Solving Problems

Back in 1978, I was assigned to a small parish in Memphis. Like all United Methodists, I arrived in the summer. Toward the end of the summer I was asked if we were going to resume Sunday evening worship services when fall arrived. Since it was the first I'd heard about it, I needed more info.

I learned that the service was about two years old and typically broke for the summer months. Attendance was maybe 20 people as compared to perhaps 150 on Sunday morning. Plus, these 20 would almost always have been present at the morning service. My initial reaction wasn't very positive since it seemed to me it was a lot of expense for little return--to put it in business terms. After all, it meant paying utilities to open the building again, paying the organist for a second service, and the extra time for me to prepare a second service with sermon. I kept that thought to myself and instead asked this question: What need are we trying to meet by adding a second service?

One of the things I experienced over and over in couple counseling and in business consulting is an interesting phenomenon. People often "prescribe" before they "diagnose," that is, without fully understanding the nature of a given problem, people launch into a solution. One school of therapy even posits that when couples do that, the problem they come to see the therapist about is the solution they had imposed on themselves. The therapist is advised to "get them to stop doing that" in the hope they will stumble upon a more effective solution.

An example in couple therapy which I encountered frequently was lots of arguments between spouses, often very heated. I might ask a husband or wife, "what do you hope to accomplish by yelling at your spouse?" The answer isn't as straightforward as you might expect. It typically took some probing and in almost every case, the goal was to "get my spouse to love me." Needless to say, the solution of yelling wasn't accomplishing that.

With that in mind, I asked my parishioners this question: "what are the reasons behind adding a second worship service?" When all was said and done, this was the answer: "some of us don't thing we're getting enough out of the morning service." I asked, "Will doing more of the same solve the problem? After all, attendance is pretty low at the second service."

I suggested there might be two alternatives open to us. One would be to reexamine the morning service and see if there were some way to have it meet the still unspecified need. Another would be to offer a series of small classes on Sunday night all about Christian living. We opted for the second solution.

For our first series we had three small groups; one led by me and two led by visiting leaders. Our average attendance over the six weeks of the experiment was 70. I'd say we had found a solution to whatever was missing on Sunday morning.

The question: "What problem am I trying to solve?" is a very important one. And typically it requires some "onion peeling," that is, some investigation that probes the easy answers. My experience tells me it almost always pays off. I've been thinking about this when I see institutions at work. Quick answers, such as, "more cops on the streets," or "a second worship service," probably aren't going to make any real difference. But quick answers are tantalizing because they give us quick relief. But quick relief rarely solves underlying problems or addresses underlying needs.

Peace,

Jerry+

Puritanism--Again

CANTON, N.C. (October 13, 2009)—The Amazing Grace Baptist Church in Canton, N.C. will celebrate Halloween by burning Bibles that aren’t the King James Version, as well as music and books and anything else Pastor Marc Grizzard says is a satanic influence.

Among the authors whose books Grizzard plans to burn are well known ministers Rick Warren and Billy Graham because he says they have occasionally used Bibles other than the King James Version, which is the sole biblical source he considers infallible.

According to the church’s Web site, members will also burn “Satan's music such as country, rap, rock, pop, heavy metal, western, soft and easy, southern gospel, contemporary Christian, jazz, soul (and) oldies.

This except came from the Salt Lake City newspaper which quoted the AP as its source along with the church's website. USA Today also reported that this church is, in fact, conducting the bonfire.

The Church's website is now shut down. When I tried to access it, I got a malware intrusion attempt, for what that is worth. However, this story showed up on other news sites too, so I think it's trustworthy.

Sad.

Peace,

Jerry+

William Tyndale

Yesterday was the feast day of William Tyndale, an Anglican priest, born in 1495. He's noteworthy for two reasons. First, soon after become a priest in 1521, he became obsessed with the notion of translating the Bible into English. This was not a popular idea. Christians were not allowed to read the Bible in any language other than Latin. Which, of course, meant most didn't read it at all. The typical parish church didn't possess a Bible in any language, and in those that did, any reading of it publicly was in Latin.

Tyndale strongly believed everyone had the right to read it and in an argument with another priest who opposed him, he said, "If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plow to know more of the Scriptures than thou dost." Earlier Wycliff had produced a handwritten translation based on the Latin Vulgate, but Tyndale worked from the much superior Greek and Hebrew manuscripts to produced his. His New Testament was printed in Germany where he was in exile, and was smuggled into England where it was received with great enthusiasm.

Tyndale's translation introduced new words and phrases into the English language which were subsequently used in the King James Version and continue to be used today. Examples include, Jehovah, Passover, scapegoat, and phrases such as "let there be light," "The powers that be," "My brother's keeper," "the salt of the earth," "The spirit is willing," and "Fight the good fight."

Tyndale was also a vocal critic of the Catholic Church. While he was distressed over many of the typical abuses of his time, he also taught, wrote about, and preached about a new concept: salvation as a gift of God. Much as Luther was also teaching, Tyndale asserted that no good works on a human's part would gain a person salvation. Salvation came by grace. It was this teaching that eventually resulted in his death.

While living in Belgium and working on his Old Testament translation, he was betrayed to the authorities by a person he had befriended. He was arrested, tried for heresy, and sentenced to die by fire. At his execution, in an act of mercy the executioner strangled him prior to lighting the fire. But Tyndale revived long enough to say, "May God change the King's heart."

Two years later, Henry VIII did have a change of heart. Mile Coverdale took Tyndale's work and did some revisions. The resulting Bible was published under someone else's name and it was ordered by the King that every parish church have a copy. On the first day a copy was available in England, people took turns reading it aloud all day long to hungry souls. As a result of Tyndale's dedication and persistence, our religious lives have forever been enriched.

Peace,

Jerry+