Edification

On October 14, 2012, the Austrian skydiver Felix Baumgartner broke two world records that had stood for over fifty years. He smashed the previous world record for the fastest dive, breaking the sound barrier and reaching a velocity of nearly 834 miles per hour. He also broke the world record for the highest freefall, jumping out of a balloon 128,000 feet (or 24 miles) above New Mexico.

But the 43-year-old Baumgartner gladly admits that he couldn't have done it without the help of his mentor—the previous world record holder for both records, 84-year-old Joe Kittinger. Kittinger, a retired U.S. Air Force colonel, has been an integral part of Baumgartner's team. Months prior to Baumgartner's record-breaking dive, Kittinger provided him with advice and encouragement whenever the younger man doubted his ability. Right before the actual jump, Kittinger told Baumgartner, "All right, step up to the exterior step. Start the cameras. And our guardian angel will take care of you now." During the fall, Kittinger's reassuring voice from mission control guided Baumgartner throughout the dive, especially during one particularly tense moment. Early in the dive, Baumgartner started spinning out of control—the same problem that had nearly killed Kittinger during his dive. Baumgartner kept talking to Kittinger, whose deep voice offered reassurance. In fact, Baumgartner didn't allow any other voice than Kittinger's in his helmet.

When the dive was finished, Kittinger had only praise for Baumgartner's new world records. Kittinger said, "Felix did a great job, and it was a great honor to work with this brave guy."

An article in National Geographic highlighted the special bond between the two men. Prior to the jump, Kittinger said, "I'll be the only one who knows how Felix feels at that moment when he jumps from that step, 'cause I've done it."

Baumgartner agreed: "[Joe] knows how lonely you are at that altitude." Then he added, "It feels like, if Joe's there, nothing can go wrong."

Mike Howerton describes how different were the motivational methods of the two men who coached his high school football team—Coach Crow and Coach Rush. When his team was losing during halftime, the two coaches would give two very different "pep talks."

Coach Crow would come in growling, spitting disdain in his words at us: "What a bunch of losers. Whaddya say let's get your girlfriends suited up; they'd do a better job. Your flimsy arm-tackles make me wanna puke. I'm gonna go look for some diapers for you babies to wear in the second half; maybe then you won't embarrass yourselves so bad." He'd leave, and absolute silence would descend, virtually no sound except for the muffled sobs of Monty, our kicker, in the corner.

Then our defensive head coach, Coach Rush, would come in. He'd look each of us in the eyes with his steely glint. When he began to speak, you could feel strength flow into your limbs. He would begin with something like this, measured, masculine, and building in intensity: "I don't see high school students. I see lions. This locker room is filled with lions. A bunch of lions is called a pride. A pride of lions hunts together. A pride of lions kills together …. Lions are majestic to behold …. Lions are the kings of the land, and this is your land. You are the pride here. But there's one thing I haven't heard you lions do tonight. I haven't heard you roar. Now we're gonna go out there … and everyone in this two-bit town is gonna hear you roar because you are LIONS and LIONS ROAR!" And we'd erupt in an ear-splitting roar (even Monty) because we weren't seniors or juniors; we were LIONS and LIONS ROAR, and we'd go out to inevitable victory. When Coach Rush died unexpectedly a few years later, he was so beloved that there was a motion to name the stadium after him.

Christian businessman and author John D. Beckett shares the following personal story about the redemptive power of speaking the truth in love:

I was in a dental chair being prepped for the replacement of a filling. Just as my mouth was filled with dental hardware so I could only mumble, the dental technician said, out of the blue, "You're Mr. Beckett, aren't you?" I grunted assent.

"Well, I want to thank you for firing my husband."

I was stuck. I couldn't move. I couldn't speak. I could only listen to the ensuing monologue.

"It happened ten years ago," she said. "A few days after your company hired my husband, he was notified he had failed a drug test. You may not recall," she continued, "but you called him into your office before he left. You said, 'I realize I don't have any choice but to terminate you, but I want to tell you something. You're at a crossroads. You can keep going the way you are, and the results are very predictable. Or you can take this as a wake-up call. You can decide you're going to turn your life around.'"

I'm sure the technician couldn't see the beads of perspiration on my forehead under all the paraphernalia as she continued: "I want you to know, my husband took your advice. Today, he's a good father, a good husband, and he has a fine job. Thank you for firing my husband!"

I wish I could say that all our terminations have turned out this way. … Regardless of the outcome, however, we must be prepared to take action when a situation can't be brought around. In a strange way, it's an aspect of our care for people.

Sean and Liegh Anne Tuohy, the real-life couple portrayed in the movie Blindside, share the following story in their book In a Heartbeat:

There is a little-known congressional program that awards internships to young people who have aged out of the foster care system. These are kids who were never adopted, and are no longer eligible for state support.

[A senator we've met] employed one such man as an intern. One morning the senator breezed in for a meeting and discovered that his intern was already in the office, reorganizing the entire mailroom. The senator said to the intern, "This is amazing—the mailroom has never looked so clean. You did a great job."

A few minutes later the senator saw that the intern had tears streaming down his face. [He] said, "Son, are you okay?"

"Yes," the intern answered quietly.

"Did I say something to offend you?"

"No, sir."

"Well, what's wrong?"

The young man said, "That's the first time in my life anyone's told me that I did something good."

The Tuhoy's comment, "A little bit of attention and a kind word—that's how little it takes to affect someone's life for the better."

Edvard Greig, the nineteenth century Norwegian composer, wrote his parents concerning the encouragement he received from famous Hungarian composer-pianist Franz Liszt, who had just played Greig's Piano Concerto in A Minor. Greig writes:

Finally, as he handed me the score, he said, "Hold to your course. Let me tell you, you have the talent for it, and—don't get scared off!" This last is of infinite importance to me. It is almost what I will call a sacred mandate. Time and again when disappointments and bitterness come I shall think of his words, and the memory of this hour will have a wonderful power to sustain me in days of adversity; that is my confident hope.

I discovered the importance of healthy counsel in a half-Ironman triathlon. After the 1.2 mile swim and the 56 mile bike ride, I didn't have much energy left for the 13.1 mile run. Neither did the fellow jogging next to me. I asked him how he was doing and soon regretted posing the question.

"This stinks. This race is the dumbest decision I've ever made." He had more complaints than a taxpayer at the IRS. My response to him? "Goodbye." I know if I listened too long, I'd start agreeing with him.

I caught up with a 66-year-old grandmother. Her tone was just the opposite. "You'll finish this," she encouraged. "It's hot, but at least it's not raining. One step at a time…don't forget to hydrate…stay in there." I ran next to her until my heart was lifted and my legs were aching. I finally had to slow down. "No problem." She waved and kept going.

Which of these two describes the counsel you seek?

John Ashcroft writes:

Many kids wake up to the smell of coffee brewing or the sound of a rooster crowing. My wake-up call was my father's passionate praying filtering through the house. Sometimes I'd ease downstairs and join him. One knee was usually raised, so I'd slip in underneath, shielded by his body as he pleaded for my soul.

I never caught Dad praying for our happiness. He realized that the pursuit of happiness for its own sake is a frustrating, disillusioning, often futile effort. Happiness usually hides from those addicted to its sugar, while it chases after those caught up in something more lasting than momentary excitement.

I never heard him pray for a bigger house, car, or bank account. Instead, he prayed that our hearts would be ignited and inspired to do things of eternal consequence. "Turn our eyes from the temporal, the physical, and the menial," he prayed, "and toward the eternal, the spiritual, and the noble."

My father never pressured us toward achievement. He knew that the push had to come from inner reserves, not outward designs. He simply dangled before us the possibilities. Thanks to his example, we sometimes took the bait.

For more than 30 years, Gordon Mackenzie worked at Hallmark, eventually convincing the company to create a special title for him: "creative paradox." Along with challenging corporate normalcy at Hallmark, MacKenzie did a lot of creativity workshops for elementary schools. And those workshops led to a fascinating observation that he shares in his book Orbiting the Giant Hairball.

MacKenzie would ask the kids upfront: "How many artists are there in the room?" And he said the pattern of responses never varied.

In the first grade, the entire class waved their arms like maniacs. Every child was an artist. In the second grade, about half of the kids raised their hands. In the third grade, he'd get about 10 out of 30 kids. And by the time he got to the sixth grade, only 1 or 2 kids would tentatively and self-consciously raise their hands.

All the schools he went to seemed to be involved in "the suppression of creative genius." They weren't doing it on purpose, but society's goal is to make us less foolish. As MacKenzie says, "From the cradle to the grave, the pressure is on: Be normal."

After all of his research, he came to this conclusion: "My guess is that there was a time—perhaps when you were very young—when you had at least a fleeting notion of your own genius and were just waiting for some authority figure to come along and validate it for you. But none ever came."

Once a month, a group of dedicated professionals ventures into their community to serve those less fortunate than themselves. They're not carrying hammers and nails to build a house, or ladles and pots to work in a soup kitchen. Rather, they're armed with blow-dryers, scissors, and nail polish. Oh yes, and love.

The volunteers of HIM—Hairdressers in the Marketplace, a ministry at Willow Creek Community Church in suburban Chicago—host monthly Day of Beauty sessions where women in need receive free pampering, from haircuts to manicures, but also hear about God's love for them. HIM also goes to nursing homes for the poor, homeless shelters, and facilities for the mentally handicapped to provide free haircuts.

Hairstylist Teresa Russo-Cox founded the ministry in 1998 after trying numerous volunteer positions at Willow Creek, where she attended. None felt like the right fit for her skills and passions. For a while, she wrestled with God. "Why did you give me a talent that's so much about vanity?" she prayed. "How can I serve you?"

She says God answered those prayers with a vision for a group that not only communicates God's love and care to women in need, but also reaches out to stylists themselves. "That's what sets us apart from other ministries that offer haircuts to the poor," explains Teresa. "We focus on evangelism to the beauty industry, which is filled with so much darkness. Its underlying message is all about external things—glamour and glitz. I want to bring the light of God's Word into our industry."

And it's working. At one 2006 event, the clients were teen girls going through drug and alcohol rehab. Melissa says she was surprised by the girls' reactions: "They told me they hadn't had 'sober' fun before—they'd never experienced that."

"I had no self-esteem," says Doreen, who was invited to another Day of Beauty after she and her two preschool children left her alcoholic, abusive husband. "That day gave me a boost on the outside, but it helped me on the inside, too. They made me feel beautiful, special, and deserving."

Chiropractor Perry Hefty and his wife, Arlys, wanted to be in what they considered "ministry" for many years. One day when Perry was crying out to God about this deep desire, he heard God speak: "Begin with what you have."

So instead of getting the $2.5 million he would have needed to start a healthcare ministry and retreat center for missionaries, pastors, and other full-time Christian workers, Perry started doing what he could: giving free chiropractic services to Christian workers who were in financial and physical need. That was in 1994. Since that time, Perry's office has given away hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of services—about a third of his business—to help restore physical, and often spiritual, health.

"Many of the missionaries and Christian workers who came to the office were deeply discouraged," says Perry. "But they felt they needed to put on a bright and happy face so they could raise ministry support. So we dedicated ourselves and our facility to being used by the Lord to heal and restore his people." Perry and Arlys prayed for people in the office, encouraged them, and counseled them, often building relationships that continued long after treatment ended.

When Perry constructed a new office building in 1999, he and a prayer team prayed over the land, the building project, and the business and ministry that would take place there. Even after they moved into the building, Perry says he often stayed late to anoint the doorways with oil and pray for the people who would come in the next day.

"Patients noticed the difference. They would often comment, 'Wow, it just feels so peaceful here,'" Perry says.

The Heftys still dream of building that Christian retreat center. But in the meantime, they've learned that God is happy to use them to minister, whatever business they're in.

The following is an object lesson you might use in a sermon:

Text: "Let us stop passing judgment on one another. Instead, make up your mind not to put any stumbling block or obstacle in your brother's way" (Romans 14:13).

Principle: Rather than becoming a hindrance, we should aid each other's spiritual journey

Objects: Set up two pathways on either side of the platform. One path is strewn with stones of various sizes and shapes making an uneven walkway. The other path is laid out with patio stones.

Action: Have someone struggle across the uneven path. Then have that same person walk on the stepping-stones. Refer to Romans 14:13 and explain how we can choose to impede the spiritual progress of other Christians, or we can do what helps a person move forward with Christ.

Purpose: To encourage believers to edify rather than criticize one another.

There are those who desire to acquire knowledge for its own value--and this is a base vanity. But there are others who desire to have it to edify others--and this is charity. And there are others who desire it so that they may be edified--and this is wisdom.

Our age is one of specialization, and yet, for the most part, lay education programs have taken a generalist direction. Programs designed with study guides and deepening faith questions have been widely accepted. In the end, however, lay ministers may still be left with a great deal of new and important knowledge, but no practical ideas on how to share it. If there are no opportunities for expressing their deepening faith, then the impression of their studies will be of little value, except self-edification. And we are not called as Christians to wallow in our own knowledge.

One and the same exhortation does not suit all. For the things that profit some often hurt others; seeing that also for the most part herbs which nourish some animals are fatal to others; and the medicine which abates one disease aggravates another; and the food which invigorates the life of the strong kills little children.

Therefore according to the quality of the hearers ought the discourse of teachers be fashioned, so as to suit all and each for their several needs, and yet never deviate from the art of common edification. Every teacher also, that he may edify all in the one virtue of charity, ought to touch the hearts of his hearers out of one doctrine, but not with one and the same exhortation.