Sunday, March 28, 2010
Not really studying any thing right now
Since finishing the last book have not found anything that I really want to work on. Instead have been reading merely for pleasure. Just finished three in fact. They were really enjoyable. I have several more to read. I started Francine Rivers A Lineage of Grace but then got sidetracked. Instead I have also been writing more than usual. I have taken several free on-line writing courses. They have prompted me to do some rewrites and additions to the five stories I am currently writing. Also prompted me to do some more serious preparation of the stories.
Saturday, March 6, 2010
Ch. Five: The Principle of Storytelling
This week's chapter fell perfectly in line with what Leonard Sweet spoke of during much of the recent Prayer and Missions Conference which is a part of the Global Impact Celebration at the local Methodist Church that I attend. Both Mr Sweet and this week's chapter extols the pinciple of using stories to witness to others about God's love. Mrs. Kent shares personal stories throughout this book and in doing so helps us remember much longer the message/point she is making about how we can become women of influence. It is not in flat impersonal preaching/lecturing that we draw other women to us but in our personal stories with which they can identify. She stated "Stories can teach complex theological truths in ways that do not intimidate or threaten."
She also uses the words of Max McLean, founder of the Fellowshiip for the Performing Arts when he stated that "a story is not a story until it has been received." His point was that in today's modern era we expect information to do something. It has to have color, it can't just be presenting flat facts, or truths. It needs to touch in some way, we need to have some sort of connection with what is being said in order to be touched by it. I know that is true for me personally. It is when a story most touches me that it become etched into my heart and my mind. McLean also stated "If a story does not touch you,doesn't get a rise out of you, it's not going to get a rise out of anyone else."
Another quote that Mrs. Kent shared is from George Barna who stated that "today's young people are 'mosaic thinkers', able to put information together in new patterns, often arriving at unusual, novel, or surprising conclusion." According to Barna the generations that preceeded the "Gen-Yers" were linear thinkers, what Mr Sweet called "Guttenbergers". Both men feel that it is through sharing personal stories that a theology or philosophy will be received instead of rejected.
Mrs. Kent remind us that Jesus was himself a master storyteller. Remember that Jesus lived in a time when only very learned men such as the church leaders knew how to read and write. Also that they often wrote in a foreign language that the common everyday people did not speak or understand. Therefore, in order to reach his audience Jesus had to tell stories. His stories also needed to be about things that the common everyday person would know about. Mrs. Kent goes on to state that if we want to make a lasting impact on others, if we want to teach them, or share the gossip with them, we need to find "points of identification" that will help them understand what we are trying to tell them. We have to be able to, like Jesus, help others "visualize our message."
Jesus also knew that stories help to make people more receptive to spiritual truth. Mrs. Kent shares a story about how she and her husband worked to reach out to another couple new in the neighborhood but it was in a simple incident of relaying a story that contact was finally made in a meaningful way. It was through the telling of a simple story that they learned of the family's need and was able to then minister to them as friends during a difficult time in the couple's life. It was through this process, begun with a simple story, that they were able to draw the couple, first to their church and then to the Lord.
Mrs. Kent also makes a point of reminding us that Jesus told his stories in everyday, informal settings. Here is a direct quote from George Barna that she shares in the book that we need to remember when speaking to others:
"{The mosaic thinkers} diet of mass media, combined with the uncritical embrace of computer technologies and the ntional shift in morals and values, has resulted in an entirely new filter through which Americans recive and interpret infomration. . . The emergence of the new filter mandates a new style of semon or lesson development and deliver. . . .Presenters who address the audience without constant reference to notes, and those who do not 'hide' behind a pulpit, also seem to generate a more positive response from their listeners."
We need to rememer that the modern "Gen-Yers" do not respond to an impersonal, stiff, rehearsed speech but rather they are more apt to listen when we share biblical truths through our own personal, informal stories of how Christ has changed our lives.
The author also reminds us that Jesus almost always made the application clear when he told a story. He might not reveal the greater truth to his entire audience but he always made the message and application clear to his disciples, his closer circle of followers.
Her final point was stated using a quote from Lael Arrington who is the author of Worldproofing Your Kids, who stated that "in the Middle Ages and Modern Age stories had a begining, an end, a plot, and characters in which people visualized themselves playing a part in a larger story. However, the postmodern person has no sense of being part of a grander story." Then Mrs. Kent stated that "As Christians, we know there is a grand story and Jesus continues to be the example of the greatest story every told." Therefore our ability to share with others how he changed our personal lives and how he continues to change them, has the power to change others lives.
It is through stories that we can reach, teach, and minister to those "Gen-Yers", those born since 1973, using Jesus' example of being a storyteller.
She also uses the words of Max McLean, founder of the Fellowshiip for the Performing Arts when he stated that "a story is not a story until it has been received." His point was that in today's modern era we expect information to do something. It has to have color, it can't just be presenting flat facts, or truths. It needs to touch in some way, we need to have some sort of connection with what is being said in order to be touched by it. I know that is true for me personally. It is when a story most touches me that it become etched into my heart and my mind. McLean also stated "If a story does not touch you,doesn't get a rise out of you, it's not going to get a rise out of anyone else."
Another quote that Mrs. Kent shared is from George Barna who stated that "today's young people are 'mosaic thinkers', able to put information together in new patterns, often arriving at unusual, novel, or surprising conclusion." According to Barna the generations that preceeded the "Gen-Yers" were linear thinkers, what Mr Sweet called "Guttenbergers". Both men feel that it is through sharing personal stories that a theology or philosophy will be received instead of rejected.
Mrs. Kent remind us that Jesus was himself a master storyteller. Remember that Jesus lived in a time when only very learned men such as the church leaders knew how to read and write. Also that they often wrote in a foreign language that the common everyday people did not speak or understand. Therefore, in order to reach his audience Jesus had to tell stories. His stories also needed to be about things that the common everyday person would know about. Mrs. Kent goes on to state that if we want to make a lasting impact on others, if we want to teach them, or share the gossip with them, we need to find "points of identification" that will help them understand what we are trying to tell them. We have to be able to, like Jesus, help others "visualize our message."
Jesus also knew that stories help to make people more receptive to spiritual truth. Mrs. Kent shares a story about how she and her husband worked to reach out to another couple new in the neighborhood but it was in a simple incident of relaying a story that contact was finally made in a meaningful way. It was through the telling of a simple story that they learned of the family's need and was able to then minister to them as friends during a difficult time in the couple's life. It was through this process, begun with a simple story, that they were able to draw the couple, first to their church and then to the Lord.
Mrs. Kent also makes a point of reminding us that Jesus told his stories in everyday, informal settings. Here is a direct quote from George Barna that she shares in the book that we need to remember when speaking to others:
"{The mosaic thinkers} diet of mass media, combined with the uncritical embrace of computer technologies and the ntional shift in morals and values, has resulted in an entirely new filter through which Americans recive and interpret infomration. . . The emergence of the new filter mandates a new style of semon or lesson development and deliver. . . .Presenters who address the audience without constant reference to notes, and those who do not 'hide' behind a pulpit, also seem to generate a more positive response from their listeners."
We need to rememer that the modern "Gen-Yers" do not respond to an impersonal, stiff, rehearsed speech but rather they are more apt to listen when we share biblical truths through our own personal, informal stories of how Christ has changed our lives.
The author also reminds us that Jesus almost always made the application clear when he told a story. He might not reveal the greater truth to his entire audience but he always made the message and application clear to his disciples, his closer circle of followers.
Her final point was stated using a quote from Lael Arrington who is the author of Worldproofing Your Kids, who stated that "in the Middle Ages and Modern Age stories had a begining, an end, a plot, and characters in which people visualized themselves playing a part in a larger story. However, the postmodern person has no sense of being part of a grander story." Then Mrs. Kent stated that "As Christians, we know there is a grand story and Jesus continues to be the example of the greatest story every told." Therefore our ability to share with others how he changed our personal lives and how he continues to change them, has the power to change others lives.
It is through stories that we can reach, teach, and minister to those "Gen-Yers", those born since 1973, using Jesus' example of being a storyteller.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Still floating on a spiritual high
Today is day two post-GIC and I am still feeling spiritually supercharged. I am also still mentally processing all of the information from the workshops and the talks by Neil Anderson, Marilee Pierce Dunker, and Lenoard Sweet. My new prayer has become: "Anxious in nothing. Prayerful in everything. Thankful in anything. Equals peace." I am also processing the fact that this is no longer a Guttenberg world of words and poems but a TGIF world of images and stories. TGIF meaning Twitter, Google, I-Phone, and Facebook. I was reminded of this again this afternoon in talking with a collegue about trying to communicate something to her clients. She's talking in words instead of images and stories. Hopefully she will be able to turn it around. We also talked how even in their texting adolescents and young adults don't even speak in words any more but in a new language made up of just different letters, not really acronyms but something similiar like OMG, LOL, R, U, B4, and many many more. It is a language that many of us middle-aged and older adults don't even know what the terminology means. Then there are words like tweet, retweet, peeps, twebes, etc. I am asking myself can we learn the language fast enough to even make a difference?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
