First Opinions

Sharing a few opinions on this and that today --

I've talked about comics in this space before. Today I think I'm through with reading Lyn Johnston's For Better or For Worse. It is a dying strip with Johnston running out of steam and she nears her planned retirement. I read comics for the humor, or at least for some kind of thought that brightens my day. Those moments have been rare in FBOFW lately. Today's blatant endorsement of homosexual marriage is a final straw for me. If I want liberal politics in my comics, I'll read Doonesbury. (If the link leads to the a different FBOFW comic, look for the August 6 strip).

Last week, we had out-of-state family visiting. It was their first time in the Northwest and we wanted to show them around the area. One day we drove as far as the highway goes up Mount Baker. We saw fantastic mountain scenery and lots of snow -- even on the first day of August. You can see some of our pictures here.

It was a little past noon as we drove back down the mountain so we began looking for some place to eat lunch. In the small town of Glacier, we found a roadside restaurant which looked promising. The food was acceptable and the prices were not too far from being reasonable. However, the menu made me wonder about the owner's marketing savvy. Like McDonald's or Burger King, it was self-serve as far as water and soft drinks. No problem there, except that apparently large tips were still expected since the menu noted that a 20% gratuity would be added for parties of six or more. Luckily, we had only five in our little group. Then the menu noted that in order to provide speedy delivery of food, no changes in the food order were permitted. Burger King might let you 'have it your way,' but this place wasn't buying into that idea. "You eat it the way we serve it, or you don't eat it at all" was the message I was getting from their menu. Finally, the menu declared that only one check would be presented at each table and the patrons would have to make their own arrangements about sharing costs since the cashier was so busy she could not take time to separate orders at the cash register.

In other words, this particular restaurant seemed to be going out of its way to be customer-unfriendly. Unless the owner is a grump by natural disposition, it makes me wonder. Does this place have so much business that it needed to discourage customers in order to provide good service? There are places where that might be necessary, but it didn't seem to be so in this little rural restaurant. There were several other patrons for lunch that day, but the place was not exceedingly busy. There was no wait for a table and several other tables were available. And this is the height of western Washington's very short summer season. It is doubtful they are much busier at any other time.

After thinking about it for a while, I think I have figured out what was going on. The management of that restaurant apparently is made up of people with the kind of personalities that value following a system more than they do pleasing people. It's efficient to serve the same dishes to all customers regardless of what they want. It's efficient to have customers get their own drinks. It's efficient (for the cashier and server) to make customers split the tab on their own. Clearly this place was run by people who were more concerned about making things easier for themselves than they were about pleasing their patrons.

Now what application does this have to leadership in the church? I think I see some lessons.

1. Unlike this restaurant, some churches are too intent on pleasing the "customer." We might forget that it is Christ's church, not ours. Likewise, it does not belong to those who visit and who might be prospects for membership if we can just do the right things to attract them. Church leaders should want to be sensitive to the needs and desires of both members and visitors, but things need to be kept in perspective. The most important thing is pleasing the Lord. His will is revealed to us in the Bible and our top priority must be to do what He wants us to do.

2. However, while recognizing what I have just said about pleasing God ahead of pleasing people, we need to be careful that we don't fall into the same trap that the management of that little roadside restaurant. If we start valuing our own systems and structures more than we value people, we are in trouble. Responding to what people want may make extra work for us. Changing incidental things to accommodate others requires change, and some people just don't like to change things.

We need to be careful about the unspoken message we send out to those who come our way. That restaurant conveyed a message to me that I was not as important as their system of doing things in the way that pleased them. The result of getting that message is that if I'm ever traveling that way again at mealtime, I'm likely to try the restaurant across the highway instead of stopping there again.

If people visit our church services and go away with the same message -- people here don't really care about me -- they are probably going to look for somewhere else to worship next time.

The old "JOY bus" slogan expresses my point very well. Put Jesus first -- always. But put Others second. Finally, put Yourself last.