in honor of TheRussian
Recently at shawncuthill.com something interesting has happened there. It has been the open showing of anti-intellectualism and dumbing down of youth and growing Christians. To that end I made a reply and this is the reply:
I wanted to say something to you Sarah and maybe to everyone at large.Although the themes are directed at a message board, I think they are apropos for things I would say to the church community at large.
I was reading what you were saying Sarah and I think you hit on something. One of my fears with the Brethren is this fear of intellect. I actually fear it with all churches really. we think words have to be simple any more. which has turned into this sub-culture language we know use called Christianese. which at the end of the day does not help anyone. I have found most Christians don't know what they mean by alot of it. I'm at another website and this was discussed. I found it interesting how some really struggled to be able to define what some words meant.
Anyway, so with this we have dumbed our youth down, our young people down, and ourseleves down. we have decided that if someone uses big words we don't understand the person is being a know-it-all and should use words and people we know. we have also made ourselves weak so weak in fact that we cannot allow ourselves to ask questions. so we sit in the corners and complain about the intellects and how they are know it alls. I find this worse in teaching youth. we tell them things in baby form and when they get older they can't accept any other language. they aren't taught to ask questions.
which leads me to here and some comments as of late. Sarah, you made a very good point. Blake uses people we may not know and words we may not know for clarity, but also to be very upfront. also, he uses them to refute heresy and with that you must be as clear as possible. what I have found here is the worst anti-intellectualism possible, but also pandering to people and not allowing them to grow. as responsible adults and responsible leaders we need to mentor the younger or weaker in asking questions, researching themselves! I found our youth at GBC grew by leaps and bounds with a balance of Blake breaking down a scripture not dumbing down words, allowing them to ask questions, the next week me coming in and exhorting. I think because of that we gave those kids a stronger foundation to walk on, but we also let it be their walk, their foundation. I learned through the death of one of my youth back home this lesson and I promised myself I would not do that again. this needs to happen here! it needs to be encouraged! we need to stop telling our youth, telling people who don't know large words or aren't as smart as someone to stuff their ears with cotton until someone dumbs their words down. this is not acceptable and the world will not have it either! there are some very smart "lost" people out there and we need to be ready for an intelligent and up front answer or we will fall with them. the more we try to dumb down people like Blake, the more we try to hush them, the more we hurt our kids, our young adults, people growing in the Lord, and we hurt people like Sarah who are looking for more than a catch phrase sugar coated with Christian ghetto speak. we must accept these people in our communties because they are needed. we must teach ourselves how to communicate to one another as well knowing our skills, our gifts, ect. again, let us not dumb ourselves down any longer. let us strive to know God in His fullest. let us strive and push ourselves to learn. let us ask questions and not be scared or intimidated by someone who uses things we don't understand. trust me, Blake nor anyone like him would mind explaining himself, they would rather do that, than to be told to put "the cookies on the bottom shelf". how frightening, how sad! may my children (if I have any) or anyone I work with ever ask to be catered to, may they be passionette about understanding and wanting to reach up and instead of being handed down to. may my teaching help them to do that as they grow, but I pray whatever communtiy I'm in that they also do this. may this place learn to do this, because right now it has handicapped its community more by gagging one of their most helpful tools here.
Sarah, I praise God for example here. it encouraged me so much. also, thank you for the kind e-mail. I feel for me it is best to just lurk, because I don't understand some actions that have happened here, such as with Blake and Drew. Sarah you are always welcomed in our home. you are also welcome to come to my blog if you want to hear some non-canned, pre-fab made brethren stuff.
Blessings on all of you! may God grant us peace and knowledge in Him more and more!
Jules
Thoughts?
