Long Haul Ministry...Daring, Caring, Sharing.
There are three things that keep me in the trenches of kingdom work. Take any one of these out of the equation and I languish in leadership. These three qualities serve to balance each other out from day to day, week to week, month to month, and even year to year. Some years one gets more attention or playtime, but the other two will bring it back toward the center in time.
Ministry must be "DARING", "CARING", & "SHARING".
I start with "Daring" simply because I'm not really interested in living my life for something safe or predictable or easy. I want something that requires faith and risk. So even though there are parts of me that hate the pressure and stress associated with adventurous and daring ministry, I can't imagine waking up everyday and trudging through the monotony of ministry where I'm simply 'managing the manageable' instead of pressing into the meaningful. Meaningful life is fraught with danger and peril, near deaths and close calls and narrow victories...but this is what it looks like to "set the captives free and help people escape from prisons and rescue people from darkness"...Satan doesn't let that go down without a fight. So to engage in kingdom work is flat out flagrant resistance of all that is of sin and Satan, and promotion of all that is good and God. Isaiah 61 is on the front burner and that means staying on the edges and in the margins for those who need freed. I want the daring life of a Christ-follower or else.
But if I get so busy with daring escapes and risky living, finding myself addicted to the adrenaline of accomplishing great feats of strength, I begin to feel like "beast mode" crowds out that "Caring" part of ministry. You know, the heart of compassion that compelled the heart of Christ as he walked this earth. I love how He would be in the middle of some smashmouth ministry moment, and just stop on a dime and feel the touch of one or hear the whisper of another. The text says his heart was 'moved with compassion'. I've been in ministry long enough to know the feeling of losing feeling. To be successful, and completely be running on the autopilot of ministry accomplishment or performance. I can lose my love for people, God, even myself as I fight the good fight. Isaiah 61 isn't just war, it's bestowing beauty for ashes, put on a cloak of thankfulness to cover the depressed, and binding up the brokenhearted. If I lose touch of the 'caring' aspect of ministry, all of the risk being the end in an of itself, I lose sight of the reason behind the action. I want to be moved and stirred deep within all the way to the end. If I don't feel "caring" in my blood or "cared for" by the group I'm surrounded by, big wins just feel hollow instead of hallowed. And that brings me to my third basic need...
I simply must be a part of a collective "Sharing" wins and loses together. To laugh alone, win alone, accomplish alone is unnatural. I want to be a part of a team effort going after things that we couldn't do alone, only together. I want to submit to the consensus of a group of caring and daring people that are chasing after the heart of God, but also tending the hearts of each other. Sharing defeat and failure in a safe environment is essential to survival. Sharing victory and joy in a safe atmosphere is crucial to staying alive. To have people that love you for you, despite your ups and downs. To have comrades that will push you if they see you getting lazy and will pull you back if they see you getting driven...this is community. When I think of sharing, I think community and friendship. I've had fellowship over the years without friendship...and it's different. It's not just doing life together, it's more than just doing. It's being with each other. It's noticing the rhythms of someone's life and them noticing yours. It's people knowing you so well that they can read your body language and ask, "You doin' ok?" They are the ones that circle back around and follow up on something you said last week or a doctor's appointment your kid had last month. They chart your journey over the years and celebrate each step of improvement instead of assessing your value based on the "what-have-you-done-for-me-lately" mentality. You feel safe under the banner of their love and their love covers over a multitude of sins like Peter talked about. To be daring and caring without sharing is empty and lonely...and I hope to always have more team wins that individual accomplishments.
Daring. Caring. Sharing. These are thing things that make me wake up and hit the ground with a bounce in my step. This is the way I will make it to the end so that I might hear my Father say, "Well done, you're a good and faithful son." To hear him say, "This is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased." I want to hear these things, but that doesn't just happen...I have to live inside this habitat of habits that keep me healthy and whole as I pour out my life in ministry.
To this end I labor, struggling with all His energy which so powerfully works within me. - Col. 1:23
Ministry must be "DARING", "CARING", & "SHARING".
I start with "Daring" simply because I'm not really interested in living my life for something safe or predictable or easy. I want something that requires faith and risk. So even though there are parts of me that hate the pressure and stress associated with adventurous and daring ministry, I can't imagine waking up everyday and trudging through the monotony of ministry where I'm simply 'managing the manageable' instead of pressing into the meaningful. Meaningful life is fraught with danger and peril, near deaths and close calls and narrow victories...but this is what it looks like to "set the captives free and help people escape from prisons and rescue people from darkness"...Satan doesn't let that go down without a fight. So to engage in kingdom work is flat out flagrant resistance of all that is of sin and Satan, and promotion of all that is good and God. Isaiah 61 is on the front burner and that means staying on the edges and in the margins for those who need freed. I want the daring life of a Christ-follower or else.
But if I get so busy with daring escapes and risky living, finding myself addicted to the adrenaline of accomplishing great feats of strength, I begin to feel like "beast mode" crowds out that "Caring" part of ministry. You know, the heart of compassion that compelled the heart of Christ as he walked this earth. I love how He would be in the middle of some smashmouth ministry moment, and just stop on a dime and feel the touch of one or hear the whisper of another. The text says his heart was 'moved with compassion'. I've been in ministry long enough to know the feeling of losing feeling. To be successful, and completely be running on the autopilot of ministry accomplishment or performance. I can lose my love for people, God, even myself as I fight the good fight. Isaiah 61 isn't just war, it's bestowing beauty for ashes, put on a cloak of thankfulness to cover the depressed, and binding up the brokenhearted. If I lose touch of the 'caring' aspect of ministry, all of the risk being the end in an of itself, I lose sight of the reason behind the action. I want to be moved and stirred deep within all the way to the end. If I don't feel "caring" in my blood or "cared for" by the group I'm surrounded by, big wins just feel hollow instead of hallowed. And that brings me to my third basic need...
I simply must be a part of a collective "Sharing" wins and loses together. To laugh alone, win alone, accomplish alone is unnatural. I want to be a part of a team effort going after things that we couldn't do alone, only together. I want to submit to the consensus of a group of caring and daring people that are chasing after the heart of God, but also tending the hearts of each other. Sharing defeat and failure in a safe environment is essential to survival. Sharing victory and joy in a safe atmosphere is crucial to staying alive. To have people that love you for you, despite your ups and downs. To have comrades that will push you if they see you getting lazy and will pull you back if they see you getting driven...this is community. When I think of sharing, I think community and friendship. I've had fellowship over the years without friendship...and it's different. It's not just doing life together, it's more than just doing. It's being with each other. It's noticing the rhythms of someone's life and them noticing yours. It's people knowing you so well that they can read your body language and ask, "You doin' ok?" They are the ones that circle back around and follow up on something you said last week or a doctor's appointment your kid had last month. They chart your journey over the years and celebrate each step of improvement instead of assessing your value based on the "what-have-you-done-for-me-lately" mentality. You feel safe under the banner of their love and their love covers over a multitude of sins like Peter talked about. To be daring and caring without sharing is empty and lonely...and I hope to always have more team wins that individual accomplishments.
Daring. Caring. Sharing. These are thing things that make me wake up and hit the ground with a bounce in my step. This is the way I will make it to the end so that I might hear my Father say, "Well done, you're a good and faithful son." To hear him say, "This is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased." I want to hear these things, but that doesn't just happen...I have to live inside this habitat of habits that keep me healthy and whole as I pour out my life in ministry.
To this end I labor, struggling with all His energy which so powerfully works within me. - Col. 1:23
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