Into The Deep Blue

Yesterday afternoon, I considered that my opening line for a talk to some at-risk students at Project LIFT might just be throwing up on the lovely blue carpet. It was a deep blue, like the far-out part of the ocean that people always warn you to avoid unless you’re an expert swimmer or have a boat. I’ve always been one to get nervous before speaking – and it’s probably more akin to anxious excitement than nervous dread – but I was especially amped up yesterday because it was a new experience for me. Sure, I’ve spoken to hundreds of youth over the past 15 years, but it was almost always within a church context, almost always on a passage of Scripture. This was different. This was me speaking to a theme, trying to inspire kids with tough backgrounds and even tougher realities to overcome the hardships before them and aspire for something more.

Sure, we were meeting in a church, but I was doing something new. And I knew I would either nail it or fail miserably.

I decided that nailing it was the preferable option. So I pushed my anxiety aside, kept my Whatchamacallit candy bar in my stomach where it belonged, and I started telling a simple story about a boy, his kinship with a pencil, and the journey of discovery they made together. (If you’re interested, here’s the PDF: Project LIFT – The Boy)

If you’ve ever spoken to teenagers before, you know they can be a tough sell. They’re smart, they’re savvy, and if they think for a second that you’re flim-flamming them, they’ll shut you out and move on. The students I spoke to yesterday were no exception. But as I went along with the story, trying my best to weave in humor and add in improvisational moments based on their responses to me, the most amazing thing happened.

They stayed with me.

Now, here’s where years of youth work comes in handy. To the average person, a teenager who is “staying with me” might seem a lot like a distracted, disinterested person. They rarely keep eye contact, they tend to shift in their seats, and every so often they’ll look up or down or around the room to see if maybe a magic fairy has flown in to grant wishes. It can take some getting used to. In fact, you really have to simultaneously speak to them and look for the cues that they’re with you: a smile, a subtle nod of agreement, leaning forward in their chair at a crucial point, tapping their neighbor on the shoulder and gesturing for them to pay closer attention. All of those signs were present yesterday afternoon, even as my talk soared past the fifteen minute mark.

I wrapped it up after 25 minutes, and the best thing in the world happened.

They wanted to ask me questions. Which means they had listened and heard something that piqued their interest. I even got asked two of my favorite questions: Have you ever thought about being a teacher? and Have you ever thought about doing stand up comedy?

(In case you’re wondering: yes to the first and no to the second.)

Afterwards, the folks who invited me to speak (without ever hearing me, might I add – brave folks) told me that it was the first time they could remember that the kids had ever sat through a presentation without having to be redirected.

“That never happens,” one worker said. “They actually listened to you.”

Yesterday, I took step beyond the familiar boundaries I’ve always known, and the ground beneath my feet was just as firm. I’ve always been told – and believed – that I was a good preacher; yesterday was the first time I’ve been told I was a good speaker. There may not seem to be much difference, but for me, there is. And since you might be asking yourself, “Self, what is the difference?”, I’ll tell you:

A preacher comes with a built in audience. A speaker has to earn one. God has always been gracious to me because He’s always provided me with a platform to speak from and people to speak to. I’ve never taken it for granted, but it’s always been built in for me because of my involvement with a church. Yesterday He showed me that he could open doors beyond a church (never mind that I was physically inside a church) and that I could earn the right to be heard. He showed me that He could do more with me than I’d imagined.

The best part of the day, however, the part that just made me fresh-from-the-oven-chocolate-chip cookie gooey inside, was when I got into the care with Rachel to leave. She silently grabbed my hand and said, “Good job.” I kissed her hand and said thanks. But then she added this, and I knew things were going to be okay:

“I loved hearing you speak like that. You really seemed to be in your element. It was awesome, and the kids really enjoyed it.”

One journey ending, another beginning. Into the deep blue we go.

For My Fellow Writers

Normally I don’t post twice in one day, but as this will be short post that will only appeal to a select few people out there, I figure it won’t hurt anything. This is for all my fellow writers out there. Today, I was the featured article for ChurchLeaders.com – which I got because they happened to read a blog I guest posted on Ed Stetzer’s website. It may not be a Pulitzer prize, but it’s progress in my career. Another credit. A wider audience.

Progress.

You know how sometimes you sit over the keyboard and sweat blood trying to think of what exactly it is that you’re trying to say? You know something’s inside of you, dying to get out and onto that computer screen, but your fingers and your brain aren’t speaking to one another so you just sit there and stare at a tauntingly empty screen. You pray. You offer mental bargains to yourself. Nothing works. You despair you’ll ever make it as a writer.

If you identify in any way with the above paragraph, I would just like to encourage you today. It’s worth it. Every little ounce of time and sweat and energy that you put into a piece is totally, completely worth it. Because someone, somewhere, reads it. And someone, somewhere, cares.

Keep writing. Keep believing that your words matter.

Because to someone, somewhere, they do.

Christian Meme of the Week

Your weekly dose of funny (or at least until I run out of ideas).

Success or Failure in the Next Five to Ten Years

This book is a great read. Even if you don't typically like books like this.

I’ve been reading a fascinating book this week: Outliers: The Story of Success by acclaimed author Malcolm Gladwell. Not only is the book an interesting study on the factors that go into success, it’s also a heck of a good read. Gladwell’s prose is engaging, easy to understand, and best of all full of reference points that you can actually understand (though there are some pretty high-minded references as well). It’s a great read for anyone who likes non-fiction.

But that’s not why I’m writing about the book.

The church where I work is settled in a little community called Grayson, Georgia, a nice little suburban offshoot of the Metro-Atlanta complex. It’s got all of the hallmarks of a Met-ATL town: grocery stores, fast food chains, sit down restaurants, doctors, lawyers, good schools, and plenty of other assorted businesses and services that make the local economy spin. It’s also got a butt-load of churches, since we live on the first or second notch of the Bible Belt, and while there are certainly plenty of people available to fill the churches, the number of people who actually go to church is smaller, making the competition to get people into your pews more severe.

Now, if this were strictly a case of business and marketing, this would be a fairly simple problem to solve. You would realign your marketing campaign and change your strategy to meet the needs and expectations of the community, challenge your leadership and labor base to double their efforts, and you’d do what you could to draw people to your door.

But the church is not a business. It’s a living, breathing organism that operates on an entirely different level than a tire shop or a pizza parlor.

All too often, we forget that truth. We treat the church as if a formulaic fix will be the perfect solution to what ails us. Numbers a little down? No problem – just change the music, or the sermon, or the dress code, or the programs. People seem disinterested? Add a new book study on “How to Improve Your Life,” or a create a self-help group that caters to the latest trend in therapy. Sometimes, instead of really looking within ourselves (and by that I mean the church’s membership as well as its community), we scan the aisles of the local bookstore and hope that someone else has a pre-packaged fix that will do.

Most of the time they won’t. Do, that is. They tend to do not, which is next to death when you’ve hitched your hopes to that pre-packaging.

Which brings me back to Outliers: success is knowing who you are, where you’re from, and what circumstances surround you. In other words, it’s about introspection and imagination and ambition and intelligence and all of the other things we sing praises to in our business classes, but it’s also about timing and luck and providence (if you believe in that sort of thing, which one would hope a church certainly does).

So how can a church in a changing community set itself up for success? And come to think of it, how should a church even define success?

The past few decades success was easy to define: growing attendance, growing budget, growing programs. If you had those things as a church, you were successful. But then someone realized: what does that have to do with the Will of God? Those were great benchmarks for a business, but lousy for a church, because a church has weightier and more ambitious goals to strive for beyond simple numerical growth. But at the same time, a church should grow.

Catch-22.

So back to my church. We are a historic church, over 160 years in the same location, which means that the people of this congregation have always done a fairly decent job of assessing the community and the times and adjusting to both. We’ve never been “trendy” but we’ve always been accessible – and that sense of community has helped the church stay around long after others have closed their doors and vanished into the ether. Entering our 161st year, we’re looking at yet another shift in the community: the turnover from the Greatest and Boomer Generations to the Gen X and Millennial Generations.

In other words, the script is completely flipping. And in five years, it will be completely flipped.

Out will be the consumer church model. In will be the engaged church model – one where the members do more than just sit in the pews. The expectations will be higher from the younger generations because of the Gen Xers’ cynical and critical eye and the Millennials’ belief in their power to create a better world. The margin for error will be smaller, as the younger generations are accustomed to sharper, faster, clearer models of leadership that see the future well before it arrives.

Reaction won’t work with them. They’ll demand proactive measures.

So my church finds itself (to borrow a cliche) on the threshold; not yet in that world, but beyond the one we’ve been comfortable with. What will we do? How will we change? Can we survive?

Those are questions we need to be asking. Those are answers we need to be seeking – both in prayer and in research.

I believe we’ll find our way.

The Myth of Independence

Lady Liberty may stand by herself, but she doesn't stand alone. None of us do.

No, that’s not just a “pee in someone’s Cheerios” blog title, cynically posted to stir up traffic on the most sacred of our secular American holidays. It’s a legitimate thought that I can and will back up in my post.

But – it certainly got your attention didn’t it?

Such is the power of the greatest of the American myths – the myth of independence. We have spent 235 years building this myth into an unquestioned ideal that the entire world not only knows but actively believes. Immigrants still flock to our shores in large part because they believe with all sincerity that in America, a person is free to live as they please. To live life on one’s own terms. To make something of oneself with hard work, grit and a little luck.

It’s a nice myth. Certainly better than what some other nations are putting out there (“Come to Afghanistan, where if you’re lucky, you won’t be killed by a deranged suicide bomber!”). It’s got a fair amount of truth to it, and there’s more than enough anecdotal evidence in the volumes of American history to provide support. Our past is littered with men and women and children who, because of the freedom and independence guaranteed by our nation, raised themselves up from unfortunate circumstances by determination and sheer force of will. These stories are placed before us as glorious reminders of the need for individual ethic and drive, the proof in the American pudding.

My family has many of these stories. My uncle, who opened his own tire and battery shop and has thrived as an independent businessman for over thirty years. My father, who turned an entry-level computer programming job into a 30 year career as an executive at a Fortune 500 bank. My father-in-law, who took his B.S. in chemistry to two different companies and cranked out over 42 U.S. patents.

But let’s not be sexist. I know a young woman who turned her passion for helping women and children in need into an international humanitarian agency that transforms thousands of lives annually. I know another young woman who turned her passion for singing into a career on Broadway and stages across the nation. And I know of other, quieter female heroes who realized that the role of mother was the best way to shape the future of the free world.

Each of these people were individuals who took their freedoms and independence as valuable gifts and made best use of them. Each of these people can be hailed as examples of the myth of independence.

And yet none of them truly are.

For all of their success, these people are not independent. Not a single one of them made their lives better on their own. Regardless of how hard they worked and how much of their own spirit they put into their efforts, each one was utterly dependent upon others to achieve all they did.

Because that’s the nature of humanity. We rely on one another. We’re not really independent creatures, free to do whatever we wish. Everything we do resonates within a larger context, a larger community. Whether its family, or neighbors, or friends, each one of us is who we are because of the people around us.

And this is not a bad thing. Dependence upon others is not a weakness, it’s not a blight on the soul. It’s a hallmark of maturity and wisdom. My son and I visited my grandfather today, and when we arrived my father was sitting, ever faithful by my grandfather’s side while my grandmother shelled beans she had just picked from her garden. There was nothing bombastic about the scene – I’ve probably seen something similar a thousand times before – but given my grandfather’s health, the interconnectedness of the moment made me realize just how much we are indebted to other people. And how much we should cherish that indebtedness.

I hope that my son grows up to be whomever he wishes to be (as long as it’s not a career in reality TV). I hope that my daughter goes on to be an icon of femininity in all of its fullness. Both will be free to be themselves as long as I’m their father. Yet both will owe profound debts to their mother, their grandparents, their cousins, their Sunday school teachers, their pastors, their public school teachers and countless other people for helping to shape and mold and drive them towards whatever they might become. Such is the nature of life, especially this American life.

Heck, even if my children decide at an early age to run away from civilization and live on the backside of some God-forsaken mountain in the New Mexico desert, they will still never escape their dependence upon other people. Because even if you go Tim McVeigh and live in a van down by the river, the freedom you have to be “independent” comes courtesy of some Marine or Sailor 0r Grunt or Airman or Coastie who took up arms to keep you free.

In a way, I suppose today is the ultimate irony: a nation of people stand together and celebrate their collective independence en masse. We’re all in this together. Thank a soldier, thank a cop, or just walk across the room and hug that person sitting on the couch, because it takes all of us to make this nation what it is. And maybe in doing so, we’ll reflect and think about one of the most powerful truths of our great nation:

The myth of independence belies the truth of community.

Or as some of our forebears so wisely put it: E pluribus unum.

God bless America, and God bless you my friend. Thank you for what you’ve contributed to my life.