I rarely use
maps anymore but have become very dependent on a GPS. When the voice directs me to make a turn on
road that isn’t there, I realize that my unit has not been updated
recently. It may be a cutting edge
technology, but I should avoid mistaking what is in its software for reality!
Alan Roxburgh
introduced me to the idea that we should not mistake the map for reality. Our
maps—whether paper or digital—are only representations of reality that lack the
richness and vitality of the real world.
When we mistake the representation for the real thing, we miss the real
joy of the journey.
We should
reexamine periodically the maps we use to help us interpret the world. Early on in our marriage, I discovered that
my wife and I had different ideas about how housekeeping duties should be
addressed. Neither of us were right or
wrong, we had just been raised to think that the wife does certain things and
that the husband does other things—but those things differed in our homes of
origin. In reality, we still negotiate
those understandings today which indicates that we don’t give up our maps
easily!
Our mental
maps determine our expectations and practices at work, in the community, in the
family, and in the church. Each of us
grew up with the idea that “this is the way things are done.” The problem is that no one had exactly the
same mental models. We adopted the
models or maps to which we were exposed.
In a book
entitled In Over Our Heads, Robert Kegan writes, “We’ve discovered that adults
must grow into and out of several qualitatively different views of the world if
they are to master the challenges of their life experiences.” Our maps may remain the same, but the territory
changes. If we continue to follow the
old maps, we will never arrive at our destination. In fact we may find ourselves wandering
around for a long time until we stumble upon the place we seek.
So do our
mental maps really match the territory?
In church, are we planning ministries and outreach programs for a population
that no longer exists? For many
churches, Wednesday night activities still work, but this is usually in spite
of the fact that the night is no longer protected by the society at large. Many of us grew up in communities where
teachers did not assign students homework on Wednesday nights because it was “church
night.” The same can be said for
Sundays. We are no longer surprised when
community or children’s activities are scheduled on Sundays during traditional times
of worship. Some churches have embraced
this and started offering worship and Christian education at other times such
as Saturday evenings.
We should
pull out our maps from time to time and evaluate how well they reflect the
reality of the culture and times. This
does not mean that our old maps were bad or poorly drawn, but it does mean that
they are now only reminders of the way things were and are no longer helpful to
negotiate the world in which we live.
Perhaps it is time to throw out some of those maps in our cars that have
outlived their usefulness and update our GPS units.
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