Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Sed sed est
nunc. Duis ultricies pellentesque lorem, et mattis sem scelerisque
adipiscing. In non commodo augue. Vestibulum ante ipsum primis in
faucibus orci luctus et ultrices posuere cubilia Curae; Fusce sit amet
elit pellentesque eros sagittis sagittis. Pellentesque dignissim tortor a
lorem posuere adipiscing. Ut id massa at felis faucibus varius et id
justo.
Well, sure, that made a lot of sense. It's Lorem Ipsum, the language type-setters and printers use to demonstrate layouts. You can read about it, and access the Lorem Ipsum Generator here. That's what I did in order to create the above paragraph of useless text above. Evidently, people selecting layout designs for printed data can concentrate on the design more when the text is indistinct. OK, so there's your useless information for the day.
Stick with me. The other day I ran into a guy at Starbucks who had visited our church recently. His name was Ray, he was under thirty, enjoyed one of those frappe coffee brews, and wasn't a regular church attender. He recognized me as the guy up there on the stage and said he liked my talk. He loved the music and wasn't bashful when he told me he didn't understand what I talked about. He was like the professor who graded a theology dissertation. He wrote on the bottom of the paper, "I understood every word, but not a single sentence." Ray said my talk was like that. It made me think of Lorem Ipsum. To Ray, my sermon was like interpreting Lorem Ipsum. Ouch!!
There's an assumption that everyone is going to comprehend our church or spiritual talk. Yes, I fully understand the work of the Holy Spirit, the way the Word reaches across cultures, how truth communicates in spite of our human frailties, and the efficacy of Scripture. But, I also read "Write down this vision; clearly inscribe it on tablets" (Habakkuk 2:2), or, again, when the Apostle Paul wrote, "I speak as to my children..." (2 Cor. 6:13), or when he wrote, "...yet in the church I would rather speak five words with my understanding, in order to teach others also, than 10,000 words in another language" (1 Cor. 14:19). Evidently the New Testament preachers valued speaking with clarity and using language that people could understand. Paul explained things, reasoned with them from Scripture, and spoke to people from various backgrounds. He became all things to all people so that some could be saved (1 Cor.9:22).
So, Ray reminded me that I must serve God in my own generation and learn to speak the eternal unchanging truths of His word in ways that communicate to this culture. And, that is a challenge for most of us. Shoot, the world talks different today. I kid a lot about syncing iOS 63 (my age till Sunday), with iOS 7, and all the dialects of the digital world. Text language baffles me, some of the new hand signals make me mad till I decipher them, and tagging requires a Rosetta Stone tool for interpretation. It's a constant learning curve.
But, interpreting the stats about the Millennial generations isn't quantum physics. They don't require extrapolation or math games. If that cohort is going to hear the message of Christ, us old guys, creatures of habit to be sure, set in our ways, with the church stuff down pat, must unlearn some old things, and learn some new ones. How nice it would be to meet Ray at Starbucks and hear him evidence at least some understanding of what it was about that day.
Fusce sit amet
elit pellentesque eros sagittis sagittis. Amen.
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