LMS Solo & Ensemble Festival 1/26
It was a very good experience learning about how these festivals are organized and done. Every student in band, grades 6-8 were required to participate (about 275 students), though many of them did not wish to and some did not show up. In general, I was impressed with how well it was organized and with the level of preparation that some students exhibited. There was an extremely high level of director control over the festival which caused a lot of stress on our part. It was decided that each student pay $7 to participate, that we know which solo each person is playing, if they have conflicts that day, that we provide their copies and accompaniment parts, as well as organize accompaniment rehearsals (for those who didn't play with a CD), and payment. We also catered in the food for the high school volunteers and judges and set everything up. This was no easy task and there was constant difficulty trying to get students to cooperate - especially the ones who didn't want to play in the first place. In general, I thought there was too much director responsibility and not enough student ownership.
LHS Symphonic Band
This class is going better. I gave them a scale test two weeks ago on a Wednesday and Friday. I did this because I wanted to hear them play individually, assign parts and chairs, and to know their scales because that is a normal part of our daily routine. They were to prepare six major scales (Bb Eb Ab F C G) in all-region audition format and I picked two for them to play individually in front of Mr. H, the head high school director, and I. They were to pick a comfortable tempo that promoted accuracy. It went badly. These were scales that they apparently should have known since 8th grade, but many of them didn't. A couple of students cried during their test and it made both of us feel uneasy. We didn't grade too low, and only a couple of students received Cs. The following Monday, I led a discussion about the importance of performing solo, learning how to deal with performance anxiety, practice techniques, and the importance of scales. This discussion lasted 25 minutes and I think it made a difference. Students argued that they should never have to perform alone and that is why they signed up for band. I did my best to give them real life examples of why they would need these skills but some weren't convinced.
I think the biggest thing that I am learning from this class is that students will always take the path of least resistance. My job as a teacher is to be the resistance. I'm finding that difficult when I am alone in a room full of people who don't believe as I do, and I realize that it takes a great deal of confidence in what I believe is right to convince them to see it my way. After all, they do not know what I know and have little ground on which to argue with me. It feels different and slightly uncomfortable to insist on what I think is right without anyone telling me to do it. I must grow up and consistently be the adult in the room.
Otherwise, I feel good about the daily routine that I have in place: Breathing (in 4 out 4, in 2 out 6, in 1 out 8); Foundations for Band (Williams & King), F long tone #1a & 1b, warm-up set 1 (options 3, 4, 5); Bb major chord articulation exercise (H); major scales (Bb Eb Ab F C G) with different rhythms; and tuning - concert A and Bb. We then have announcements in the middle of rehearsal so they are paying attention and ready to listen. There is usually 25 minutes left over for repertoire after the daily routine. I am working on getting them a march to play and will introduce two other pieces in the next couple of weeks for teaching purposes.
My rehearsal technique is generally going in the right direction. I am learning how to isolate textures and make changes, but I don't isolate things enough to understand exactly what is going wrong. Sometimes, I forget to put the isolated part back in the context of the music so that I can clearly hear the change or improvement made. I am reluctant to go back when the band does not play consistently because I do not enjoy going back for people who make mental errors because their focus is bad. This is something that I absolutely need to do, though, because otherwise I am communicating that it is ok to make mental errors and not pay attention. It is not ok. If I don't insist on this, no one will.
Lastly, I could improve the way I speak to the ensemble. I too often give directions in the form of a question: "Trumpets, could you start at 8?" instead of "Trumpets, start at 8" or "Are you playing F#?" instead of "You played F-natural. It should be F#." I also need to work on questioning them more instead of telling them. This will help them to think critically about their playing instead of relying on me to fix their errors.
Beginning Trumpet Class
This is my best-behaved, most focused class. I gave them their first test two Thursdays ago on their C and Bb scales from page 40 & 41 of Essential Elements. I am not confident that some of them understand how to practice these, though I went over it many times during class. We started pass-offs which involve each student playing through 20 different tunes from Essential Elements that they must play nearly perfectly to get credit. If they pass all 20 by the end of the semester, they get to go to Sandy Lake to perform and play in the park on May 6th. We will spend most Fridays taking time to do this, since F.M. is doing that with her beginning classes.
My issues here are three-fold: (1) I do not isolate groups or individuals enough to tell if they are understanding and playing correctly, (2) I struggle to insist that they both focus and do it right the first time, and (3) I am not patient enough to go at a slow enough tempo where everyone can play it without error.
Beginning Clarinet Class
I have the same issues teaching this class as with the trumpet class. There are a couple of special cases which I am not sure how to deal with. One student in the class has some kind of spur or wrist problem and can not hold the clarinet. Another person has no working reeds and insists that her mother does not have money to buy one. She has a major attitude problem and is probably failing many of her classes. The school has provided her with at least four reeds and she has not paid for them, but F.M. will not give her any more. These two students are friends and become very disruptive. I am struggling to give them enough to do and they often become bored and disruptive. It seems that the other teachers don't know what to do with them either. They have a deal with the directors that if they mind their own business and be quiet, they don't get in trouble. They will get by with Cs.
Anyway, I am never sure what to do with students who do not bring their instruments or books to class. I usually instruct them to follow along, fingering and singing, and let them know that their participation grade is lower as a result.
Miscellaneous
I am starting to get over the culture shock of being a teacher and being in this environment. It is tempting to get settled into a routine and stop striving to learn and try new things. I need to get more in the habit of asking for feedback from my cooperating teachers, because they almost never offer it. They tend to be very busy and overwhelmed with their jobs and I let that get in the way of getting feedback. Most of the time, I can not tell if I am doing well or badly. I tend to record the audio of many of my teaching sessions and that has been one of the only ways knowing how to improve. This is the most frustrating part about student teaching at the moment. Thanks for reading.
Showing posts with label rant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rant. Show all posts
Monday, February 18, 2008
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Reflections 1/03 - 1/25
I am in a busy season of my life again. I'm student teaching and I barely have enough time to write my required weekly reflections on it to send to my supervising professor. I think I'll start posting them here so you have at least some idea of what's going on with me. I've changed or abbreviated some names to protect the innocent.
LHS Symphonic Band
LHS Symphonic Band
At Lake High School, the two bands meet four days per week: 3 days have 45 minute rehearsals and one day has an 1 1/2 hour rehearsal. The honor band (top group) meets 1st period and the symphonic band meets second period. I was placed in charge of this group on day 2 (Jan. 4), even though their semester would end in 2 weeks and some of the instrumentation would change. When I was placed in charge, I had no advance notice from W.H., the head director. I warmed them up and we sight read some chorales.
Since then, I have been responsible for going through the library and selecting repertoire for them, leading the rehearsals, doing the grading, organizing auditions, scale tests, and copying parts. The plan originally was for the honor band to compete at UIL and in Corpus Christi (spring band trip) and for the members of the 2nd band to simply come along, but the parents complained, so now the Symphonic Band will compete in Corpus Christi with me as their sole conductor. I feel really privilaged to get this opportunity as a student teacher.
There are a number of challenges with this group, though. First, the instrumentation is extremely unbalanced: there are 13 flutes, 12 saxophones, 1 clarinet, and 1 horn, 1 tuba and no bassoon players. Other sections have enough players, though most of these students are not on private lessons. I was told that this group was unmotivated, that they don't really care, and that I would need to keep them busy in order to avoid major behavior problems. I was told that they sounded worse than both middle school bands and that is why they would never go to contest. W mentioned that their other teachers have very low expectations of them and that many of them do nothing in class every day. It is my opinion that both directors have given up on these kids. They do not trust them with anything, it seems. This was a pretty intimidating situation to walk into.
In general, I feel prepared to lead rehearsals and did a fairly good job of planning. The first 1 1/2 hour class (3rd day total), I only had 45 minutes of rehearsal planned, but this past week I was able to fill the entire time. I selected two grade 2 pieces for them so far and we've been rehearsing them the last two weeks. I hope for them to have at least six pieces by the middle of February, though we will only compete with three. I've added a warm-up routine that includes 1 minute of breathing exercises, 3-4 minutes of exercises from Foundations for Band (Williams & King), as well as six major scales. All of the bands here are dependent on using the loud speaker metronome for almost everything, though I would like to get away from doing that as much. I find that using the metronome relieves my responsibilities quite a bit and I could see it as a way of being lazy in the future both on my part and the part of the students.
Otherwise, I have felt a bit nervous on the podium until this Friday, when I was able to relax a bit more and even smile. I often trip over myself when talking and it would help if I talked a bit more slowly and took time to think about my comments before speaking them.
LMS Beginning Trumpet & Beginning Clarinet class
By the second week, I was in charge of these classes at Lake Middle School. Trumpets meet 6th period (1:30) and Clarinets meet right after during 7th (2:19). They have just finished their Solo & Ensemble contest and will be working to finish the Essential Elements book this semester.
They have a history of being very fidgety and talkative, and asking too many irrelevant questions. I laid down my behavior policy and I think that it is going to really help them. It involves several rules, put in positive terms (do's instead of don'ts) and a list of things that will happen when they break rules. I don't think this was clear last semester and there were no direct consequences for bad behavior. This seems necessary for a class of 20-25 beginning 6th graders. Things have been better since, though some students simply do not want to be there, so they often distract others purposely by making odd noises on their instruments or by talking.
I have already given the Trumpet and Clarinet semester exams two Thursdays ago, which was difficult since I had not been with them for the Fall semester. They each had to play their solo in front of the class with the CD accompaniment and were graded based on a weighted rubric, using a sort of "tick system." F.M. (head middle school director) wanted me to grade easy, and most of them got As and some got Bs. This test was also to determine their chair order. I am definitely not comfortable with tests in front of the class or chair positions in beginner classes. These can create a very negative stigma that students may carry with them throughout their musical experience, should they continue after this year. Maybe it might help them practice, but I am not sure.
Sectionals
I have already lead four middle school sectionals and three high school sectionals. These have all been very positive experiences, and in general I felt more comfortable leading high school sectionals. This is where I feel most relaxed as a teacher. I am amazed at how easy it is to teach students who want to be in these sectionals versus the ones who do not. "He who has ears to hear, let him hear" seems an appropriate reference here.
Observation: HS Honor Band, HS Jazz Band, MS Honor Band, Beginning flute
The three ensembles mentioned above are some of the best bands at their level that I've heard. They are well-balanced and are full of dedicated, self-motivated students. The MS Honor Band is playing 10 major scales 2-3 octaves at the beginning of each rehearsal and playing some grade 4 music for UIL this semester, and already sounding good on it. I feel that I have a lot to learn from F.M. and T.F. this semester. I'm excited.
Thursday, September 13, 2007
@#$%ing Verizon
Time for an old-fashioned rant.
Dawn and I recently moved to a new apartment which is about 3 miles away from our old one. We had Verizon DSL and the most basic land-lined phone service for something like $38 per month.
When it came time to move, Dawn called to have our exact service transfered to our new address, where Verizon is the exclusive telephone and internet provider. They even offer their new FiOS here, but we didn't want to pay that much.
The problem is that they not only took down the wrong address, but they didn't have the correct callback phone number, either. They finally called us on our land line just before we moved to say that the address they had didn't exist, so Dawn spent a couple hours on the phone with them trying to get the correct address. She even had the woman repeat it back correctly to her three times. It was supposed to be installed yesterday.
Mind you, we were getting calls for the previous resident here until yesterday, as well. We also could use her internet service (I think she had FiOS because I had a 2MB/s download speed on her connection). I think this might have contributed to the problem, though this woman supposedly moved out on August 31.
Anyway, I called them this morning and they determined that my phone and internet service had been cancelled because they still had the wrong address (2016 instead of 2060). I couldn't figure out why it was cancelled. Maybe the tech guy was like, "duh, there is no 2016, so they must want to cancel their service." So the tech support guy referred me to another Indian woman who referred me to a local agent who could only sign me up for new DSL service. However, I realized that if I don't have Verizon phone service, I can't actually get the DSL. If I need to order new phone service, I probably won't get to keep my old phone number! ARGH!
At this point, I have three options:
1. I could try to get my old phone number back which would involve hours on the phone and perhaps some yelling, or
2. I could cancel my newly ordered DSL service for the phone number that was cancelled and order fresh, probably FiOS. However, when I went to their website to get a quote, it said that there was existing phone service on the address that I gave them. Bloody hell.
3. I could wait a couple of days to see if my phone magically starts working, and then wait until the 25th for my "new" DSL service to be activated.
Did I mention that the tech support hold music is the most annoying elevator music imaginable?
@#$%ing Verizon.
Dawn and I recently moved to a new apartment which is about 3 miles away from our old one. We had Verizon DSL and the most basic land-lined phone service for something like $38 per month.
When it came time to move, Dawn called to have our exact service transfered to our new address, where Verizon is the exclusive telephone and internet provider. They even offer their new FiOS here, but we didn't want to pay that much.
The problem is that they not only took down the wrong address, but they didn't have the correct callback phone number, either. They finally called us on our land line just before we moved to say that the address they had didn't exist, so Dawn spent a couple hours on the phone with them trying to get the correct address. She even had the woman repeat it back correctly to her three times. It was supposed to be installed yesterday.
Mind you, we were getting calls for the previous resident here until yesterday, as well. We also could use her internet service (I think she had FiOS because I had a 2MB/s download speed on her connection). I think this might have contributed to the problem, though this woman supposedly moved out on August 31.
Anyway, I called them this morning and they determined that my phone and internet service had been cancelled because they still had the wrong address (2016 instead of 2060). I couldn't figure out why it was cancelled. Maybe the tech guy was like, "duh, there is no 2016, so they must want to cancel their service." So the tech support guy referred me to another Indian woman who referred me to a local agent who could only sign me up for new DSL service. However, I realized that if I don't have Verizon phone service, I can't actually get the DSL. If I need to order new phone service, I probably won't get to keep my old phone number! ARGH!
At this point, I have three options:
1. I could try to get my old phone number back which would involve hours on the phone and perhaps some yelling, or
2. I could cancel my newly ordered DSL service for the phone number that was cancelled and order fresh, probably FiOS. However, when I went to their website to get a quote, it said that there was existing phone service on the address that I gave them. Bloody hell.
3. I could wait a couple of days to see if my phone magically starts working, and then wait until the 25th for my "new" DSL service to be activated.
Did I mention that the tech support hold music is the most annoying elevator music imaginable?
@#$%ing Verizon.
Monday, July 09, 2007
Music teacher
I'm taking a break from studying for an assignment for my online class.
I spent some time this afternoon processing with Dawn about what being a music teacher could be like. I often wonder:
Here are my predictions so far:
I spent some time this afternoon processing with Dawn about what being a music teacher could be like. I often wonder:
- What kind of band director will I be?
- How will I treat the students?
- Will they think I'm funny?
- Will they think I am really uncool?
- Is it possible to have the kind of instrumental music program that I'm hoping for or will I lose my sense of idealism after a couple of years?
- Can I be a better band director than the one I had in high school?
- Am I going to have time for family and church activities, or will I end up working my butt off and get burned out?
- Will it take me a while to get over looking stupid in front of a crowd?
- Do I have the confidence that it takes to teach?
- Will this be a career that I stick with for decades or will I only last a couple of years? The odds are not in my favor.
- Am I organized enough to do this job or will I fumble my way through and pray that students get something out of it?
Here are my predictions so far:
- What kind of band director will I be? Probably a lot like my high school band director,
Mr. Cruse (pictured right), but less hard-working and perfectionistic about some things. Hopefully, I'll live a more well-rounded life than he. Mr. Cruse didn't have a wife or family and often spent 60-80 hours working per week.
- How will I treat the students? I will probably treat them with lots of respect and will try never to yell, shame, or guilt them into cooperation. The worst I imagine being towards them is a little passive-aggressive and unclear about my intentions.
- Will they think I'm funny? Sometimes.
- Will they think I am really uncool? Yes, but maybe that won't matter.
- Is it possible to have the kind of instrumental music program that I'm hoping for or will I loose my sense of idealism after a couple of years? A. I'm sure its possible, but I might lose some of my idealism. But, hey, a guy's gotta have goals, yes?
- Can I be a better band director than the one I had in high school? I think so.
- Am I going to have time for family and church activities, or will I end up working my butt off and get burned out? I think both might happen sometime in my career. The danger is making teaching an idol in my life. We'll have to see about this one.
- Will it take me a while to get over looking stupid in front of a crowd? Most definitely, but its good for me.
- Do I have the confidence that it takes to teach? Yes, I have a great education and lots of support.
- Will this be a career that I stick with for decades or will I only last a couple of years? The odds are not in my favor. I think that if the organization and time factors don't overwhelm me in the first couple of years, than I can imagine sticking with it for a long time.
- Am I organized enough to do this job or will I fumble my way through and pray that students get something out of it? Not sure.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Crusade
Warning - very long post. Even though this is labeled "rant," your comments are welcome if you don't know me personally. Kerry: this may bring back traumatic memories. Mom: feel free to use this in your book, though a more complete version is pending.
This morning I'm remembering my experiences in college ministry. Rewind to fall, 2005. I'm a junior in college. I'd led a community group for a year now and my group had grown to about 12 people. I was an RA in the engineering dorms, so even though I was a music major, my group consisted of mainly engineering students. Talk about an unnatural community. We got along for the most part, but when ever we were not talking about Jesus, they talked about math, science, car engines, computers, classes--they left me out most of their conversations.
My commitments as a leader were to attend the ministry's main event on Thursday nights, hang out with my community group (not bible study--we were better than just a bible study) on Friday nights, lead community group on Monday afternoons, go to leadership meetings on Monday nights, go to Impact (larger group bible study) on Tuesday nights, disciple three guys in my group for one hour each during the week ("raise them up as leaders"), and meet with my staff-discipler for an hour. This ended up being 12-15 hours per week of time commitments. I didn't have much time to practice clarinet.
There were several doctrines that this ministry developed and tested while I was there, both overt and covert. Some I expect they've had since my parents were in it when they were in college. All doctrines stemmed out their desire to take The Great Commission very seriously. OK, here we go:
The doctrine of spiritual multiplication. If we as a ministry were going to reach the whole campus with the Gospel, then we can't we wasting our time adding to our numbers. We must multiply our numbers. Here's how it works. I grew up in the church and recently learned how to share my faith using the 4 Spiritual Laws booklet. I share this with you and two others who accept Christ into their hearts. I begin discipling you three with our five follow-ups which include basic principles of the faith. I then train you on how to use the 4 Spiritual Laws to share your faith. You go out and convert three people whom you disciple and teach how to share their faith. Now, disciples don't necessarily have to be new believers. In fact, they could have known Jesus far longer than me and even served in leadership before coming to college. I still must go through the five follow-ups with them, just to make sure they get it right. No funny business.
Target-area doctrine. This ministry's strategy was to target living areas for evangelism. The pressure was on the area community groups to target the communities in which they lived. This meant that we would do outreaches including giving things away in exchange for people's contact information (so we could follow up later and share our faith with them), do servant evangelism by taking out people's trash, giving out more stuff or throwing parties, go prayer-walking, or just talk to people around campus in "guided conversations" that eventually led to us sharing the Gospel using the 4 Spiritual Laws. Not a single one of these outreaches grew our group in size or depth.
The Great Commission necessitates all to be leaders. If you share your faith, you are "leading" someone to Christ. In a movement like the campus ministry that I was in, no "dead weight" could be afforded. As a leader, I was to put most of my energy into people who would replace me. The big problem is that none of them felt called by God to be leaders. Many of them were introverts and most of them were extremely busy with school. Engineers have a ridiculous amount of work to do for their classes. I would estimate that they have almost twice as much work to do than average students. Sorry about all the "quotes."
The FAT doctrine. This ministry believed that, in order to be qualified for leadership, you had to be FAT: Faithful, Available, and Teachable. I met their standards, but these engineers weren't that available, and they required a lot of explanation in order to buy into biblical principles. They were analytical thinkers. The ministry's staff member who supervised and discipled me determined that none of the members in my group were FAT. Therefore, we must work all the harder on community outreach to get people involved who were FAT. My whole group was "dead weight" to the movement.
The Chart of Influence. In order to show how much and how far God was reaching (or to bolster their own confidence and success-complexes), the ministry's staff members all had to chart their influence. My discipler showed me his chart the day after my junior solo clarinet recital. It had the people who had discipled him on the left, him in the left/center, the people he was discipling on the right/center, and the people we were discipling on the far right. I remember seeing the other four people he was discipling with three people connected to each of them, and three little arrows pointing from my name to blank spaces. No one from my group had time to meet with me very often, so I couldn't help him out. It was then that he determined that none of my group members were FAT.
The conference doctrine. I remember the director of this ministry telling us in a leadership meeting that, "given the choice between attending Denver Christmas Conference or attending a whole semester's worth of bible study, I would choose DCC." In other words, conferences were extremely important to him. As a leader, I was to spend much of my time trying to convince my group members to attend the next conference. We even spent part of our leadership meetings trying to strategize on how we could get people to go. We were supposed to tell our group members not to think, "why should I go to Denver Christmas Conference," but "why shouldn't I go?" We always were to say, "it'll change your life." If that didn't work, then were were suppose to ask our group members every time we met, even if they'd already said no. If that didn't work, then we prayed profusely for them by name to go to this conference. I'm pretty sure the region's campus directors competed for how many people they could get to attend from their respective campuses.
A progression to full-time ministry. This ministry often stressed the importance of their own activities over all others, even those which were school-related. Rationalization: "What are you going to remember 10 years from now: some grade you got on a paper your freshmen year in college, or all of the friends you made and things you got to see God do?" Because how could anything satisfy more than God? So get involved.
Using names I substituted for the real ones, here is the progression:You start college and come to a main event meeting in this ministry. You hear about Weekend-Long Fall Retreat (WLFR). You go to Weekend-Long Fall Retreat and have a great time, meet new friends, and hear at least ten times about Week-Long Winter Conference (WLWC). You and your friends get into a bible study and hear about Week-Long Winter Conference all semester and about how much fun it will be and how much God will change your life, so you go. Week-Long Winter Conference is like a huge college party for God with two rock concerts per day, a dance, games, outreach, and a whole day about Summer-Long Evangelism Project (SLEP). You raise support all spring to go on SLEP, and you find that Summer-Long Evangelism Project is like your normal spiritual walk, but on steroids and in a totally sheltered environment. All summer long, you hear about taking the Gospel back to your campus, and committing a year of your life to go on Post-College Year-Long Over Seas Mission (PCYLOSM). Since you spent all of your time being involved in this campus ministry during college, you probably didn't do as well in academics or lost your original goal for college that all of your parent's money went towards. So you go on PCYLOSM. Here, in post-Soviet Paganistan, you have a great experience starting a campus ministry which will be a partner to your campus, so others from your campus can go on Summer-Long Evangelism Project there. If you are successful, then it is often suggested that you become Full-Time Staff Member (FTSM) for your ministry, so you can begin to pressure freshmen to go on Weekend-Long Fall Retreat.
As you can probably tell, it didn't end well with me and this ministry. Maybe I'll write that story another time.
This morning I'm remembering my experiences in college ministry. Rewind to fall, 2005. I'm a junior in college. I'd led a community group for a year now and my group had grown to about 12 people. I was an RA in the engineering dorms, so even though I was a music major, my group consisted of mainly engineering students. Talk about an unnatural community. We got along for the most part, but when ever we were not talking about Jesus, they talked about math, science, car engines, computers, classes--they left me out most of their conversations.
My commitments as a leader were to attend the ministry's main event on Thursday nights, hang out with my community group (not bible study--we were better than just a bible study) on Friday nights, lead community group on Monday afternoons, go to leadership meetings on Monday nights, go to Impact (larger group bible study) on Tuesday nights, disciple three guys in my group for one hour each during the week ("raise them up as leaders"), and meet with my staff-discipler for an hour. This ended up being 12-15 hours per week of time commitments. I didn't have much time to practice clarinet.
There were several doctrines that this ministry developed and tested while I was there, both overt and covert. Some I expect they've had since my parents were in it when they were in college. All doctrines stemmed out their desire to take The Great Commission very seriously. OK, here we go:
The doctrine of spiritual multiplication. If we as a ministry were going to reach the whole campus with the Gospel, then we can't we wasting our time adding to our numbers. We must multiply our numbers. Here's how it works. I grew up in the church and recently learned how to share my faith using the 4 Spiritual Laws booklet. I share this with you and two others who accept Christ into their hearts. I begin discipling you three with our five follow-ups which include basic principles of the faith. I then train you on how to use the 4 Spiritual Laws to share your faith. You go out and convert three people whom you disciple and teach how to share their faith. Now, disciples don't necessarily have to be new believers. In fact, they could have known Jesus far longer than me and even served in leadership before coming to college. I still must go through the five follow-ups with them, just to make sure they get it right. No funny business.
Target-area doctrine. This ministry's strategy was to target living areas for evangelism. The pressure was on the area community groups to target the communities in which they lived. This meant that we would do outreaches including giving things away in exchange for people's contact information (so we could follow up later and share our faith with them), do servant evangelism by taking out people's trash, giving out more stuff or throwing parties, go prayer-walking, or just talk to people around campus in "guided conversations" that eventually led to us sharing the Gospel using the 4 Spiritual Laws. Not a single one of these outreaches grew our group in size or depth.
The Great Commission necessitates all to be leaders. If you share your faith, you are "leading" someone to Christ. In a movement like the campus ministry that I was in, no "dead weight" could be afforded. As a leader, I was to put most of my energy into people who would replace me. The big problem is that none of them felt called by God to be leaders. Many of them were introverts and most of them were extremely busy with school. Engineers have a ridiculous amount of work to do for their classes. I would estimate that they have almost twice as much work to do than average students. Sorry about all the "quotes."
The FAT doctrine. This ministry believed that, in order to be qualified for leadership, you had to be FAT: Faithful, Available, and Teachable. I met their standards, but these engineers weren't that available, and they required a lot of explanation in order to buy into biblical principles. They were analytical thinkers. The ministry's staff member who supervised and discipled me determined that none of the members in my group were FAT. Therefore, we must work all the harder on community outreach to get people involved who were FAT. My whole group was "dead weight" to the movement.
The Chart of Influence. In order to show how much and how far God was reaching (or to bolster their own confidence and success-complexes), the ministry's staff members all had to chart their influence. My discipler showed me his chart the day after my junior solo clarinet recital. It had the people who had discipled him on the left, him in the left/center, the people he was discipling on the right/center, and the people we were discipling on the far right. I remember seeing the other four people he was discipling with three people connected to each of them, and three little arrows pointing from my name to blank spaces. No one from my group had time to meet with me very often, so I couldn't help him out. It was then that he determined that none of my group members were FAT.
The conference doctrine. I remember the director of this ministry telling us in a leadership meeting that, "given the choice between attending Denver Christmas Conference or attending a whole semester's worth of bible study, I would choose DCC." In other words, conferences were extremely important to him. As a leader, I was to spend much of my time trying to convince my group members to attend the next conference. We even spent part of our leadership meetings trying to strategize on how we could get people to go. We were supposed to tell our group members not to think, "why should I go to Denver Christmas Conference," but "why shouldn't I go?" We always were to say, "it'll change your life." If that didn't work, then were were suppose to ask our group members every time we met, even if they'd already said no. If that didn't work, then we prayed profusely for them by name to go to this conference. I'm pretty sure the region's campus directors competed for how many people they could get to attend from their respective campuses.
A progression to full-time ministry. This ministry often stressed the importance of their own activities over all others, even those which were school-related. Rationalization: "What are you going to remember 10 years from now: some grade you got on a paper your freshmen year in college, or all of the friends you made and things you got to see God do?" Because how could anything satisfy more than God? So get involved.
Using names I substituted for the real ones, here is the progression:You start college and come to a main event meeting in this ministry. You hear about Weekend-Long Fall Retreat (WLFR). You go to Weekend-Long Fall Retreat and have a great time, meet new friends, and hear at least ten times about Week-Long Winter Conference (WLWC). You and your friends get into a bible study and hear about Week-Long Winter Conference all semester and about how much fun it will be and how much God will change your life, so you go. Week-Long Winter Conference is like a huge college party for God with two rock concerts per day, a dance, games, outreach, and a whole day about Summer-Long Evangelism Project (SLEP). You raise support all spring to go on SLEP, and you find that Summer-Long Evangelism Project is like your normal spiritual walk, but on steroids and in a totally sheltered environment. All summer long, you hear about taking the Gospel back to your campus, and committing a year of your life to go on Post-College Year-Long Over Seas Mission (PCYLOSM). Since you spent all of your time being involved in this campus ministry during college, you probably didn't do as well in academics or lost your original goal for college that all of your parent's money went towards. So you go on PCYLOSM. Here, in post-Soviet Paganistan, you have a great experience starting a campus ministry which will be a partner to your campus, so others from your campus can go on Summer-Long Evangelism Project there. If you are successful, then it is often suggested that you become Full-Time Staff Member (FTSM) for your ministry, so you can begin to pressure freshmen to go on Weekend-Long Fall Retreat.
As you can probably tell, it didn't end well with me and this ministry. Maybe I'll write that story another time.
Saturday, May 26, 2007
Where I am with God
It is my assignment this week for CR to write out where I am with God so that it may be compared with where I am with God in 22 weeks when the 12-step program is over. I thought I'd share this with you and you can offer any insight or encouragement if you want to.
For the most part, what I know to be true about God and the way I feel about him are extremely different and often conflicting. For example, it makes sense to me that God is a loving, merciful, tender God who has counted the hairs on my head and wants his light to shine in every area of my life. But the way I feel about God is that he is some kind of control-monger who just wants to own me and use me. I feel like he just wants me to know how powerful he is and how little my actions affect him, right or wrong. I feel like he just wants to have his way regardless of what I think or feel. When I feel far from him, I think, "how is it that my wife can spend lots of time and energy pursuing Christ and I can spend almost none, and we can still feel the same amount of discouragement?"
In general, I feel mad and resentful toward God because I think of him the way I think of most of the Christian leaders in my life growing up: as invulnerable perfectionists, power-hungry, controlling, manipulative, efficient and success/purpose-driven. Like these leaders, I feel like God is always trying to put the blame on me and just wants me to sit in my pain as long as possible sometimes.
As a result, I haven't spent time much in solitary prayer (my wife and I pray often together) and I have almost no desire to read the bible, and have never developed a habit of doing so. I should mention that I contributed to these feelings with my own pride, laziness, selfishness, lack of faith and trust in God. I haven't helped that situation by trying to escape for so long and deny that this is an issue whatsoever.
I do have hope that God will heal me of my bitterness from past church experiences and make me whole again. There are evidences of his love every day and I want to hold on to and look for those. I want to believe fully that God is good and that his way is better, and that no matter what hurts occur in the body of Christ, that he is big enough to heal those bitter wounds. I want to believe that he is worth my time and energy and love.
For the most part, what I know to be true about God and the way I feel about him are extremely different and often conflicting. For example, it makes sense to me that God is a loving, merciful, tender God who has counted the hairs on my head and wants his light to shine in every area of my life. But the way I feel about God is that he is some kind of control-monger who just wants to own me and use me. I feel like he just wants me to know how powerful he is and how little my actions affect him, right or wrong. I feel like he just wants to have his way regardless of what I think or feel. When I feel far from him, I think, "how is it that my wife can spend lots of time and energy pursuing Christ and I can spend almost none, and we can still feel the same amount of discouragement?"
In general, I feel mad and resentful toward God because I think of him the way I think of most of the Christian leaders in my life growing up: as invulnerable perfectionists, power-hungry, controlling, manipulative, efficient and success/purpose-driven. Like these leaders, I feel like God is always trying to put the blame on me and just wants me to sit in my pain as long as possible sometimes.
As a result, I haven't spent time much in solitary prayer (my wife and I pray often together) and I have almost no desire to read the bible, and have never developed a habit of doing so. I should mention that I contributed to these feelings with my own pride, laziness, selfishness, lack of faith and trust in God. I haven't helped that situation by trying to escape for so long and deny that this is an issue whatsoever.
I do have hope that God will heal me of my bitterness from past church experiences and make me whole again. There are evidences of his love every day and I want to hold on to and look for those. I want to believe fully that God is good and that his way is better, and that no matter what hurts occur in the body of Christ, that he is big enough to heal those bitter wounds. I want to believe that he is worth my time and energy and love.
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
Celebrate Recovery List
I'm going to Celebrate Recovery at my church on Thursday night and I wanted to make a list, or maybe just rant about what I am going to say in the group. It is really important for me to get these things off of my chest and out into the open in a safe environment like CR. I feel like this process has been the beginnings of healing for me, so here we go:
1. I avoid and escape from pain at all costs. I am really good at it, too. This is how I've spent most of my life, certainly since I was 10 years old. I began by doing impressions of cartoon characters or funny movie characters, always putting on a different face. I then moved to video games when I was about 12 or 13 and have not stopped using that method. As a 14/15 year old, I began a pornography addiction that was extremely effective as well. In the past year, I've seen lots of victory in that area, though it still tempts me.
2. I escape my pain by talking about and focusing on other people's pain, especially the people who are closest to me. I then try to control them and force them to feel better, as if I could. Dawn, my wife, gets the brunt of most of this. And for her, it is easy to see her pain because she is not as skilled at avoiding it. Yesterday, I was busy on the computer escaping my pain (not very well, actually) when she made an important call to her mother that she was worried about. She thought that her mother might judge her despite the fact that she could identify with Dawn's situation and was very loving and accepting recently. I was not worried about it, so I didn't help her or encourage her or talk through it with her. I just wanted to be proven right, and that was much more important to me than loving Dawn. I am really ashamed of how much pride I have.
3. Last night, I realized that I don't even need video games or porn to escape. I'd bet that anything short of locking myself up in a windowless, padded room in a straight jacket wouldn't be enough to keep me from escaping. Sometimes, when I'm in a bad mood or feeling discontent, I just focus on something else and wait for the pain to go away. I also escape by playing music or calling someone on the phone.
4. My conclusion is that if I go anywhere but to God for healing and restoration, then the pain will always come back. I have a 13-year track record of going to other things than Him, so this is going to take a lot of work.
5. In a related matter, I do not encourage my wife to spend time with God anymore because when she does, I feel a lot of shame. I feel this because I don't have that same desire to spend time with Him. And I have shame about that. But I'm angry at God. I easily forget how much He loves me and cares for me, and how awesome and worthy of my praise He is. Mostly I just see him as prideful and stubborn; as a control monger. I've taken my view of the Campus Crusade leadership of two years ago and projected it on God. In some ways, I've given up pursuing God's will in my life because I tend to think that God is going to do what ever the hell He wants without regard for my feelings, attitudes, and requests. I resent that. I don't feel like I matter to God.
6. I have shame about the things I think about God. How could I think such aweful things about the God who delivered me from a pornography addiction or the God who gave me such an amazing wife or the God who has blessed me with talent and a love for music or the God who CREATED music to begin with?!? The bible says that all of the good things in my life are from God. What makes me think I can resent Him? Lord, forgive me.
1. I avoid and escape from pain at all costs. I am really good at it, too. This is how I've spent most of my life, certainly since I was 10 years old. I began by doing impressions of cartoon characters or funny movie characters, always putting on a different face. I then moved to video games when I was about 12 or 13 and have not stopped using that method. As a 14/15 year old, I began a pornography addiction that was extremely effective as well. In the past year, I've seen lots of victory in that area, though it still tempts me.
2. I escape my pain by talking about and focusing on other people's pain, especially the people who are closest to me. I then try to control them and force them to feel better, as if I could. Dawn, my wife, gets the brunt of most of this. And for her, it is easy to see her pain because she is not as skilled at avoiding it. Yesterday, I was busy on the computer escaping my pain (not very well, actually) when she made an important call to her mother that she was worried about. She thought that her mother might judge her despite the fact that she could identify with Dawn's situation and was very loving and accepting recently. I was not worried about it, so I didn't help her or encourage her or talk through it with her. I just wanted to be proven right, and that was much more important to me than loving Dawn. I am really ashamed of how much pride I have.
3. Last night, I realized that I don't even need video games or porn to escape. I'd bet that anything short of locking myself up in a windowless, padded room in a straight jacket wouldn't be enough to keep me from escaping. Sometimes, when I'm in a bad mood or feeling discontent, I just focus on something else and wait for the pain to go away. I also escape by playing music or calling someone on the phone.
4. My conclusion is that if I go anywhere but to God for healing and restoration, then the pain will always come back. I have a 13-year track record of going to other things than Him, so this is going to take a lot of work.
5. In a related matter, I do not encourage my wife to spend time with God anymore because when she does, I feel a lot of shame. I feel this because I don't have that same desire to spend time with Him. And I have shame about that. But I'm angry at God. I easily forget how much He loves me and cares for me, and how awesome and worthy of my praise He is. Mostly I just see him as prideful and stubborn; as a control monger. I've taken my view of the Campus Crusade leadership of two years ago and projected it on God. In some ways, I've given up pursuing God's will in my life because I tend to think that God is going to do what ever the hell He wants without regard for my feelings, attitudes, and requests. I resent that. I don't feel like I matter to God.
6. I have shame about the things I think about God. How could I think such aweful things about the God who delivered me from a pornography addiction or the God who gave me such an amazing wife or the God who has blessed me with talent and a love for music or the God who CREATED music to begin with?!? The bible says that all of the good things in my life are from God. What makes me think I can resent Him? Lord, forgive me.
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