As Mari was teaching this past weekend about the Ark and the people of Israel consecrating themselves for the journey ahead (Joshua 3), I started thinking about my tub. I had to fix mine this past weekend and it’s been rumored that the average home repair takes 3 trips to the local hardware store. Personally, I’d love it if it only took me 3 visits. Fortunately for me, I didn’t need any trips to the store for this fix. We had a slow drain.

The big decision I had to make was this – should I lug my whole, heavy toolbox upstairs or just grab the tools that I need? Obviously, I don’t want to be carry all that weight and all those tools upstairs. Besides that, I’ve done this job before so I know what I’m doing.

Trip Downstairs #1: I grabbed my channel-lock pliers, a screwdriver, and a wire coat hanger. Why the coat hanger? Ask someone who has daughters or a wife with long hair. They can tell you the gross details.

I get back upstairs to the tub, grip the top of the drain with the channel-locks and quickly realize that I cannot hold on to the bottom part of the drain. It’s too slippery. I need another set of channel-locks.

Trip Downstairs #2: Get second set of channel-locks.

Back upstairs to the tub, grip the bottom of drain. Top turns right off with little problem. Grab screwdriver to completely remove drain when I notice I have a Phillips head and I need a flathead.

Trip Downstairs #3: Grab flathead screwdriver.

Back upstairs to the tub, put screwdriver into tub drain and now see that this particular flathead is too narrow. I need a wider flathead.

Trip Downstairs #4: Grab fatter flathead screwdriver.

Back upstairs to the tub, fatter flathead works like a charm. Drain comes right off. Grab wire hanger to clean out drain. Realize I don’t have my plastic trash bag to put treasure that I am digging up.

Trip Downstairs #5: Grab plastic trash bag. Grab rubber gloves. Pat myself on back for avoiding Trip Downstairs #6.

Back upstairs to the tub, clean out drain with no problem. Put…stuff in bag and then tie bag up.

Put drain drain back together and realize that during Trip Downstairs #5, I took the fat flathead out of my pocket to answer the phone. Fat Flathead is now sitting on downstairs kitchen counter.

Trip Downstairs #6: Grab fatter flathead.

Back upstairs to the tub, put the drain back in with no problem. Grab bag to throw. Bask in the glory of a job done.

Trip Downstairs #7: Grab an ice tea and some peanuts. Amy asks – did you test to see if that solved the problem?

Back upstairs to the tub. Turn on water. Drains like a…well…not really sure what simile to use here. It works great.

Trip Downstairs #8: Tell Amy yes. Realize I left my drink on the bathroom counter upstairs.

Sell the house for a single floor, ranch style home.

I am curious how many of us approach our faith like this? We show up to a task bringing the bare minimum of what we think is required for the job. After all, we’ve done this before. We know what we are doing. We just want to get this done so that we can go on with the rest of our day/week/life.

Instead, our lack of CONSECRATION to the task at hand turns a simple job into a lot of work, a lot of frustration, and at times makes the accomplishment of the task impossible.

I loved Mari’s definition of Consecration she taught us this week – to make ready, to get prepared. When God told the Israelites to Go!, He first told them to GET READY – to consecrate themselves. Do what you know to do, what you need to do to be in a place to obey, to get the job done.

Next time you hear a GO! from the Lord, consecrate yourself. Bring the whole tool box.

Prepare The Room: Psalm 51 from Grant English on Vimeo.

Rick actually came up with the phrase after going to a worship conference last year. He observed that at the conference before any worship service, there was always a few minutes at the start where they prepared the room. Could have been a video or a practice or silence – but it was a prepared, purposeful pause at the start of the service to remind themselves that they were about to engage with the Holy God in worship.

What does that look like in a local congregation that meets every single Sunday morning?

And no – the Opening Song doesn’t really count as “prepare the room.” See Northpoint’s video below to see what I’m talking about. So last week we started with the video below followed by another video depicting Psalm 31 – My times are in your hands.

The feedback has been pretty positive. Not everyone got the “artsy” rendition of Psalm 31, but everyone loved the reminder to get prepared to worship.

It’s a new tradition, new spiritual discipline of worship for us at Western Hills – prepare the room. And it’s rubbing off in other areas as well. I find myself walking into a meeting or a lunch – pausing in the car to ‘prepare the room.’

Prepare The Room

Psalm 31//My Times video by Jakub Blank

I’m showing the video below.

Overall, I like the video. I don’t interpret this guy as trashing the Church. Some will disagree. Which is part of the problem of the video, the shortcomings of the video. I really have 3 issues with the clip – that I think would be great for a small group discussion.

First, love the “voting Republican doesn’t make you Christian” slap at the very beginning of the video. Very true. But I wouldn’t have stopped there. Jesus had words for the Zealots and the Pharisees. Anything that compromised Jesus as the solution to the problems of the world, Jesus had a quote for. Politics, education, religion.

So my question/issue to him is this – does he feel that way about all political parties? Or is it angst just reserved toward the Republicans? Democrat, Libertarian or anyone else who’s hope for our culture is in the political system is in the same boat (albeit the opposite side) as the Republicans. To limit the sting of his words to one party is doing exactly what he is railing about.

Second, I don’t think Jesus was thinking of me on the cross. That is a very ego/man-centric understanding of what is going on at the cross. The cross is all about God’s character and glory, not the value of us. Yes, we get the benefit of the transaction of sacrifice – no doubt about that. But God was thinking of Himself – his promise and vision of a world without death and sin. And dieing for the consequence was the only way that was going to happen without blowing it all up and starting over.

So I think God was thinking about that. Not me.

Lastly, I can see where he comes across as an anti-church, anti-organized anything guy. But as I read his other comments, I don’t think that is him at all. I think he cares deeply about the church and wants to be a part of a movement that sees church get closer to being a Grace Station instead of Code Enforcement. I think there are glimpses of that in the video but not overtly so. I hear a guy who loves the concept of the church as the Bride of Christ but hating the examples and experiences he’s had with her so far.

And that I think is the real shortcoming of the video. There isn’t a deep, holistic handling of the issues he brings up. They make great soundbites. At times he sounds like a prophet…statements of profound truth and conviction. Then he takes an abrupt left turn leaving that conversation to sound like an angry teenager screaming shallow, pithy cliches at his parents that he himself doesn’t really understand. There are some nuanced, deeper opportunities he missed. Instead of pushing us into deeper conversations about theology or the church and what transformation COULD look like, he’ll take the quick exit to hit another platitude.

But then again, that might have been the point of the whole exercise anyway. Maybe his point was to generate conversations and dissonance with people who otherwise wouldn’t think twice about their own understanding of grace, church, Jesus, or religion.

Like I said earlier – I like the video. I’ll keep my eyes out for the next piece they produce. My hunch is they will get better and better. I think it’s worth a watch and even worth some discussion time in a small group. I think it would spark some deeper conversations of what is the church, what marks Christianity different from all other religions, and what exactly is my role in all of that.

Here’s the video:

Quick Exercise #2: The Importance of Ministry Worth Multiplying Circle

Take that list of activities that you created at the start of the evening.

Ask for volunteer.

There is a great opportunity to tutor at risk kids after school, using any curriculum I want. I can even use the scriptures for character studies but I need someone to help me, are you in?

First – any opportunity that I’m offered I’m first going to my list of stuff that I’m already involved in and I’m asking myself – is this opportunity WORTH fitting into my life? Either cramming it into an already packed life OR by saying NO to something else. WORTH is relatively defined.

I’m also going to evaluate my list of activities with this question – is this WORTH doing?

Second – as a leader – I want to make sure I define WORTH like God has defined WORTH. This is a love, live and serve opportunity. This is a Great Commandment/Great Commission opportunity.

My job as a leader is NOT to guilt people into showing up or participating. That won’t last and it’s not of God. My job is to be a champion of what God is doing. To point out the already there eternal value and worth of the opportunity.

Quick Exercise #3 – Take a ministry you are in and walk thru 3 circles answering key questions.

Example: Men’s Fraternity
Circle 1 – focus is to disciple men into being spiritual leaders who love, live and serve. YES, worth it.

Circle 2 – Need a key PROVEN leader for director/champion position. Same vision, passion for discipleship. Deep Christ-follower, self-starter, available to do it, teachable, high character, honest, not perfect, vulnerable.

Found the guy – now ready to start.

Circle 3 — Process proven to work
Other churches have their trophies, we don’t…yet. We have process we want to try, run with it and evaluate as we go.

Nor do we have a process to replace Director…yet. We will need to address this if this is going to make it beyond just one season. Every ministry needs to wrestle with that question otherwise focus becomes the program and filling slots.

4 Foundational Multiplication Principles

1. Make micro decisions with macro viewpoint of does this advance God’s Kingdom?

2. Call people NORTH. Even yourself.
Ask more of people than where they are. Don’t ever demand more of those around you than yourself. Keep Love, Live, Serve in the forefront.

3. Something is better than nothing.
It’s easier to steer than start. GO! Starting somewhere and changing it later is better than doing nothing until you have the perfect plan. We know what doing nothing produces – nothing.

4. Invest in PEOPLE, not the program.
Programs have shelf life. Our job isn’t to keep the program running. Our calling is to make disciples who love, live, and serve.

Open Questions, Comments, and Thoughts

Which circle should we start with? Depends. All three need to be developed and dealt with but program and condition of culture will have a HUGE role in determining which circle to tackle first.

Key entry points into ministries is PEOPLE (relationship) and MINISTRY (program) but long term investment will only happen if all three are developed.

PROCESS is the most neglected circle in most churches. They spend time and energy running around to fill slots instead of developing people. Must change in order to be a multiplying church.