Prayer Room Eight Garden Steps, Step Four First-Plymouth Congregational Church United Church of Christ 2000 "D" Street Lincoln, Nebraska 68502-1698 Office (402) 476-7565 Fax (402) 476-8402

   Step Four-
                    Endeavor ["Competence"]

Psychosocial Crisis: Industry vs. Inferiority    
Range of Relationship: Neighborhood, School

Competence is the free exercise (unimpaired by the infantile sense of inferiority ) of dexterity and intelligence in the completion of serious tasks. It is the basis for cooperative participation in some segment of the culture.

[Erik H. Erickson, The Human Cycle (1968)]

[Endeavor; 20x43 in. Painting by Nadine McHenry. An adolescent is occupied with how things work and how they ought to operate. School and out-of-home activities play important roles.]

Biblical Reference     The Tower of Babel      

    Now the whole earth had one language and few words. And as they migrated from the east, they came upon a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, "Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly." And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said; "Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth. " And God came down to see the city and the tower, which the sons of men had built. And God said, "Behold; they are one people, and they have all one language; and this is only the beginning of what they will do; and nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down, and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another's speech." So God scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. Therefore its name was called Ba'bel, because there God confused the language of all the earth,. and from there God scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth.

[Genesis Chapter 11, verses 1-9]

Taoist Reference

If you pour all your energy into one thing, you're sure to harm 
The rest of your being and, if you invest it all in profit -
You'll end up losing the whole lot.

[Tao Te Ching, Chapter 44]

Plant Selection            The Rose

Roses. Hybrid Tea roses, Climbing roses, English roses, Old Shrub roses, Meidiland family of roses, French roses, Grandifloras and Floribunds or cluster roses, and standard or Tree-form roses. "Atissimo ", "Brilliant Pink Iceberg", "Heritage", "Royal Bonica", "Johann Strauss ", "New Dawn", "Climbing Peace", "America", "Cottage Rose", "Love's Promise", "Mr.Lincoln"...I wonder what qualities one must possess to be so honored as to be assigned a namesake rose. Competence.

[Thomas Bare]

Step Four: Endeavor [Competence]

Industry unimpeded, undivided,
Shall do all works of wonder,
Or poured in one ambition can do harm. 
The Babel Tower defied the Lord
So the people's voice was scattered. 
Singular roses cry out vanity.
Many hues and shades, however,
Accord endeavor unending beauty.

[Randall E. Dinsdale]

From the program notes for the Abendmusik: Lincoln Eight Garden Steps concert, May 19, 2002.