Out With the Old

Last year Andrew Faiz asked readers to share their stories. Here’s one.

For almost 15 years, I’ve been the keeper of our family tree and have been diligently searching – and finding – generation upon generation of ancestors. My cousin Nathalie, at the age of 100 and legally blind, decided to type out the family history and over a six month period churned out an amazing 110 pages. Since she and my grandfather were double cousins – their mothers were sisters who married two brothers – her history is my history. As we went through the records and talked about her life, almost every story she told started with, “Oh, the changes I’ve seen!” And each story ended with, “Oh well, out with the old, in with the new.”

Things have a way of changing whether we want them to or not. Benjamin Franklin said that the only things certain in life are death and taxes. As an amateur genealogist, I spend a lot of time looking at death and tax records. I relish the hunt for lost generations. Nothing warms up a cold winter evening like digging through dusty documents or trying to decipher an ancestor’s hand-written diary. I spend way too many hours using Google Earth to zoom in on the still-standing cottage in England that a forbearer lived in during the early 1800’s. But as much as I enjoy delving into the past, I can’t live there – no matter how comforting or comfortable it is. Even though I understand the need for change, it isn’t always easy. In fact, the older I get (great grandchild number 4 was born last December), the harder it is for me to embrace the changes that are happening in my family, my work, my neighbourhood and even my church.

First it was the old hymns. I remember the Sunday back in 1977 when I first attended my current church. I’d been part of a very traditional Presbyterian church in California and had grown up in a small United congregation where we sang the same old hymns week after week. They were full of words that I never used in everyday conversation and the melodies were often hard to follow. But the harmonies, when the choir and congregation could get them, were nice. All in all, they really didn’t mean much to me. So on that first Sunday, when we stood around the inside of the sanctuary holding hands and singing “Lord of the Dance” I was dumbfounded. It was upbeat and fun and contemporary – remember it was the 70’s – and I understood the meaning of every word. We continued to sing choruses at retreats and sing-alongs but the hymns stood their ground on Sunday mornings. Then in the late 80’s there was a subtle shift. A new chorus would be introduced here and there with the words either projected on a screen or printed in the bulletin. We’d switch back and forth between The Book of Praise and the contemporary songs. By the time we moved into our new building in 1998, there were no longer hymn books in the pews. For many of our congregation who didn’t grow up in the church, this made perfect sense. But for some, it is just another example of out with the old, in with the new.

Our church recently purchased a new baptismal font. Well, it’s not really a “font” so much as a pretty dish on a metal stand. Very modern looking. It replaces the tarnished silver bowl housed in a rickety oak cabinet that was donated in memory of someone who died in 1923. Now I know that some of the older members of our congregation will get their knickers in a knot over this. And I was almost one of them until I thought long and hard about it. Does it really matter? Does being baptized by water from a historic piece of ecumenical furniture “take” better? Seems to me it’s more about the words that are said, the commitment that is made, the support that is offered by the congregation, than it is about the vessel that is used. But for some, it is just another example of out with the old, in with the new.

When I was ordained as an elder back in the early 80’s, our session and board of managers was made up of the “old guard” – folks who had served faithfully for many years. We valued their wisdom but secretly called them “old fogies” whenever they voted against a change that we, the “younger” generation, put forward. Now, as a member of the new old guard, I have to remind myself that change is not only inevitable, it is necessary. I want my church to be the place where my next generations want to be on any Sunday morning. My four year old great granddaughter loves her class in our children’s ministry and calls me every Saturday to make sure I’m picking her up for church. In her class, they sing upbeat songs, sit on mats on the floor, do crafts and learn about Jesus in a fun and highly interactive environment. Would she be that excited about Sundays if she were experiencing it the way I grew up – sitting in a circle on bum-pinching cracked wooden chairs, listening to the Sunday School teacher go on and on and on? I doubt it. Our fast-paced, interactive, digital world may not be ideal but it is reality. Just another example of out with the old, in with the new.

Every year we hear of more and more small congregations closing their doors. And, for many of them, it is because of an unwillingness to change. As long as we continue to hold tightly to those hymn books, baptismal fonts and antiquated classroom environments – and all that they represent – we won’t be able to keep up. And if the church doesn’t keep up, it will close up. It won’t be out with the old, in with the new; it will just be out with the old.

Ezra 3:11-13 NIV
With praise and thanksgiving they sang to the Lord: “He is good; his love toward Israel endures forever.” And all the people gave a great shout of praise to the Lord, because the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid. But many of the older priests and Levites and family heads, who had seen the former temple, wept aloud when they saw the foundation of this temple being laid, while many others shouted for joy. No one could distinguish the sound of the shouts of joy from the sound of weeping, because the people made so much noise. And the sound was heard far away.