Faith Revolution

Linda and I were at a conference this past week.  It was the annual business meeting of the district in which I serve as a pastor so there were a few hundred people there.  I love going to events like these.  I like the food, the speakers and the worship.  I also enjoy seeing people I know whom with I rarely get to visit.  I also enjoy meeting the new people coming into the district to work.  It was a good time.  However, and it might be just me, but I alway sense an unseen and unrealized tension anytime there is a gathering of this size. 

For the most part, everyone blends together and everyone seems to be enjoying themselves.  But within the whole, there seems to be two distinct groups.  They seem to be on the fringe.  Like a bell curve, the vast majority all look alike.  They are the business casual.  Then on either side of the curve are the suits and the jeans.  The suits seem to gasp in some degree of distress at the jeans because, well, they look different (perceived by the suits as a lack of respect for standards) and they act and think differently (perceived by the suits as disrespectful of tradition and the work of their predecessors).  The suits like to speak in negative tones about the jeans when they ignore them as they walk by and speak negatively to them when they can’t just walk by. 

This is a personal plea.

I implore the suits (the older generation) to look beyond the hair, the clothes, the mannerisms and the methods of the jeans (the younger generation) and see their passion for Jesus and people.  If you will take the time to talk to them you will find that it is the same passion for Jesus and people that you have.

Or at least once had.