So I don’t write a whole lot of blogs directed just too church planters, but here is one. I recently had a friend of mine (a fellow church planter) tell me that the day after he preaches he has to stay busy or he gets into a funk. We discussed how rock starts have this post performance thing also but often times they just mask it with drugs, alcohol and women. I am excited to say that he isn’t going that route. Even though I go through something, I don’t feel depressed like he does. If anything I am relieved that it is over because we made it through another week. So far we have done that without any serious meltdowns. I think the week before last was actually the first time (other than my mouth getting in the way of my thoughts) that we had much of a glitch at all. Considering all of the potential issues we could have… a power bar kicking off and needing to be reset which caused the loss of stage lighting and one projector wasn’t that bad. I know that a lot of people struggle to get in gear on Monday mornings but it seems like the last few weeks it has been getting harder and harder. Maybe it has to do with us being portable and participating in a full body aerobic workout before and after service; but today I am just mentally and physically exhausted. For the past 13 weeks I have worked 7 days a week and I don’t even know how many hours. Don’t feel sorry for me because I am guilty of taking this on. But I just wanted to share what I am learning. There is always 6 days or less till Sunday. I have read a lot of books talking about the value of monthly preview services to get you into the swing of things. I am a huge advocate of those but transitioning from 30 days between services down to 6 is a big transition. I don’t know the answer maybe it is reducing the time between previews as you go along but regardless get ready Sundays come quick.  

I heard a story about a kid’s basketball team recently where one of the kids was bigger and in basketball in the early years size plays a big factor as kids develop their skill. The children’s parents told their son to hold on to the ball and don’t pass it if you want to win. I am almost sad to say that the team did win and there are certain times when holding onto the rock can bring success. What I have found over 13 weeks of holding too many rocks is that they get heavy. I have done my best to give people the assist but here is my challenge. I am not afraid that people can’t handle the rock. God has given us some incredibly talented people who in many cases are more talented than I am. My fear has been that they will get tired of carrying the mail, tired of taking it to the hole, and any other basketball analogy you can think of regarding the effort of it takes to get the ball through the goal. Being portable and being a new church we use a lot of people for set-up and tear down in addition to normal church duties like hospitality. So we multi-task plain and simple… For a month or so I have been tracking our volunteer percentage and it has been over 40% of total attendance (including kids) every week so that is pretty good. Still we have a lot of people doing multiple jobs and even though I have had people say “we’ll do whatever” I have tried to utilize their gifts, talents and passions to get the most effectiveness. I learned that managing in the business world but I am not sure it is the best governing tool in a young church plant. So…This past week I have started dishing more rocks. I am trying to utilize talents and passions where I can and then everywhere else I am trying to find levels of commitment. I don’t want to burn people out and that is not my intention. I am challenging people to get more involved and at the same time I am challenging them to work their way out of a job by looking for additional volunteers. I don’t know if it is going to work but when we started going week to week I gave myself 6 months till complete exhaustion. I knew that God either had to provide us help or would have to increase my AQ (adversity quotient). The jury is still out on the 6 months, but I know there is only 6 days to Sunday.