Tag Archives: attitudes toward past generations

When God spoke to Samuel

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In the bilingual group at the University Church of Christ in Abilene, we’ve started using the Narrative Lectionary to guide our preaching. This lectionary provides a text for each week, which helps those preaching guide their thoughts. This week’s text was 1 Samuel 3, when God calls to young Samuel during the night. I was preaching this Sunday, and some unusual thoughts jumped out at me as I worked with the text.

  • Eli’s physical blindness mirrored his spiritual blindness. As high priest, he led a religious system that allowed corruption and abuse to have a full-time seat at the table. Because of this, he had lost the ability to receive messages from God.
  • Eli had failed largely because he loved his sons more than he loved God. He failed to correct them. He failed to protect the people that they abused.
  • As often happens, a younger person could hear what the older person had lost the ability to hear.
  • As often happens, the younger person needed the guidance of someone with more experience in the faith in order to be able to make sense of God’s words.
  • And as often happens, the message the younger person received wasn’t a new message; the same prophecy had been proclaimed in chapter 2 in even more detail. What was significant was that God was showing how the prophetic voice was passing from one generation to another.

Those were some thoughts that struck me, though I confess that some could be because of where I find myself in my life’s journey. What thoughts strike you when reading 1 Samuel 3?

Ignoring the wisdom of generations past

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elderlyWho wants to listen to the old-timers? When is the next generation going to get a chance to take the lead? Who cares about what people said and did 10, 20, or 30 years ago?

Some of these thoughts are stirred by the slight toward my friend Juan Antonio Monroy. This year is a special anniversary, marking a half century since a story that many of us in churches of Christ grew up with: how this man from Spain found the churches of Christ at the New York World’s Fair and learned that they shared the same doctrine. As Juan comes to the States to commemorate that event, there is one congregation that won’t be taking part: the church that supported Juan in ministry for three decades. There was no room on their schedule for someone who is part of their history, but apparently not of their present nor future.

I remember when I was working on my master’s degree in communication. At that time, I could choose to write a thesis or to do a non-thesis degree. I was considering doing a thesis, preferably something related to the two years I had just spent in Argentina.

That’s when two elders from the University Church of Christ asked to meet with me. These two men had been leading the missions committee at UCC, had made numerous trips to Argentina, and were excited at the thought that someone would do research that would be useful to the missionaries. They asked if I would be interested in doing a study in conjunction with the missionaries supported by UCC.

I was thrilled. It was what I had been hoping to do. I had even broached the subject with the missionaries, and they had expressed interest in the study and a willingness to help shape the research.

Then they mentioned, “But we’ve just restructured things at University, and the elders are no longer on the committees. You’ll need to get approval from the missions committee.”

So I went through channels and submitted a request to the missions committee. A few weeks later, the deacon in charge pulled me aside and said, “We’re not going to help you with this study. I don’t know anything that I need to know to do my job. And no one who has been involved with the Argentina thinks it’s a good idea.”

I was stunned. And saddened. And fully aware of how ridiculous this man’s words were, especially the last sentence. Two of the men who had been most involved in the Argentina work had approached me about doing this study. It was obviously that this deacon hadn’t spoken with them or hadn’t given their input any credence.

Sadly, though, I see the same in me. I give little respect to those who have gone before. Like your current plumber criticizing your previous plumber, I can only see the defects in what previous generations did; I can’t appreciate anything positive that they contributed.

History has value. Experience brings wisdom. We don’t have to be tied to the past, but we do well to be informed by it.

Standing on shoulders

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OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAIt’s very easy to look at those who have gone before us and feel that everything they did was wrong. Or at least to talk as if we felt that way. As we grow and make our own discoveries, we sometimes look back with a bit of disdain.

And that’s wrong.

I was thinking about the metaphor of standing on the shoulders of those that came before, considering how useful that metaphor is. The fact is, had previous generations not done what they did, we’d have a hard time being where we are right now. We’d have a hard time questioning them had they not prepared us to do that very thing. We are what we are because we stand on the shoulders of those that went before.

So let me offer some thoughts based on that metaphor:

  • There are two mistakes we often make when looking at previous generations. One is to try and tear down everything they did, looking to start over from ground zero. The other is to place them on a pedestal, regarding their work and their ideas as completely untouchable. That also leaves us standing on the ground. The healthy response is to climb up and stand on their shoulders, respecting what they’ve done, but not limiting ourselves to that.
  • As we look at future generations, we need to prepare ourselves to be stood on. We need to stand as tall as we can, yet keep a strong base. We need to accept that being stood on is uncomfortable; it’s much nicer to have someone stand back and gaze at us lovingly. It’s more productive to allow others to reach higher than we ever could.
  • To the next generation, I say, “Stand on me.” Don’t be limited by my mistakes. Don’t overlook my contributions. Use what I’ve done to reach higher. I don’t want to be a memorial, nor do I want to be a pile of rubble. I want to be a ladder, allowing future generations to be better than my own.
photo from www.morguefile.com