The Lost Art of Apprenticeship
Apprentice - one who is learning by practical experience under skilled workers a trade, art, or calling.
It's amazing how our minds can process smell and connect what we smell to certain memories, people, places, and feelings. For some this might be the smell of the ocean, pine forests, old library books, or a certain air freshener that causes our minds to be instantly taken back to days gone by. For me, the unique smell of raw tanned leather is one of the most powerful in bringing my mind to remember a very special season of my life during my late high school and college years.
In today's world, if you want to learn a new skill you can simply Google it. The internet has become an unmatched repository of DIY training videos, "hacks", guides, reviews, and instructions of how to do nearly anything you could ever aspire to accomplish. Whether your looking to install a fence, train for a marathon, teach your child to walk, or even learn how to fly fish, you can just Google it and you'll find no less than 150 million results for any one of those prompts. Pretty amazing, extremely efficient, but at what cost?
Imagine rewinding 100 years, finding a young man on a river, and asking him how he learned to fish. I'd be willing to bet that he learn learned it from someone not something. For me, I've taken advantage of all kinds of DIY online videos teaching me how to wire GFCI outlets, install a tile subfloor, and fix my refrigerator, just to name a few. Years ago, completing each of these tasks yourself generally would have required contacting someone who knew how to do the task and asking them to show you. In the context of this practical teaching, relationship would develop so that by the time you had your tile floor installed, you also had a stronger relationship with the person who taught you. Unfortunately, our Google and YouTube trained world has at least partially short-circuited what was previously an avoidable necessity of developing teacher/student relationships with real living people in your community.
For me, the smell of raw leather brings me back to a job I had with a man named Jerry who owns an automotive upholstery business near my hometown. I had developed a relationship with Jerry in my church youth group where he served as a volunteer leader and he invited me to work part time at his shop helping out where ever I could. In hindsight, this part time job was one of the greatest blessings of my teen years. It was in the context of the sometimes tedious but always rewarding work of helping Jerry with his business that I learned the value of good conversation in the midst of hard work. We each had a workbench about 20 feet apart and Jerry would assign me a task and then go to completing his own work. We steadily worked and periodically mixed in talk about life, our church, politics, future plans, school, pretty much anything. Jerry would have customers come in the shop and I would watch as he interacted with them, we ate lunch together and then some evenings would go out for a bike ride together. My work in Jerry's shop took place during some of the most formative years of my life and Jerry's influence on the direction of my life through our conversations and work together could not be overstated.
From a biblical perspective, we might call this type of relationship, discipleship. It's a relationship where one person, a little bit further along in their faith, walks alongside another with the goal of seeing them grow in Christlikeness. Discipleship requires time together, it offers instruction, invites imitation, and often occurs in the context of friendship. Jerry made it a priority to spend time with me, this time was in all parts of life - work, church, dinner with his family, and even hobbies (cycling). I watched him interact with all different types of people, some Christian, many not, and I learned to imitate him both in the work that we did together and in my pursuit of Jesus. This is discipleship and this is what we are called to pursue. In Hebrews 13:7 the Bible teaches us to "Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith." Likewise 2 Timothy 3:10 Paul wrote about Timothy, "You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness, my persecutions and sufferings." Finally, in 1 Corinthians 11:1 Paul wrote, "Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ". This is the fundamental call to men in our families, churches and communities. I pray that our lives are worthy of imitation, for Christ's sake and for His glory, and that we humbly invite others to follow us as we follow Christ.
Be an apprentice, find an apprentice.