Chicken Shizzle and Frances Schaeffer

“Dare he, for whom circumstances make it possible to realize his true destiny, refuse it simply because he is not prepared to give up everything else?” –Dag Hamarskjold, Markings

22 October 2009.
Chicken “Shizzle” and Frances Schaeffer.

The title is a little crass, yet true…Jon Akers, this one is for you.
Last night, I sat in an uneven, gravel-floored back patio under an enormous palm tree and single light bulb as a young, bracket-faced pastor gave a talk on wise financial management and good work ethics. Did I mention he is currently unemployed and in his second year of college, at the age of 24??

His audience: four Dominican guys, 22-24 years old, who can’t hold a steady job and have left their university studies more than one. All four diligently took notes, participated in the discussion, and joked around about being “Vagos,” or Bums, though supposedly, they all recently left their jobs to “look for something better—“ while remaining decidedly under-qualified, hyper-active, and unwilling to work for the Dominican minimum wage. The familiarity of the situation made me sad. This is the clay of our generation. Eager, but lacking discipline. I was anxious to see where the study would go.

As we talked about good work ethics, a flee-bitten puppy milled about, a hen cackled, and the lights went out at least three times. Our makeshift whiteboard with fading, streaking markers, fell off the stand twice, and one of the guys soaked his pant-hem in a bucket of potable water as all four guys repeatedly tried to mix English into the lesson, with hilarious and incomprehensible results. They are Dominican men! Of course they love English! Their Fantasy is to move to New York, the land of Dominican dreams come-true with the Yankees as a prime incentive.
We sat in wiggly, white-plastic chairs and flipped through our Bibles in the flickering light. The smell of chicken waste was unbearably heavy in the humid night air. “We have a zoo back here…” the young pastor laughed. I felt a little queasy, but that might be because I had not eaten after hours of driving.

Pastor Braces went over the points of his study with clarity and conciseness. He was time-conscious and even a little over-formal for the setting. But such is the Dominican way; it is a high-context culture with very little resources. Formality is a matter-of-course, even when the instruction manual is a bug-bitten book from the 80’s and a yellowed sheet of paper with pen-written notes. No Macbooks or powerpoint presentations were necessary. The group was responsive and it was clear that even with the chicken shizzle, this was a reproducible model.

Pastor Braces closed the financial class with a long quote from the Theologian-philosopher Frances Schaeffer, which he summarized as, “He who hears, better act on it.”

The grand finale included the presentation of three hand-made diplomas for successful completion of the several-week study: The diplomas were pen-scrawled financial-responsibility pyramids on green paper. The paper was mounted on rectangular cardboard and covered in heavy glass one of the boys cut in a local shop, secured to the mount with a strong, clear packing tape. A personal note to each of the boys was written with pen on the back of each diploma; the boy’s full name was carefully written out in cursive on the front. During the presentation, we all laughed and clapped and pretended to take pictures of the recipients with our very cheap cell-phones (which do not have cameras.)

Pepsi and orange cola in one-liter glass bottles and a snack of dry soda crackers completed our party on the back patio, under the palm tree and single light bulb, air heavy with flea-bitten puppies, chicken waste and the strong warning of Brother Schaeffer: “What you hear, DO—or else.”