I watched the National Youth Orchestra perform in one of the Proms on Friday evening (on my parents' TV). Back in January I had the joy of seeing them live, performing Britten's War Requiem. Both concerts were fantastic. During the interval, the BBC showed an interview with the conductor, talking about the intensive rehearsing they had done all day, every day, for the eight days before the concert. Why did they work so hard? To achieve excellence.
I'm currently reading 'The Fabulous Reinvention of Sunday School' by Aaron Reynolds, who used to be the artistic director for Promiseland (the children's ministry of Willow Creek Community Church in the States). I know that one of Willow Creek's key values is excellence, so I was interested to see how that plays out in Aaron's view of Sunday School. In part 1 of his book, it means memorisation and rehearsal. Aaron's view is that whoever is leading the session should memorise everything they are doing - not just what comes next, but the actual script. This leaves you free on the day to focus on how you are communicating with the children, and how they are responding, rather than trying to work out what to say. He also sees rehearsal as non-negotiable. Everyone involved with the session - the leaders, musicians, actors, technical team - does a complete run-through beforehand, usually either on a mid-week evening or on Saturday.
You can see, from the list of people involved, that Aaron is writing about a different scale of children's group to anything most of us experience. (I don't have a 'technical team'!) He also comes from a background where they will repeat this Sunday School programme three times in one day, to run alongside three adult services. It would, therefore, be easy to dismiss his views as less relevant for the UK scene - as well as being unrealistic for most teams of leaders. But are they?
I met an author during my trip who told me that 'excellence leads to inclusiveness'. We were talking about the quality of writing and illustrations in children's books, at the time - but doesn't the same principle apply? If a non-Christian family pops in to our church on Sunday morning, and the children's and youth groups are a bit below par that day, does it make it less likely that they'll come back? But if they sit in with their children, and see a session that oozes excellence, will that draw them back the following week? Does 'excellence lead to inclusiveness' - by including and drawing in those who are not Christians? Should memorisation and rehearsal be the norm we all aspire to? Is this a way of showing that teaching God's Word to children and young people is the most important thing we do all week? Or is it just applying secular values (and gloss?) to Christian areas of service, rather than remembering that it is the Holy Spirit who draws people to God?
'Excellence attracts people. Excellence inspire kids. Excellence honours God.' That's what Aaron Reynolds says. What do you think?
3 comments:
Excellence does I think lead to inclusiveness, I wonder whether knowing “the script” would make a session excellent? I can see how it would be helpful for some. There might be a danger of it leading to pride and a rather human centred view of what happens when the Word is opened.
Thanks Rory. I've just discussed this issue with a colleague, who grew up in a church which had such a tight approach to 'excellence' in church services that they effectively became performances. There must be a balance somewhere - which means we can aim for excellence, teaching God's Word well and effectively, and reflecting the importance of what we do and the wonderful Lord we serve - but without this becoming a source of pride, where our focus is on the quality of our performance rather than the One we are serving.
I agree with the idea that we should be aiming for excellence and that it leads to inclusiveness. However some of us are at the stage of hoping that people won't forget to turn up - practice, run-throughs and learning a 'script' are a long way off. How does Aaron Reynolds cope with going off script when some bright spark asks a good question?
The first area I would push for excellence in is Bible handling. That coupled with a servant heart and a modicum of communication skill will do for me as a start.
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