The Pastor’s lips moved, but “Grealve trhso thin nethstht tdownhely frheslf frnidsehs,” (John 15:13) was all I heard. The Word was barely sharper than any doubled-edged mush.
Loudspeakers positioned around the Sanctuary trapped the congregation in a crossfire of voices, and garbled the Pastor’s words. Loudspeakers located on the extreme edges of the altar hit people with sound from the front left and front right. Loudspeakers located in the rear corners of the Sanctuary hit the congregation from the back right and back left.
Each word from each loudspeaker arrived at each person’s ears just slightly behind the last word from some other loudspeaker, causing them to crash into and wreck each other like a multi-car collision. The bombardment of voices garbled the message and confounded the congregation each Sunday.
As an acoustical consultant, the church had hired me to investigate and solve the problem. So I listened intently with a few members of the church staff in the pews as the Pastor spoke from the pulpit. After a minute or two, they turned anxiously, and looked at me for some initial answer. Typically, when consultants or engineers get brought in to solve problems, people expect a lot of complex analysis, in-depth number crunching, and large, multi-syllabic words to explain the mysterious forces of the universe at work and how to harness them. But sometimes, the answer is simple.
So I walked to the soundboard, and unplugged the rear loudspeakers.
Instantly, the Pastor’s words became more understandable. By unplugging half of the noise sources in the Sanctuary, the Pastor’s voice became much clearer.
Jesus often unplugged, too. After feeding 5,000 people, he made the disciples leave in a boat without him, and “he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray” (Matthew 14:23). In Chapter 1 of Mark, while everyone searched for Jesus, He “went off to a solitary place, where he prayed” (Mark 1:35-37). In the Garden of Gethsemane with the disciples, “He withdrew about a stone’s throw beyond them, knelt down and prayed” (Luke 22:41). He only wanted to hear one voice – His Father’s – and He knew the only way to hear it clearly was to the remove clamor of other voices around Him.
Today, so many voices battle for our attention. Kids, cell phones, mp3 players, co-workers, coaches, email, family members, text messages, social networking, etc., are not necessarily bad things. But when we do not control our own exposure to them, they will bombard us with noise. And we can miss God’s message for us, because the noise drowns out and garbles our Father’s voice . . .
. . . unless we take a simple lesson from Jesus, and unplug once and while to pray.
Loudspeakers positioned around the Sanctuary trapped the congregation in a crossfire of voices, and garbled the Pastor’s words. Loudspeakers located on the extreme edges of the altar hit people with sound from the front left and front right. Loudspeakers located in the rear corners of the Sanctuary hit the congregation from the back right and back left.
Each word from each loudspeaker arrived at each person’s ears just slightly behind the last word from some other loudspeaker, causing them to crash into and wreck each other like a multi-car collision. The bombardment of voices garbled the message and confounded the congregation each Sunday.As an acoustical consultant, the church had hired me to investigate and solve the problem. So I listened intently with a few members of the church staff in the pews as the Pastor spoke from the pulpit. After a minute or two, they turned anxiously, and looked at me for some initial answer. Typically, when consultants or engineers get brought in to solve problems, people expect a lot of complex analysis, in-depth number crunching, and large, multi-syllabic words to explain the mysterious forces of the universe at work and how to harness them. But sometimes, the answer is simple.
So I walked to the soundboard, and unplugged the rear loudspeakers.
Instantly, the Pastor’s words became more understandable. By unplugging half of the noise sources in the Sanctuary, the Pastor’s voice became much clearer.
Jesus often unplugged, too. After feeding 5,000 people, he made the disciples leave in a boat without him, and “he went up on a mountainside by himself to pray” (Matthew 14:23). In Chapter 1 of Mark, while everyone searched for Jesus, He “went off to a solitary place, where he prayed” (Mark 1:35-37). In the Garden of Gethsemane with the disciples, “He withdrew about a stone’s throw beyond them, knelt down and prayed” (Luke 22:41). He only wanted to hear one voice – His Father’s – and He knew the only way to hear it clearly was to the remove clamor of other voices around Him.
Today, so many voices battle for our attention. Kids, cell phones, mp3 players, co-workers, coaches, email, family members, text messages, social networking, etc., are not necessarily bad things. But when we do not control our own exposure to them, they will bombard us with noise. And we can miss God’s message for us, because the noise drowns out and garbles our Father’s voice . . .
. . . unless we take a simple lesson from Jesus, and unplug once and while to pray.
