I have a new idea. I have been thinking of beginning every church meeting by asking the present committee members to raise their hands if they have the time and desire to volunteer to do something. It doesn't matter what it is. It might be sending out emails. It might be researching out ideas. Looking up information. Anything that they are willing to do is fine with me. But it would have to be something.
This idea came about from feelings of expressed disappointment by some of the staff and congregants immediately following monthly meetings. Leaving a high energy meeting where the Holy Spirit is tossing out ideas like hot potatoes only to discover that no one has the time to carry through with the vision is a major letdown.
But just think if we figured this out from the moment we sat down together. Not as a shaming activity but perhaps as a form of connecting. The work of the church is always done by a minority of the members...so why should they carry all the pressure to do it all. In times when there isn't the collective labor to carry out ideas perhaps we could spend an hour sitting and listening to those things that were sucking our time and weigh it against those things were we wish our time was being spent. Or wouldn't it be nice to discover in the first five minutes that we can pack up and go home and be with our families. It could serve as a formal opportunity for an already overburdened population to say "no" to one more burden.
The second thing I think this would accomplish is the open acknowledgement of the commitment needed by all people on a committee if any ministry is going to move forward. We come to meetings assuming that the people there are able and willing to put in the time and effort to get their hands dirty and that just isn't the reality of many of our lives. Most of us have the best of intentions but are already overwhelmed by a plethora of demands simultaneously pulling us in various directions at the same time. Pastors are no different. We don't have magic wands to convince everyone to participate and we definitely don't have the budget for the esspresso needed to do it all ourselves.
I had someone once tell me that I should call everyone in the church to personally invite them to a program I was doing. It was the only way people would pay attention...a personal phone call...from me...the person who just put together the entire event. And for awhile I felt guilty for not doing it, especially when attendance was embarrassingly low. But is that really what our ministries have become...another burden that only the guilt of a personal plea would convince a person to take on? Isn't this the exact opposite of why we believe church is just the place for the lost and broken?
Maybe the people we spend our meetings focused on just aren't interested in what we have to offer them but are still in need of what God's love is waiting to bring them. Which means we are getting in the way of the message. A message that doesn't need pretty packaging, a flashy solgan, or a six week program. And while we always (but rarely discuss) the option we have to pack up and go home we also have the option, that before we being planning new classes or expensive projects, to sit with one another and learn first to love and accept those people who God has already set before us. Perhaps it will only be when all the busy-ness of planning and programming is set aside and we face the choice to sit and stay with one another or pack up or go home that we will begin to do what millions of meetings never could: spread the Love and Light of Jesus Christ.
