For God sent not His son into the world to condemn the world

The floods have lifted up, O Lord, the floods have lifted up their voice; the floods lift up their waves.

The LORD on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, yea, than the mighty waves of the sea.  Psalm 93:3-4

This morning, while I was waiting for my Italian expresso pot to do its magic, I wrote a little thank you note to The Quartz newsfeed.  Curiously enough, I specifically thanked them for helping me hold back the noise of many waters: Indeed, I, like our society in general, am swept over by the tidal wave of information.  But more and more frequently, I find that you are whom I turn to in that early morning moment to help me sift through the crashing flood to what is of value.  And interest.  Interesting is good.  

One of the interesting articles was by the Harvard Business Review and the value of praise in the workplace.  The research showed that the factor that made the greatest difference between the most and least successful of 60 strategic-business-unit leadership teams was praise– as defined by such comments as “I agree with you,” or “thank you for your efforts.” The ideal praise to criticism ratio for greatest productivity and effectiveness– was 5.6 to 1.  The medium-performance teams averaged 1.9 (almost twice as many positive comments than negative ones.) But the average for the low-performing teams, at 0.36 to 1, was almost three negative comments for every positive one.

“Negative feedback is important when we're heading over a cliff to warn us that we'd really better stop doing something horrible or start doing something we're not doing right away. But even the most well-intentioned criticism can rupture relationships and undermine self-confidence and initiative. It can change behavior, certainly, but it doesn't cause people to put forth their best efforts.”

“Only positive feedback can motivate people to continue doing what they're doing well, and do it with more vigor, determination, and creativity. Perhaps that's why we have found with the vast majority of the leaders in our database, who have no outstanding weaknesses, that positive feedback is what motivates them to continue improvement. In fact, for those in our database who started above average already (but are still below the 80th percentile), positive feedback works like negative feedback did for the bottom group. Focusing on their strengths enabled 62% of this group to improve a full 24 percentage points (to move from the 55th to the 79th percentile). The absolute gains are not as great as they are for the most-at-risk leaders, since they started so much further ahead. But the benefits to the organization of making average leaders into good ones is far greater, because it puts them on the road to becoming the exceptional leaders that every organization desperately needs.”

This conversation ties in with last week’s family dinner conversation, with a very admirable and thoughtful Brandon Coverdale leading the way with his query to Dustin and Heather and me on effective teachers, and how they should deal with unruly students to pull them into line.  And what we all three learned from painful trial and error was positive and specific praise was what worked on the Southside– marvelously well.  And apparently in the workplace.  And, according to Zenger and Folkman, in marriages as well.  

So I know all about this.  Jerry Bowen’s eyebrows rightfully lifted in doubt when I raised my hand to step into the world of secretaryism.  There was certainly a steep learning curve: how to answer the telephone with the proper blend of courteous warmth yet distant professionalism, how to wrestle Excel files into proper tidy submission, how to sit at a computer hour after hour– shoulders back, face away from the screen.  Proper.  Suddenly my enthusiastic Tigger bounce bounce had little place in my day-to-day life. And I had certainly never heard of an em or en dash and really what did it matter?  A lot.  

But Sue.  Dear, beloved Sue.  She squinted her eyes and peered into all these noisy, crashing waves and threw me a life buoy.  Her praise was not the faint, “Well, well, um.  Good job,” that flutter throughout our world helplessly. Unhelpnessly.   Or a lazy happy face taped on top.  Positive. Positive. Positive. Positive. Positive.  And, oh, by the way Christy, have you ever considered this?  Word by word, smile by smile, she watered my sprigs of competency, and they sort of unfurled.  A bit.  

Marco, who is learning company leadership the hard way, in a swaying skyscraper so far away in Shanghai, sent me a letter he had written to his particularly inept and clueless staff.  It was impressive.  While it was perfectly clear that the audience was stunningly careless in the ways of the business world, lacking even the decency to make sure heaps of trash actually landed in the rubbish bin, somehow it was framed in such a way that the reader would straighten up with hope, with clear understanding as well, but with hope that the steep curve could be conquered. And that she was an integral part of a productive and effective team. Marco seems to have mastered cross-cultural communication.

So this weekend Jincheng had a bicycle accident.   The sort that all men dread.  And he had to have seven stitches where no one would wish on his worst enemy, much less a sixteen-year-old boy in a strange culture, strange language, crashing waves so far from home.  But perhaps, just perhaps, he will be able to see the LORD on high in the loving buoys tossed to him by Gio and Gio’s dad, and Nicole and Mary Anne, as he floundered in fear.  Even horror.   So I prayed for him as he lay curled in bed this morning, as I set his white hot dog buns smeared with Nutella next to the ibuprofin bottle and glass of milk.  May this love communicate cross-culturally.

Because each of us are indeed strangers in a strange land.  I got a phone call from Sweden yesterday.  The marvels of modern technology.  And a question from Matteo.  Who is working through this cross-cultural communication as well– how to convey the truth of Jesus to this ever-so-hungry Hindu?  And the little brochure that the Norwegian pastor gave him to share felt too complicated, too many confusing negatives that distract from the positive message of For God so loved the world.   So what one verse would I suggest to turn into a prayer for his friend?  How to communicate truth to someone who speaks a different worldview? I sent him the Roman Road + my ACSI password verse: John 3:17.  But it is a question that has echoed in my head all day.

Because the Vineyard has been working through some stories of Jesus as he interfaced with the folks in His world.  And that has been what has struck me the most actually.  This is a man who speaks the truth.  Yet a bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth justice unto victory. He might smack the occasional stiff-necked Pharisee upside his stiff-necked head, but when faced with the bound woman caught in adultery, he scrabbled in the dust.  He starts where we are.  Where I am.  And moves forward.  Up and over the crashing waves.  Into safe harbor.  

Selah.