I'M OLD BUT I STILL HAVE SOME PAGES TO BE TURNED

Having spent many more than my 10,000 hours in institutional religion and outside the church trying to fix the church, I feel like I have some ideas of reason and wisdom from which to share on the subject.  Having spent many more than my 10,000 hours of my life on another path other than the one God designed for me to walk on, I feel like I have some ideas of reason and wisdom from which to share on the subject.  Having spent many more than my 10,000 hours in silence and contemplation before God in His Presence, I feel like I have some ideas of reason and wisdom to share on the subject.

Add to that over 40 years of reading, study, and instruction in the Bible, leadership training and certification in Christian growth and direction, a few years in ministry, and even a few years in seminary, 25 years of Camp work, 10 of those in an administrative position, and most important almost 70 years of life experience, I feel like I have a few or more things to say on self growth and working with people that may be helpful to those who care to listen.

I know that I am not the only person of age that can make those claims.  I didn’t do those accomplishments all by myself in my room.  There is a wealth of wisdom that is untapped these days.  Some are sitting in the pews of churches, some are sitting in nursing homes or retirement centers, and some are sitting on the benches in town, waiting for a bus.  They are everywhere, containing all that reason and wisdom, but continue to be invisible and unheard.  Peter, Paul, and Mary sang a song that had a verse that is significant to this time in space.  “Just when you have the wisdom of the ages, there is no one who wants to turn your pages.”  I find that a mighty truth statement.

I live in a very fast paced and hi tech world today that has left many of us oldsters left behind in the dust.   I can’t keep up with the daily changes that occur, just as I had finally learned to work what I needed to learn to be able to use the “toy” given to me to make my life easier.  I truly try to keep up with all the “new and better’ stuff, from gadgets to ideas, but I find it difficult and frustrating, so I succumb to sitting and silence.  I go to workshops or lectures on redoing church, just to be told that everything I did failed or sucked.  Seems to have worked well for me and many others for many years, but now it’s old and irrelevant to life so it needs to be refused and rethought.  I am all for change but to be told the old way never worked is too much. 

I am not for “clear cutting” and starting all over again.  I have lived through several of these “new ways” and found them to become the old ways, but with new leadership.  It wasn’t so much that the old ways of the church were deficient; the church changers simply wanted to be Pope and run things their way.  That wasn’t true of all but it was true enough for many that I grew leery and weary and simply left them to themselves.  Unfortunately I saw enough of them fail and reap what they sowed.  That didn’t make me feel good or right, but it continues to make me leery.

I think there is a time for your people to step into leadership, but I think they would do better to step into it knowing that others have plowed the road ahead of them and are still there to aid and assist them in their endeavors.  I think they would do better to know that foundations are to be built upon and not destroyed and disregarded.  I think they would do better to see us oldsters as complements to their ideas and not complainers because things are changing.  Change is good and necessary but it can come by building on the old ways not just saying they don’t work and doing away with them.  I taught some pretty staunch church people to clap their hands and sing some upbeat songs, not by telling them their passive singing was wrong, but by simply doing it with a group of kids in front of them, all smiling and happy to be in church with them.  The joy was infectious and the clapping came all on its own.  Everyone was a winner in the change and that is the way I think it should work.

My hope is that older people would bring out their books more and younger people would be encouraged to turn those pages of experience and exchange it for some of their enthusiasm.  Then everyone is a winner and feels needed, and appreciated.