Good Communications — George Verwer

Paul and Barnabas’s Communication Breakdown

Can you turn to Acts chapter 15? In Acts chapter 15, we find a very interesting incident. Sometimes the church seems to forget, or maybe it doesn't. Verse 36, some days after Paul said unto Barnabas, Let us go again and visit our brethren in every city, where we have preached the word of the Lord.

Let's see how they do. That's a normal thing. We send people out to visit O .M. teams in the summer. See how they're doing. Visit the O .M. bases and teams during the year. That's one of Viv Thomas' ministries.

See how they're doing. Barnabas determined to take with them John, whose surname was Mark. But Paul thought it not good to take him with them, who departed from them from Pamphylia, and went not with them to the work.

I'm sure your translation sounds a little smoother than this old English. Basically, Mark was somewhat of a deserter, having left Paul's previous team. So when Barnabas, great son of compassion, really Paul's senior, wanted to bring Mark, they had a communication problem.

Isn't that amazing? Two great men of God, great heroes, were all patterning our life after these people, and they had a communication problem. And the contention was so sharp between them, oh, if we had only had a movie, that they departed asunder, one from the other.

And so Barnabas took Mark and sailed on to Cyprus. They were in the ships back then, as you probably are aware. Can we have that in a modern translation? Verse 39. Words for contention and disagreement.

What does your Bible say? Matilda, is that English? Sharp disagreement? Bob? Okay, it's from the Greek Scholar Department. Anybody else have some light on that word, contention? Well, I think we've got enough.

Paul chose Silas, plan B. Paul chose Silas and departed being commended by the brethren unto the grace of God. And he went through Syria, Cilicia, confirming the churches. And of course, we know the result of that particular trip.

Communication, Unity, and Disunity in Christian Ministry

Now, you can go right back into Genesis, right through the book of Revelation, and you can make an amazing study on the whole area of communication. A high percentage of our difficulties in our own ministry, on our own teams, are in the area of communication.

And this is something that I think we need to talk about far more often and study and read about. And I am still a learner, I can assure you. I had the privilege of going through David Cummings' tapes a couple of years ago.

That was basically on communications to our prayer partners, to our churches. That actually is not my greatest burden, and that's not particularly what's on my heart tonight. It's an important area, unlimited scope for improvement.

But, you know, if a group of people over here are not interested in getting involved with OM, you know, fine, that's not my biggest concern. But if they're fighting among themselves and dividing, that is what really puts an ache in my heart.

God has given OM, it's frightening, a very important ministry in building unity in the body of Christ. I don't know if you can imagine the impact of the ship in this area. As they go from port to port in these cities where the church is so divided, even in Canada, there are people that said, if this group is on the committee, we are not coming onto the committee.

And let me just say something that's very important, especially for so many of you who are new. Don't be naive about disunity. Don't go praying some flippant little prayer that all the Christians are going to all be united together until you study a little bit of what's involved.

Because you are talking about something far more difficult than sending the Dallas Cowboys to play cricket on the moon. Christians are of a tremendously difficult and different viewpoint on many, many issues, and they are not small issues.

Some of the things I touch on in this little talk may be small issues that can be overcome. But many of the issues that are dividing people and dividing churches are not small issues. Just like oftentimes we are very naive about some of the struggles people have in marriage.

I've been listening to John Stott today on marriage. I've been going through his lectures on the contemporary school of Christianity. Think of all the money and time they pay to go to that school. I've got all the tapes for nothing.

I have it right in my office while I'm trying to shuffle around my papers. His lecture on homosexuality is brilliant, just brilliant. He can speak on the subject because he's a single man. And the people who are crusading for homosexuals to be able to do anything they want and get married and all that, and the strong push that says, look, how can you deny a man or a woman the privilege of sex just because they are homosexual?

And of course this is based on the fact that they don't think anybody can live on the planet without sex. And of course he, as a single man who has lived in purity and reality, points out that it is possible to have a fulfilling life without sex or without sexual intercourse because sex is a bigger thing than sexual intercourse.

I don't want to get into talking about those tapes because it's so great and so vast and it's not specifically what I'm sharing about. I wanted to read something from this book by Swindoll. He said, John Wesley and George Whitefield were good friends in their earlier years, Wesley having begun his outdoor preaching ministry at Whitefield's encouragement.

As time went on, men disagreed with Whitefield's leaning more heavily toward Calvinism, his younger friend's Arminianism. When Whitefield died, Wesley was asked if he expected to see Whitefield in heaven.

In exaggerated but honest respect, he said no. He will be so near the throne of God that men like me will never even get a glimpse at him. Though differing, they did not lose their sense of oneness in Christ.

It has been my observation that well-meaning but narrow-minded evangelicals in this generation have spent far too much time camping on a few differences and thereby opening our ranks to disunity and petty infighting and not enough time accentuating the vast number of things that link us together.

And the result has been weakness rather than strength, a divided, splintered, fractured body of Christian cripples instead of that mighty army of cracked troops, he had just quoted from Onward Christian Soldiers, marching as to war.

What a powerful state. Well, I don't think we need to go into, because we're limited in time, great proofs about the divisions in the body. I'd rather share some of the areas where probably Satan is trying to hinder us in our own unity or things in our lives which will bring disunity.

One of the great problems, as we've emphasized a number of times this year, is when you leave O .N. and you try to go back to a so-called normal secular situation and to try to communicate what you've learned on O .N.

The problem is not the lack of sincerity, generally. The problem is a lack of communication skills or other things which I'm going to touch on right now. I think you know by now one of my favorite verses.

It's not a favorite in some ways. It's where it says in Corinthians, let's not be ignorant of Satan's devices. Let's not be naive. And let us understand some of the strategies, some of the methods that Satan has used to try to bring disunity, as he brought disunity between Paul and Barnabas, as he brought disunity between Whitefield and Wesley, though it was broken down somewhere later on.

You know, the greatest tragedy in Methodism is that when the pressure came after Wesley's death, though he predicted it before he died, greater disunity came. And, of course, Methodism was one of the groups that went the fastest into liberalism.

And there are, of course, a large growing segment of evangelical Methodists. But the Methodist Church in some places is, you know, just... If Wesley has to look at it from up there, I mean, it must be something.

I don't know how he handles Heaven. I guess he can. Maybe he can't see it. That sounds a little more sensible. What are some of the enemies of reality in this thing of communication? Just a few that I would like to share.

And I really believe if you could work on some of these things in your own life and avoid either one extreme or the other, it'll help you on your team right now, the next couple of weeks. We don't want the next couple of weeks to be miserable for anybody here.

You know, I know you feel we emphasize brokenness, but we are not trying to arrange your situation so that you can get, you know, all broken up. We haven't purposely put somebody on your team or living in your flat who's a pain in the neck so that you could learn the crucified life.

God handles that. We're actually wanting to arrange things so things can go smoothly. What are some of the things that often bring disunity in the body, on our own teams, in the Church? I've listed number one, not because of its importance, but just to get started.

Rigid Thinking, Pride, and Prejudice

Rigid thinking. That's very much linked with pride and prejudice. Pride and prejudice. Last year we had to make a statement to our leaders, especially to some other people from different countries, to take it a little easy on the Americans.

The Americans being the sort of big nation with big TV coverage, and their mistakes are greatly publicized. And with Ronald Reagan not being the most popular person in Europe, and a lot of other things, there were quite a few things being stated last summer that really hurt some of the Americans who were on the teams.

And that's sad, because the history of OM is a history of Americans generally trying to esteem other nationalities, there's been lots of failure, and to in fact step back and let the Europeans or Asians take the lead.

This is almost policy within OM. It doesn't always work. But I've noticed it's especially been hard lately for any dear soul from South Africa. Everybody now suddenly thinks they're great advisors on South African politics.

Most people don't know what they're talking about. And I can tell you, God is working in South Africa. One of the things God is doing in South Africa is sending out workers. We still believe in OM that world evangelism is more important than political solutions, though we actually believe in both.

We know what our calling is. And we have been having South Africans coming on OM for 20 some years, some very outstanding people. Somebody once really hit me heavy that we didn't have any black South Africans.

It is a very complicated situation. They are not easily granted visas. But how many Polish people do we get? How many Saudis do we get? How many Soviets do we get? There are dozens and dozens of countries whose injustice is just as great as the injustice of South Africa.

All nations have injustice. If they're leading the pack right now, let God or somebody else decide it, not me. It's interesting that there's an exhibition now in London that people think is the greatest thing going right now.

It's just finished. The Saudi Arabian Exhibition. Would you like me to give a lecture on injustice in Saudi Arabia? Did you receive one of the leaflets that some of the dissidents of Saudi Arabia were giving out at the entrance?

One of my co-workers put one on my desk. It's very interesting. I think, personally, as Christians, we should have had a Jericho march around that arena. If I didn't have so many other things going on, I would have organized it.

Because they want all this freedom in Britain and we cannot even have one believer, not one Bible, not one church in that country. And nobody says anything about it, including Amnesty International. The whole world, brothers and sisters, is filled with injustice.

It's not just this country or that country. The media is what affects our thinking. We think the way we're told to think to some degree. And it's highly complex. It gets very emotional, especially when we see some of the pictures.

And, of course, they show us the pictures we want to have. And it's all very short. And it really, for a movement like O .M., and especially with the ship Doulas headed in that direction, I tell you, it needs a lot of prayer.

But I have this burden that somehow, on all sides, we battle prejudice in our own hearts, in our own minds. We do have prejudice about nationalities. Why don't we just be honest? German people have prejudice about Swiss, Swiss about Germans, Norwegians about Swedes.

A Norwegian told me once, the only advantage the Swedes have are good neighbors. Every nation, every group has its prejudice. I can honestly say that I just so love the Russian people. I may not be 100 delivered.

I don't know what that is. But my trips to the Soviet Union, my studies of the Soviet people, I just love those people. I see right beyond their political viewpoint, which I may not agree with, to people.

And I love the Polish people. And I love the people of all these different nationalities. And I could, in some cases, care less what nationality it is. And certainly when he tells me his nationality, I'm not going to immediately list in my mind five things I don't like about that nationality.

That is unchristian. I heard such a great challenge, I was listening to the tape twice, by John Stott, who brought out that nationalism in its more extreme form. He said nationalism in general, but I think he was referring to it in an extreme form, maybe in a different definition than I do, is sinful and wrong.

And I will tell you, I think he's right. Our loyalty is to the body of Christ. Our call is a revolution of love. And we must slowly be set free from pride and prejudice. And this means we are going to have to learn how to love and handle people who are filled with prejudice.

When you meet someone who is a real racist, you have to learn to love him as well. And I found this a problem. After I got, a long time ago, more free from racism, which I never thought I had, but I had it in its more subtle forms, I became really uptight when I met a racist, or someone I thought was a racist.

But you see, with God, love has no barriers. And when you meet someone, I have a real struggle still to this day with the Orthodox Jews. It's a psychological reaction. I see them in the airports, little curls, the hats, the black.

I don't know what it is or how I pick this up, but I get a negative feeling about these Orthodox Jews. Reform Jews, Jews I love. I love their noses, great. But the curls, the black hats, you know. And I've walked around Jerusalem where I've heard of these people coming out of their houses, stoning, you know, Christians and burning their cars.

And they are probably the strongest enemies in the world to the Gospel. I mean, these people are anti-Christian. They have written books that say things about Jesus Christ that you wouldn't want to even look at.

But I saw the privilege of seeing that little film, The Chosen. It's based on a great novel. I'm not a great novel reader. I have to read so much, that if I want a novel, I'm going to go see it in a cinema.

But I tell you, I saw that film, The Chosen, and my heart just broke for the Orthodox Jews. In many ways, they are very beautiful people. When you get beyond the first impressions, beyond our prejudices, of course, we legitimately disagree.

I mean, I met one on the train in Belgium who believes that the modern Israel is a greater enemy to Judaism than Hitler. He was really extreme. He was a prophet, and he literally tried to disciple me right on the spot.

And this guy just went for me. And while Leon was with me, I saw I was safe. But, amazing. Divisions, actually, between these people. So, rigid thinking. It's not easy, because as Christians, we are Orthodox and Biblical Christians.

We have definite doctrines. And again, forgive me for mentioning his name too much, but it seems to me that John Stott is a terrific example of someone absolutely Orthodox. And, of course, some people in the world would accuse him of having rigid thinking.

But he's Orthodox, he's evangelical, he's Biblical, he's very strong-minded. And yet, as you listen to him, and I have for many years, you read his books, there's that love, there's that compassion, there's that balance, there's that willingness to listen to other people.

And I believe that he, and men like him, are people that we can learn from. So, let's beware of that number one enemy of communication, rigid thinking coupled together with pride and prejudice. Realizing, of course, often on a nitty-gritty, on a team level, the area of pride, it touches far more basic things.

But we don't have time to get into that right now. The second enemy of reality in our relationship building, especially as we try to build a relationship with different churches, is super-spirituality.

Super-Spirituality and Humility

Now, you may think, well, oh, I'm just so balanced now. We don't have that anymore. Our problem is the opposite. No spirituality. Well, probably it's somewhere in the middle. But let me just tell you that when you go back to your home church, some people, even emotionally without realizing it, they'll be waiting for you.

And they'll be waiting for you to say something that gives the idea that you feel you're better than they are. And to break this down is not easy. One way is to take a legitimate interest in what they are doing, and in their ministry, and to never communicate that the missionary is God's highest calling.

Especially the likes of us shouldn't have too much problem in this area. Super-spirituality has caused terrific grief on our teams. Places like India. Places like, well, the ships. Different places. It just comes in a most surprising way.

I think of the terrific emphasis in scripture on humbling ourselves, on humility. As you know, Eugenia Price has been an influence in my life. She says if you're sitting with someone over a meal, and they say something that really just puts you off, and you want to really put them immediately right, she says maybe one thing you could do is just humbly realize, well, maybe they have never had any light on that subject.

This is a great problem that some of us grow older. How many of you are over 35? Over 35. That's it. Quite a few of us. Some of us are over 40. Over 45. Moving on. And as we get older, there is a danger that we are impatient with the new recruits.

We think they are going to learn in the summer conference, what has taken us 10 years. Or just, not necessarily on OM, just 10, 15 years in life. This is why often there is friction between younger and older people.

I sometimes just presume anybody knows how to go down the post office and send a telex, or make a long-distance call to Mongolia. I mean, the things I've presumed on with some of the people that have worked for me, very intelligent people, all of them, of course, have brought some very interesting sidelights in the OM program.

Beware of super-spirituality in all of its subtle forms. And as you go back to your church, try to be a good listener. What's going on there? Before you open your big combustion chamber or whatever, try to find out what's going on.

Faulty Communication and the Need to Listen

Number three, the third enemy is just the lack of communication. Faulty communication. It's played havoc in my marriage, I tell you. It's a miracle that I survived 27 years of marriage, because what I would never do on a team, I wouldn't be so dumb to do on a team or in the office.

I do in the home. And I read a book about this. It seems to be quite a common phenomenon. A businessman is holding his whole business together. He's a manager. He comes home and he's a complete twit. How can it be?

And this is me. And I'm still working on it. And there's a fair amount of failure. And one of the reasons is because I have never developed a great enough gift in the area of listening. Listen to people.

Perhaps this is a part of the danger of life in the fast lane. I thank God for this book by Gordon MacDonald, Ordering Your Private World. Every time we put it on the table and we offer it, all the copies go.

It's obviously there are quite a few people around that would like to order their private world. And if that's the only book you get exposed to in your time on OM, it is worth coming to Europe for. Because that is a brilliant book.

Go over to the book shop. You have it in stock, right? Use your private money or make a deal with Christine. Somehow get a hold of Ordering Your Private World. I've only seen a few Canadian films. One was brilliant.

It was a little risqué. I saw it one night when I won a great victory over pornography. I went into this film and thought this was a great victory. It was a clean film, sort of. How many of you have ever seen a real Canadian film?

Raise your hand. Oh, one or two. But it was about a Jewish fellow reared in the back streets of somewhere in Ontario. His mother was a prostitute at his bar. What do they call that? Bar Mipta? She did a strip tease in front of all the little Jews.

Incredible. That was the only bad scene in the film. And of course I closed my eyes. He, of course, broke from his orthodox Judaism and he fell in love with this daughter of a top diplomat. A Canadian government leader.

It was just a brilliant film about communication problems. I learned a lot through that. That's when my wife was broken down in a motorhome. Remember that one from so long ago? She broke down, Bob and my wife.

I had to fly on to Ontario. I had this Monday night free. I thought I was doing great. I went to buy my son a magazine in this newsstand, which I tried to avoid. I wanted to get this car magazine. There was one of these porno-holics.

He's just an old guy. I walked behind him. I just saw over his shoulder. And I tell you, God gave me great grace to get out of there and get into the movie. It wasn't a total escape. Faulty communication.

We're all so different. Often, often what we say has different meaning to different people. That happens all the time right in this room. Right in this room. And we need to work on it. Number four, the fourth enemy, of course, is absolutely basic.

Impatience, Irritability, and Generational Friction

Another one of my greatest problems. Impatience and irritability. Do you ever find that you get a major victory of a really heavy problem? You know, doctors told you you've got terminal cancer. You go out of there, praise the Lord, I'm going to heaven, terminal cancer.

And you lose the keys to your car. The whole day. It's destroyed. Because you can't find the key to the car. And you remember that you put one, you know, you buy these little cases, little magnetic case.

You knew you put one under there. You went under there to look for the magnetic case. It wasn't there. And so you have all kinds of things. You call the police. You call your wife. You start steaming.

Your ears start smoking. You've forgotten completely that you're going to die at the end of the week. The main thing is that you're going to somehow get the car open. Well, that's an exaggerated story.

But you'll at least remember it. Impatience and irritability should be repented of. We distribute Calvary Road right out of this warehouse. The whole emphasis of that book is when you sin, when you fail, when you're irritable, to repent.

And if we just practice, it doesn't have to be a big fanfare. You don't have to roll on the warehouse floor. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You need to get on with the work. A lot of difficulties come because of this difficulty.

Selfishness and Conflicts over Kingdom Work

Number five, plain old selfishness. I've seen this again in the last days, how my own life, even for the cause of the kingdom, I at times can be selfish. You know sometimes work for the kingdom collides?

That's right. One person wants to do one thing for the kingdom. Somebody else wants to do something else for the kingdom. He wants to do it his way. She wants to do it her way. And we have disunity and collision over the work of the kingdom.

It's a different form of selfishness. Selfishness ordinarily is, you know, I, my, me. We're having a collision because I want to do this for myself and maybe somebody else wants to do something else. But we can have the same kind of collision over the work of the kingdom.

And it does get more complicated. I don't think we should be surprised that relationships are more complicated among Christians. We believe so much more. We are more complicated because we have chosen that narrow road that is totally out of step with society.

We're going to be attacked from every side. Paul says from within, from without. I don't think we're surprised about the disunity that comes into the churches, the disunity that comes into some of our teams, the problems you have living together with other people.

I'm amazed that things sometimes go so well. And then number six, idealism, perfectionism. You know, there are many forms of perfectionism. And I think sometimes we're perfectionists without realizing it because we've been psychologically tuned to perfectionism.

Idealism, Perfectionism, and Personal Responsibility

And of course, in certain ways, attempting to do something absolutely right, various forms of, if you want to call it perfectionism, are valid. What about the guys that fly the airplanes? I mean, I'm glad these guys are really hyper about doing it right.

I don't like pilots that are just... In certain countries, actually, I feel shouldn't participate in the whole... I think they should be into music and opera but not flying airplanes. But that theory has been proven wrong anyway.

I believe that getting your perfectionism under control, getting your idealism into balance is absolutely essential if you're going to be in unity with God's people, even with your own self. And you know, many of us, if we're honest, the problem isn't the people that are coming in here and bothering us or calling us at the wrong hour and night or sending the wrong books back.

The problem is right here. It's us. I know so many cases when I've started this theme, the problem has been me. Maybe complicated by other factors. Often I cannot do much about what the other person is thinking or saying but I can do something about myself.

If I didn't believe I could do something by Christ's power about my own behavior, I don't know how I could be a Christian. I would be caught into a Freudian fatalistic trap in which despair would be the ultimate end.

Forgiveness, Rejection, and Preserving Relationships

Number seven, the lack of forgiveness. How can it be that Christians are practicing this philosophy that if so-and-so comes to me and apologizes, I will forgive him? The world does that. The world does that.

Christian secular rock artists had songs about that. The Christian, because of Christ, is able to forgive at the moment of impact. Whether apology ever takes place. I had a very moving experience a few days ago.

The first director of STL, Paul Ingram. A man who didn't last very long. Well, I had been backslidden for 15 years. His marriage broke. He got remarried, came back to the Lord. His second wife came to the Lord and then died of cancer.

And on Sunday, I met his third wife. He now has children from three families. And he came to me at the church meeting Sunday morning up in Sunderland. And he said, you know, I want to apologize. This is 24 years later.

I want to apologize for the way I left STL. And I thought and thought and thought and thought. As far as I know, I've never had anything against Paul Ingram. He did let me down. He left in a hurry and in a huff.

I knew he was under pressure from his wife. But, you know, it would have been really damp for me to hold that against him for 24 years until he came to me and apologized last Sunday morning. Now that apology helped him.

He gets that off his heart. Fine. But I had nothing to forgive. Nothing to forgive. We had a beautiful time of fellowship. The apology is water above the glass. Jesus fills the glass. Through his blood, through the miracle work in your heart.

And if the person apologizes and puts it right and he or she should and there are cases when you have to even talk to them about it and I'm not excluding that. That's water above the glass. Your glass is already filled by the love of God.

And I tell you, it's a beautiful way to live. You never go to bed with anything against anybody. You may have memories. We can't liquidate memories where people have hurt us. And we have to learn to deal with memories.

We have to cast them on the Lord. They may come back five minutes later. Cast them again. It's like fishing. Fly fishing. You just keep throwing it out. Eventually you might even catch something. So forgiveness is so absolutely basic.

And you know another key emotion that brings a lot of chaos and a lot of division is this whole thing of rejection. You know, you can pray for me. I've got a lot of struggles, a list of all. But I really find it hard when I may have 15 positive experiences with a person through personal fellowship, through letters, through serving them, through loving them, through being at their wedding, through writing.

15 or 20 things that have all been positive. The person has been encouraged. They believe I'm their friend. And all that kind of thing. And then one negative thing and the whole thing's finished. I will tell you this has almost driven me to despair in the past few years.

But God has given grace because I know Satan is such a specialist at using negative things. We all want to build relationships. We all want friends. He who wants friends must show himself friendly. And if you're going to develop relationships, you've got to dwell on the positive.

And when there is a legitimate negative, maybe your best friend fails to show up at your wedding. Maybe somebody fails to show up and give you flowers at your funeral, of course. Seriously, the wife. The wife gets upset then.

Don't, please, don't write off a lifetime friendship, even a one-year friendship, on the basis of one bad experience. It may be a heavy experience. You may have felt rejection. But to take that which has been taking time, do you know how long it takes to build relationships?

Do you know how long it takes to build marriages, to build the kind of relationships that OM has right across the world? Our prayer partners, our churches. And we have situations in which one negative thing, I remember this dear pastor, I was working with him, visited him, preached in his church, loved him.

And his daughter went on OM. It was a Pentecostal church. She was a Pentecostal girl. I don't know what happened. Went to Italy. Somehow she started feeling inhibited about her tongue speaking. She went back.

That got out to her father that OM was not, you know, so positive about tongues. And we got a letter. We are through with Operation Mobilization. I will tell you, I didn't give up on that one. And I got him on the phone and I just, I shared, look, we have people coming on OM all the time that are getting the gift of tongues.

We may have others who come on OM. They meet different kinds of people and maybe they lose it. I don't know. I said, often these problems, these problems aren't because they're coming on OM. They're because they're people.

People change. Most of the hyper-pentees, forgive the expression, were once brethren. Yeah. The group that shoots the pentees the most. And many of the people who are anti-Pentecostal or at least perhaps have chosen a little more non-Pentecostal road, many of them came right out of the Pentecostal church.

So I don't think we can blame OM because someone, you know, has this or that experience. Well, when I talked to that man on the phone, you know, he backpedaled and he wrote me again. He said, we are praying for OM.

And I recently went and saw him again and had a terrific time of prayer with him and his wife. And the church is linked with us. But, you know, you don't always get that opportunity. They don't always write you a letter.

They don't always tell you what's on their mind. They just drop you. People are like that. We must get used to it. And I don't think the average person, maybe even Arnold realizes what we are up against as leaders trying to maintain long-term relationships.

We have relationships with prayer partners, relationships with those who are giving, relationships with the churches, relationships with new people, relationships with ex-OMers, 37 ,000 of them, relationships with new OMers.

And then we have relationships with each other. If OM is to continue, we are going to have to become a little more relaxed with each other. We're not going to have as much time with each other as the work continues to grow.

And when something goes wrong or we don't get a birthday card or we hear a bit of gossip, we somehow have to believe the best and say, you know, 15 years we've been linked. 15 years or 5 years or 2 years we labor together, we're not going to get one even nasty experience.

We're not going to allow that to hinder a long-standing relationship. And that should especially be true when people leave. The time of transition when you leave in movement, if you've been in it for a number of years, is a very vulnerable position.

I could write a book on it. There's a lot of different emotion involved. And we've had people that during 3 or 4 years on OM had no really big problems but in the transition to leave a root of bitterness came in.

Maybe we didn't give them enough money or maybe we had a case where they were insulted because we tried to give them too much. I mean there are so many rules in this transition period. And I just pray that as some of you leave OM, they're only short term, that you'll realize that the great unity is not whether you're in OM or not.

The great unity is that we are in Christ. Don't sit back developing a root of bitterness, pouting, moaning, or thinking, why don't they write me a letter? I heard George Beller phones people. He has never phoned me.

Don't do it. Believe the best. Probably if an OM leader knew that you had a particular need, he might be on your doorstep within the day. OM is a movement to some degree, I'll be very honest, that has run out of energy.

Too many people, too many commitments, too many problems. It's all tied in with the church, it's all tied in with the environment we're living in and we want to do so much more. And I tell you, if I hadn't learned my own limitations in ministering to people, my marriage would have broke, I would have broke, and who knows what else could have happened.