Goldman Sachs

Sour Grapes? Maybe. Management was not happy with his resignation letter. He sent it to the New York Times. A senior management adviser for Goldman Sachs resigned because he believed that the company he had gone to work for no longer existed. The culture of the company now was "toxic." That was his word for it. He claimed that when he went to work for the company they had their customers' best interest as their primary focus. How could they help their customers make money in the financial world. Now he claims that the only concern is how can the adviser make the most money for the company and himself. (herself as well). They joke and laugh about how to fleece the investor. They are urged to sell investors offerings or financial instruments that the company is pushing without regard to whether or not it fits the investors' financial objectives or fits into their plan.

He claimed that when he went to work for Goldman Sachs the idea was that if they made money for their customers the firm would make money. Now they just want to make money for the company and care very little about what happens to the investors. Such seemed to be the case in the subprime mortgage crisis.

The shift of focus from the investor to the company suggests to me that something like that has happened in so many of our Christian communities. People go to church with the hope of having an encounter with the Holy. They want a word from the Lord. They come seeking to be in the presence of the Almighty. The focus of the worship ought to be how can we be receptive to the presence of the Holy Spirit in our midst when it comes.

Holy Places are where God reveals Himself to us. "The Holy Spirit bloweth where it wills", and we are blessed when we feel the presence of the wind in our face. We keep returning to those places where the Holy has been experienced before. We cannot make it happen but we can make ourselves available to it. The more open and receptive, the more the spirit dwells in us, the more there is a readiness for worship and the holy, the more we are excited about being in that place and with those people. And others will come to share with us.

Have you ever noticed that it is not hard to draw a crowd to a place where somebody has claimed to see the face of Jesus or Mary in a soap dish, or a Pizza piece, or a spider web? People are eager to be in the place where the Holy has appeared.

But preachers, teachers, deacons, elders and others have this great desire to be helpful, to be of service, to do something, to make something happen, and so they begin to focus on the organization of the church. They start planning more and more programs. They begin to manage things. They look for new approaches, new music, new technology to make a "better service, a happier congregation, a more positive feeling.

Joining with others in the waiting and preparation for the coming of the Holy is not easy and does not always satisfy those who come because it does not happen every week on cue. Carlyle Marney, a great Southern Baptist, one said, "There are Sundays when even God does not show up for church." So the primary purpose of worship gets put aside and the focus moves to what we can control which is programs and activities and if we are luck fellowship. There is a focus on the members and how to manage their lives.

In forty years of ministry, I would probably be optimistic if I said I thought that we might have had 25 or 30 Sundays when it seemed to me that something holy and special was in the room. But that experience never happened any place but in worship with others. You keep going and waiting because it is the place where He said He would visit.