I just read the phrase, “Information
Cascade” and I find myself intrigued. An “information
cascade” happens when one person answers a question
wrongly but with a lot of confidence, the second person
to answer it isn’t sure enough to disagree so goes
along with the first person, and then the third person,
who may indeed have the correct answer, decides to agree
with the first two because he/she assumes that both can’t
be wrong. Things just expand from there, with this wrong
answer taking on more and more credibility until some
courageous person finally says, “The emperor has
no clothes.”
The particular context in which I saw the
phrase “information cascade” came from some
research findings that apparently refute the long-held
idea that dietary fats were the direct cause of heart
disease. For almost 20 years now, nutritionists and physicians
were absolutely sure that low-fat diets would slow down
the progression of heart disease. Now it looks like they
were all wrong. Whew! Pass the butter and the well-marbled
steak, please. It’s time to indulge again.
What particularly fascinates me is the
willingness of the crowd to follow the first one to speak
with authority, even when they sense that something may
not be right. It’s age-old peer pressure operating
again, but with such subtlety that it goes unnoticed much
of the time.
I look at the world around me and wonder
how many absolutely wrong ideas we are following because
it is easier to just listen to the one speaking with authority
rather than find out for ourselves and also to trust our
own thoughts.
There’s definitely a challenge here—uninformed
thoughts lead to uninformed opinions. Just because we
think something doesn’t make it right. But just
because someone else thinks something doesn’t make
that right either.
Those who attend the Krum UMC know something
of my own spiritual journey. I’ve longed to know
God and to serve God since my early 20’s. At that
point, I knew there was something far greater that I and
that “something” certainly represented creative
power and redeeming love. In my early years as a Christian,
I spent much time trying to find absolute certainty. I
wanted to know exactly what to believe, how to believe
it, and how to convince others to believe the same things
since I was so sure I was right.
I’m still pretty sure I’m right.
God is love; God is full of creative energies; God is
interested in the redemption of all of creation through
Jesus, the Sent One, so we might live most fully and die
most courageously and be prepared to spend eternity in
glory.
I’m still pretty sure I’m right.
God is love; God is full of creative energies; God is
interested in the redemption of all of creation through
Jesus, the Sent One, so we might live most fully and die
most courageously and be prepared to spend eternity in
glory.
Right now, the “information cascade”
in church growth movements has been saying, “the
bigger, the better.” The more bells and whistles,
the more “contemporary” we can make our worship,
the more successful we will be. It’s so easy to
buy into this. Go big, go fancy, make worship entertaining,
let the people be spectators and walk out feeling good
and maybe they will leave a lot of money in the offering
plate so the church can buy more bells and whistles.
But then I start looking more closely at
Jesus, this Sent One, the One who came to show us most
fully the creative and loving God. Certainly, he attracted
big crowds, but the majority of his time was with those
who were not just there to be entertained, but were there
to learn and to enter into the discipleship relationship.
Disciple is an old-fashioned word. There
doesn’t seem to be a contemporary equivalent. I’ve
tried using “mentor” but it just doesn’t
work. There’s too much distance there. Discipleship
is more demanding, more intimate, more transforming, more
connected. It’s a higher calling. And it is what
Jesus asked his own disciples to do—to make disciples
of others. Disciples may be followers, but they do not
follow the crowd, going along with others because someone
spoke with confidence and it just easiest to agree. Disciples
use their brains and thinking powers with integrity and
independence.
Right now, we’re doing a series on
Sunday mornings about the marks of a Christian. So far,
we’ve talked about obedience.
This Sunday, October 14, will be about thankfulness.
On the 21st, we’re going to talk about justice.
These are all hard words, and evidence of a big and powerful
calling. There is also laughter
and joy and good
memories and so much else that folds into the life
of a disciple. It’s a life lived to deep fullness
and rich beyond imagination.
The “information cascade” on
church life right now may say, “come and be entertained.”
But the real truth is: come and be transformed. It’s
a lot more lasting and a lot more fun in the long run.
