Oh, to be my father's daughter

I’ve been pondering more regarding my Yearly Meeting workshop: I know - what a shock. :) Most presenters probably aren’t putting this much thought into their hour or two hour slots, but this topic is something that’s been nagging at my heart as well as something to look forward to in the current driven- by-daily-routine-rather-than-extraordinary-activities state of my life.

It’s been such a blessing to be in contact with folks who care as well, who’ve had experience presenting and sharing the passions of their heart, who are actually interested. I recently had a conversation with my husband regarding the fact that I don’t want to be my dad. Now, that’s not completely true: he’s a man who seeks after God’s will with such vigor and driven-ness that others tend to put up shields of defensiveness or apathy. Each year at our Yearly Meeting sessions he would give his Sunday night superintendent’s address, and each year he had a message that would ‘rock the boat! Cause big waves! This could be the year I get the axe!’ And each year people got crabby, but the majority just shrugged their shoulders and went “Enh.” If they truly heard and understood the radical nature of the message, they would’ve been blown away. But generally they didn’t grasp the message or they chose to dumb it down: conscientious apathy is a wretched thing to overcome.

So I was pondering what direction to take my class: the ‘nice’ route, or the ‘Dad’ route. The nice route is scratching the surface: see if folks have young adults attending their churches, if they know where their young adults have gone, if they can think of ways to connect with them one-on-one - build relationships - be missional and incarnational - what that might look like.

The ‘Dad’ route is digging to the core: see if folks have functional churches, if young adults aren’t the only population leaving, if they spend most of their time on administrative duties rather than evangelizing and discipling, if their worship gatherings are a time of celebration or the only time they’re being fed during the week, if their board and committee structures get anything done or sap time and energy from folks, if the structure of the church and yearly meeting is functional or an eroding model from a previous generation/culture/time frame that no longer applies, *if we worship they way we do church and business more than we worship God*. Offspring tends to leave unhealthy areas: should we get to the absolute core of the problem? I mean, if we’re going to talk about stuff, let’s not tip-toe around and use band-aids: let’s dig out the infection and get this healed up properly!

The response could be one of three things: received with the love, grace, and concern that it was intended, prompting folks to seek if God’s saying the same thing to them; received as a personal attack, thereby causing shields to go up; processed as a ‘nice message, but not realistic’ - deadly apathy!

My husband, so wise for his years, lives out the principles I so greatly appreciated from Nouwen’s “Teaching” chapter of Creative Ministry. He offered up the idea of class involvement: put the question out to them. As opposed to the ‘teacher’ knowing everything (unilateral teaching), the teacher recognizes that the students have as much to offer as the teacher does (bilateral teaching). That’s been my paralyzing fear: I don’t have all the answers. And what if the way I express my thoughts and hypotheses cause folks to shut down rather than further explore? Jason voiced the opinion that folks don’t often like to be told what’s wrong, but they often have an idea of what’s not working and enjoy pointing it out themselves. Plus, it creates involvement by giving to the conversation rather than simply receiving, as well as discussion makes it more applicable and personally relevant to their situation. Such a brilliant and helpful husband of mine.

So my perception of the workshop has changed. Perhaps it shouldn’t be so information-oriented as much as a forum for folks to discuss the current state of their young adult attendance. I don’t have to have ‘the answers’ as much as create the space and provide some tools for folks to explore themselves. Interesting ... .