of emotional security instead.

“Personal security includes a sense of inner peace, peace with God and peace with yourself,” he told his audience. “Job once said, ‘I know that my Redeemer liveth.’ He said, ‘I have inner peace because of that.’ Jesus once told his followers, ‘Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you.’”

3. A sense of priority

Graham explained, “This is the ability to separate the important from the unimportant, the critical from the trivial, the vital from the insignificant, the eternal from the temporary.”

Not only does a leader’s sense of priority help in the daily tasks we all face, but it has greater implications for the overarching directions of our lives.

“Until a man gets his priorities in life straight, everything else is going to be out of order,” Graham noted.

4. Vision

“When there’s no vision, the Bible says, the people perish,” Graham told his audience. “This is the quality of seeing what can be and ought to be done and how to get there.”

Graham closed his speech by challenging his audience to be people of integrity, personal security, with a sense of priority, and with a personal vision.

“But most of all,” he stated, “I challenge you to be individuals who are committed to Christ.”