Director of Ministry Success

I heard a presentation today at a college orientation by an individual whose title was Director of Academic Success. It seems her job is to make sure that the 3000 students of the university are...successful, you know, academically.

She pulls out all the stops at it. Charting mid term grades and standing at the ready to email or call students producing unsatisfactory work. She'll talk to resident assistants, professors, parents, advisers, and whoever else is necessary to make sure the students have every opportunity to succeed.

I might try to introduce myself at the staff meet and greet for new members of our organization as the Director of Ministry Success.

I, I'll explain, do every thing within my power to make sure you are successful in your ministry.

What exactly would that mean?

I would have to establish some means of determining how well the freshman church members are doing at their ministry.

What if they don't have a ministry?

What if they don't want a ministry?

Why would students be at a college if they didn't want to learn?

Would people join a church if they didn't have or want a ministry?

What about a calling, then?

Director of Calling Discernment Success.

I'll be visiting with you from time to time to make sure you are finding your comfort zone and then proceeding to step out of that comfort zone sufficiently to allow God's spirit to bring you in to fresh understandings love and grace.

I'll visit you at your home and work to get to know you better so that I can invite you to only the things that I'm sure you will find valuable. I'll ask you to do difficult things. And to struggle. And to take on the sorrows of others for no real advantage to yourself.

If I don't hear from you for a while, I'll email you or call you and say, Hey, what's going on?

I'll talk to your former Ministry Team chair and see if she has any insight into why you shut down sometimes.

We'll keep working at it until we find out what role you play or will play in God's reconciliation to and redemption of the world.

Man, I would love to be a Director of Calling Discernment Success.

Turtles in the road

I came across a turtle in the middle of the road. It was along a stretch of road where I had recently seen a magnificent (scary, but magnificent) alligator turtle smashed to bits. It seemed like such a loss to creation that this turtle with this beautiful shell and destined to move so slowly across a busy road might meet the same fate as the smashed up alligator turtle. So I checked the traffic and picked up the turtle and moved him across the road in the direction as best I could tell he was trying to go.

Just, you know, subduing a little bit.

Do you think mission work could be more like that? Innately trying to help people in their struggle to live without recompense or expecting really anything too much to happen on any real scale, much less an eternal one.

Can we leave more to ourselves what God created us to be and leave more to God what is his?

That's what I felt like was happening with the turtle and me.

I wonder if there is a discipleship app for that.

Counting change

If I tried to get you to put up a bulletin board about your thing, I would probably have to ask a few times and explain what I'm wanting from you a couple of different ways.

I'd feel guilty for asking you to do something that took time and energy away from the things you do everyday that you do because you want to and not because somebody asked you to.

If you then put that bulletin board up about the next event you are doing or the recap of the last thing you did or how you are trying to get people to join your team, it probably wouldn't be all that good.

And you would feel guilty for taking so long to get the bulletin board done, and I'd start counting down the days until we could take down the bulletin board.

And then maybe I'd find somebody good at bulletin boards to do a good bulletin board about something, anything. Just to take up space.

But, if for some reason there was a bulletin board about a campaign or emphasis that had been up for 14 or 15 months and we decided that it was time to take it down and put up some posters or something so it wouldn't be a big blank bulletin board, it wouldn't be long before you or someone like you would put up a bulletin board about your thing or something like your thing on a portion of the bulletin board that we just redid. After having it up for 14 months.

And I don't know why. And I don't know that leaving the board blank would encourage you any more.

It's like after 14 months, movement is contagious.

It's just strange that after 14 months of one bulletin board, changing it inspired you to do something that I couldn't have asked you to do.

It's like somebody is just waiting for you to change that bulletin board.

I need to start using the staple remover more and the stapler less.

"Just" being selfish?

What if- the path to selflessness goes right through selfishness.

Not only- "I'm doing this because I want to and if others want to join me, great: but I'm doing it anyway."

[I've discovered this is much more rewarding than- "This thing I'm doing is really important and others (a lot of others) should think it's important too and why in a church this size do so few people think this thing is as important as I do?" but that's another story]

I'm talking about- "The reason I'm doing this is because it makes me feel good. The reason I want you to come around to my way of thinking is because it validates me. The reason I want you to participate in this event is because it makes me important. The fact that I'm accepted and needed is why I'm happy about a good turnout."

And what if, in a weird way- when I am able to accept this and embrace it: then I can do things and think things and have faith in things and believe things more selflessly.

What if- my true self is able to deal with my selfishness (false selfness) only when I

1. accept it

2..own it

3. take responsibility for it

4. don't regret it and repeat as necessary

What if- the more I try to convince others (and myself) that I are a team player, that I am doing this for others, that I am fulfilling a commission or a commandment, or I don't care who gets the credit, or that it was a God thing; the more it isn't?

Just imagine.

What if-

A Return to Love by Marianne Williamson

A Return to Love

by Marianne Williamson

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate,

Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.

It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.

We ask ourselves, "Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?"

Actually, who are you not to be?

You are a child of God.

Your playing small does not serve the world.

There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people

won't feel insecure around you.

We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.

It is in everyone.

And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give

other people permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our own fear our presence

automatically liberates others.

Red faced and loving it

I've heard of the super bacteria we are growing in our hospitals and schools and homes from our vigilant anti-bacterial efforts. The ease and low cost of administering antibiotics for every ailment no matter how minor is leading to resistant bacteria. Our constant use of hand sanitizers and antibacterial soaps every time we was our hands and take a notion that the swine flu is lurking around the corner has actually weakened our ability to deal with even minor bacteria that we would normally have no trouble with. Or so the story goes.

I wonder if that works with emotions as well. Maybe our reluctance to engage in conversation about different ideas and beliefs has cost us our ability to do so. Have we been so conditioned to not get emotional that we don't "know" how to get emotional? Why am I embarrassed when my face gets red when someone says something in a meeting that I don't agree with?

A friend shared with me that he doesn't see emotion as a bad thing at all. He sees it as a filter or maybe even a canary in a coal mine. When rage comes, what is really at the root of it? When I get mad about something, can I take a step back and say: What was that about? And then work through it.

Too often I might say: I can't get mad. I shouldn't say anything because that just might make it worse. Maybe if I ignore it, it'll go away.

But instead of making things better, healthier, and more whole; I'm thinking it just sets me up for sickness and makes the problem even more resistant to treatment.

I imagine if there were just a few more conversations that I didn't smile politely all the way through: would I actually be healthier in the long run?

Sorry if my face gets red.