A Case for a Technology Sabbath
Last week the Perry’s had a family reunion at Camp Anjigami in northern Ontario, Canada. The trip was a result of our boys and I “taking a risk” by inviting our entire extended family to join us for our annual fishing trip.It was a risk because going to northern Ontario means there’s absolutely no connectivity, and we had no idea how everyone would handle such a 5 day “technology sabbath”.
Well the consensus from the family was simply this – it was an incredible vacation. Our family said things such as
“The most relaxing vacation I ever had”
“I got to know my cousins in a way I never have before”
“It was so nice not having any distractions”
There’s no doubt that the lack of television, video games, cell phones, text messages, internet surfing and social media monitoring was a major contributor to this great experience (as well as being in God’s stunning creation). Why? Because all of these technologies add stress and distractions instead of eliminate them.
But it wasn’t just the lack of technology that eliminated stress and distractions, the difference was the lack of the temptation to use it (you can’t get cell service or internet in the Canadian wilderness). You see, we tend not to crave the chocolate cake when it’s out of our line of sight or reach. This is especially true when we’re immersed in so many other incredible things (people, nature, facilities).
So the lesson I took away from our family reunion? Take the occasional break from technology but do it in a place that’s beautiful, peaceful, with great people, and where there’s no possible temptation to be connected, then you’ll have a true sabbath (rest).
C.S. Lewis on Reading Old Books
C.S. Lewis got it right in his assessment of benefits and the necessity of reading old books. Now I just need to do a better job of following his advice.
“There is a strange idea abroad that in every subject the ancient books should be read only by the professionals, and that the amateur should be content himself with the modern books….This mistaken preference for the modern books and this shyness of the old ones is nowhere more rampant than in theology….Now this seems to me to be topsy-turvy. Naturally, since I myself am a writer, I do not wish the ordinary reader to read no modern books. But if he must read only the new or only the old, I would advise him to read the old….it is a good rule, after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between. If that is too much for you, you should at least read on old one to every three new ones….We all…need the books that will correct the characteristic mistakes of our own period. And that means the old books….We may be sure that the characteristic blindness of the twentieth century…lies where we have never suspected it….None of us can fully escape this blindness….The only palliative is to keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds, and this can be done only by reading old books.”
Quoted by John Piper in God’s Passion for His Glory, from C.S. Lewis’ “On Reading of Old Books” in God in the Dock
It’s Much More than a Blob!
The lifeguard gathered the Copper Country (4th through 6th grade camp) kids around him after an hour of playing on the Gusher. If you don’t 
know, the Gusher is a high and long “slip and slide” that empties into one of our lakes. One of the things campers like to do is to try to spin (roll over multiple times) all the way down, seeing how many spins they can achieve before landing in the lake below.As the campers gathered, the lifeguard asked them a series of questions in what we call a “debrief.” The debrief is where we use the activity the campers just participated in as an object lesson to reinforce and bring to life the spiritual themes of the week. It’s for this reason that we debrief all
our activities from the zipline to paintball and even the Gusher, and why debriefs are such a critical part of the SpringHill Experience.You see our activities are tools for helping campers grasp and remember the spiritual truths we want them to take home with them. It’s one of the main ways we integrate faith and fun.
In the best debriefs, the activity staff asks a series of questions, leading the campers to discover the connection between the activity and the spiritual theme for themselves.
Questions like this lifeguard asked “could you spin a
thousand times on your own down the Gusher?” and of course the answer is “no way”. Then the lifeguard asked “can you get to heaven on your own?” and kids answered with “yes”, “no” and “maybe”. Which led lifeguard to explain that to have eternal life requires something outside of ourselves just like spinning a 1000 times down the Gusher would require something outside of our selves. And, of course the lifeguard explained, that something outside ourselves we need to “get to heaven” is Jesus Christ.It was a simple 5 minute debrief but it beautifully reinforced an important spiritual truth that these young boys will keep with them for a long time.
Can You Relate to this Camper’s Dilemma?
“When I came to camp I had a problem. My heart believed in God but my head didn’t believe in Him” explained one of our campers from Copper Country (4th thru 6th grade camp) at our week ending rally.He shared that he struggled with this nagging doubt (my words) during the first few days of camp. But it was at Wednesday evening’s campfire where the opportunity to work out this tension opened up for him.
You see, during the campfire time, this young camper’s Area Director clearly presented the Good News of Christ and asked campers who had questions or wanted to make a faith decision to stay back after the campfire. And of course this young man did.
And as he put it “I went straight up to my Area Director and said ‘I have a problem and I need your help in solving it.'” So the he and his Area Director sat down on a log where he proceeded to share how his heart had faith in God but his head didn’t.
After much discussion, prayer and through the wise leading of his Area Director, this young man was able to announce on Friday to the crowd of 2000 people “Thanks to my Area Director, I now believe in God, not just in my heart but also with my head.”
Then in a final question, when asked what this new faith will mean to his life when he goes home, he answered “I will read my Bible every day because I want to get to know this God I now fully believe in.”
Talking with someone whose walked before you and then reading God’s Word is the perfect combination of assistance one needs when navigating and overcoming nagging doubt as this young camper demonstrated.
Some Lessons Learned the Hard Way about being Connected 24/7
On any given day I have people contacting me by voice through my office phone and smart phone, via email accessed through my laptop, IPAD and smart phone, text messages via my smart phone, as well as people contacting me through Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn,and on my Blog all accessed, as well, by my laptop, IPAD and smart phone.This simply means, if I allow myself, I can be responding to people’s inquiries (in other words, working at my job) 24/7 on four different tools through seven different communication mediums (yes insane, but I have no one to blame but myself). So out of sheer necessity I’ve learned the following lessons and have incorporated them into my routine in an attempt to put some sanity into my work and personal life.
- First, when I’m off work, I don’t answer any of the above except for personal contacts and when I receive a text signaling an emergency at camp (we have a protocol for this).
- Second, when I’m on, I look at and respond to inquiries from all 7 mediums only 3 times day – first thing in the morning (usually between 5:30 and 6:30 am), after lunch and before I go home.
- Third, my goal is to respond within 24 hours except over weekends and vacations (I’ll admit I can do better on this one).
- Fourth, I don’t answer any inquiries from any mediums when I’m with people – be it meetings, meals, casual conversations, or on the phone. I think it’s inconsiderate and inefficient use of my time and the time of the people I’m with. My goal is always to focus first and foremost on the person, or people, I’m with.
- Finally, I prioritize my responses this way – phone calls first, followed by texted messages, then emails, my blog and finally Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter (so now you know how to increase your chances of a quicker response).
I’m not perfect at all of this, but when I’m disciplined in this way my life seems to have a bit more sanity and make a bit more sense.
How the Mighty Fall
In Jim Collins’ helpful book “How the Mighty Fall” he describes the following tell-tale signs of an organization in the first stage of decline from “greatness.”- “Success, entitlement, arrogance: Success is viewed as ‘deserved,’ rather than fortuitous, fleeting, or even hard-earned in the face of daunting odds; people begin to believe that success will continue almost no matter what the organization decides to do, or not to do.
- Neglect of the primary flywheel: Distracted by extraneous threats, adventures, and opportunities, leaders neglect a primary flywheel, failing to renew it with the same creative intensity that made it great in the first place.
- ‘What’ replaces ‘why’: The rhetoric of success (‘We’re successful because we do these specific things’) replaces understanding and insight (‘We’re successful because we understand why we do these specific things and under what conditions they would no longer work’).
- Decline in learning orientation: Leaders lose the inquisitiveness and learning orientation that mark those truly great individuals who, no matter how successful they become, maintain a learning curve as steep as when they first began their careers.”
I consider making a regular and honest assessment of SpringHill (and myself) against these markers one of my top priorities. I have no doubt the moment I stop the self assessment, both I and SpringHill, have taken the first step towards decline.
Where Center Stage isn’t Central
As I’ve traveled around the SpringHill world this summer one of the things I’ve seen at every one of our locations is the high number of staff who are incredibly talented on stage. Whether it’s speaking, acting, singing, or performing musical instruments every one of our 14 summer camp teams have people who are funny, compelling and clear when they step on stage.
Now the ironic part of having this wealth of talented people doing great work is the fact that what happens on stage isn’t central to our programming, not by a long – shot. It’s the small group and the intimate communities we work so hard to create that is the center of the SpringHill Experience. In contrast the stage, and the talent that uses it, ultimately exists only for the purpose of setting up, reinforcing and making the small group and its leader successful.
In other words, at SpringHill, if Jesus is King, then the small, intimate community is queen, the counselor is the knighted ambassador serving both, and the stage talent becomes the trusted advisors to the ambassadors – our counselors.It can be deceptive if someone observes our programming in action and sees only the great stage productions, without seeing where the powerful ministry really happens – in the small community. Yet the truth is the small communities we’re able to form in a SpringHill Experience couldn’t happen as they do without the aid of the talented people who stand up on stage and do what they do so well. It’s when these talented people share their gift from stage knowing all along when center stage isn’t central their work becomes its most powerful and effective, opening the door for life-transformation.
A Camper Shares Her SpringHill Story
One of our campers, Anne, wrote out her SpringHill story and this is what she said –“I learned a lot at my first week of SpringHill. I learned how to zipeline, blob, twist on the water slide, but most importantly, I learned about God. Our theme this week was God has a plan for us! The Bible stories we read were about Moses from when he was born to when he saved the Israelites. I learned a lot from those stories. We learned about sin, God’s plan, forgiveness, and trusting in God. God is always with us, keeping us safe. I also took a lot from Moses’ story. Like how Moses killed an Egyptian, yet God still forgave him! I also learned about God’s love and forgiveness is always there, you just have to accept it. He is always there. In bad situations he is there crying with you. When we sin and then accept his forgiveness, he wraps you up and you start over and he fills you with his love.
I think all that I learned here at SpringHill will carry with me for the rest of my life. When I get home I think I will be more enthusiastic about God and praying and church. I think I have definitely had a positive change this week. All I can say is I can’t wait to come back next year.”
Now our prayer is that God will use Anne’s week at SpringHill as a foundational step in her becoming, every single day, more and more the person Christ created her to be so she can do all He created and planned for her to do now and throughout the rest of her life.
For Me, Against Me, or for Yourself?
Jeremie Kubicek, President and CEO of Giant Impact, challenges us in his thoughtful book, Leadership is Dead – How Influence is Reviving It, to imagine what the effectiveness of our leadership would look like if we were truly “for others” before we were for ourselves or our organizations.
“Think about it this way: people around you are either for you, against you, or just for themselves. While there may be variations on these three motives, this concept generally holds true…
(Now) take out a sheet of paper and make a short list of the people in your life (business, home, family and so forth). Answer this question for each: ‘Is this person for me, against me, or for himself/herself?’
Revealing isn’t it? Now turn the tide. What would they say you were to them? For them, against them, or for yourself?
The reality is that the majority of people are self-centered. Rarely are people against you. It’s more that they are for themselves and totally driven by self-interest. It’s human nature. Most people I know are in survival mode day-to-day, doing whatever they can to take care of their families and their businesses and organizations. I fall into that mode, and it’s likely that you do too.
What would happen, though if you intentionally demonstrated that you were for the people on this list? You would see amazing changes transpire in the lives of those around you if they knew you were invested in their success as well as your own.
Imagine yourself becoming so significant in other people’s’ lives that you are not only memorable but also valuable to them. Imagine people believing that you want the best for them and understanding that you are for them. Imagine that they open up to you, enabling you to wield true influence and have an impact. Imagine experiencing, as a result of these things, the fulfilling relationships you’ve dreamed of at work and at home.”
The Lesson in Eclipsing 19,000 Summer Campers
“By the summer of 2019, 19,000 kids will attend one of six summer camps.” It was 1997 and the SpringHill board and leadership had just updated and approved the ministry’s strategic plan using Jim Collins and Jerry Porras’ book Built to Last as a guide.
Collins and Porras’ research revealed that enduring organizations had a “Big Hairy Audacious Goal” (BHAG). The “19 by 19” goal, as it was soon to be called, was SpringHill’s BHAGG (we added the first G – God – to our definition).
Now understand, in 1997 SpringHill’s board and leaders were people of talent and faith who wanted to do something significant for kids and Christ’s Kingdom. And the “19 by 19” goal reflected both this desire and the best information available to them at the time.
Yet today as I write, here in the summer of 2012, we just eclipsed this “19 by 19” goal. Please know I’m not sharing this with you so you can be impressed or congratulate us for handily beating our goal, but instead to demonstrate a point about goal setting that Collins and Porras doesn’t address.
In goal setting we tend to be overly optimistic about short-term goals and overly pessimistic about long-term goals. The main reason for this phenomenon is that we tend to think of the future only in the context of what we know in the present. For example, our staff and board knew and understood overnight camping but could not possibly have foreseen the dramatic demographic changes that would lead us to begin our Day Camp ministry nearly 10 years later (this ministry has played a significant role in our beating the 19 by 19 goal seven years early).
The lesson we learned, and then implemented in restating our BHAGG back in 2003 was that a visionary goal isn’t based on a “calculation”. It’s bigger than that, so big that we’d have no any idea how it would be achieved. The goal needed to be big enough “to leave room for God”, as one board member put it. Today our BHAGG is that, by 2025, we’ll have 260,000 people a year experience SpringHill.
Now, to be completely honest, only time will tell if we got this long-term goal setting thing right and whether the next generation of SpringHill leaders will judge us as fool hearted souls or Saturday morning sand baggers.
