Kim, a sister of mine from different parents but the same Parent, sat in church looking at the brochure that invited her to commit to a place of service for the coming year. Many churches do this - prepare a list of all the opportunities for the members to use their spiritual gifts and talents to a the glory of God. It's why we're here, after all.
Kim scanned the list. She does a lot already. Her paying job serves those who want to learn to read. She co-leads a Sunday School Bible study. She is a lay speaker who leads in worship and preaches occasionally in her own and other churches.
All those are good. But her main ministry is acts of kindness, most often, cakes of kindness. Kim is someone who doesn't just have good intentions; she gets up and does the things she thinks about. When it's her turn to bake a birthday cake for a co-worker, Kim prepares delicious and time-consuming works of art out of a desire to bring delight and joy to another. Once, she baked a chocolate mint cake for a neighbor, because the Spirit led her to do that. When the neighbor, Kathy, wasn't home, Kim colluded with her family to stash it in the fridge so it wouldn't melt. Upon discovering it, Kathy said with tears in her eyes, 'No one ever baked a whole cake for me before.'
That's Kim's ministry. Others might look at a gorgeous cake in a magazine and think, "Wow, so-and-So would really love that." Kim bakes it and takes it to the person. Sometimes for a birthday. Sometimes just because some whisper of the Spirit moved her.
Kim does a lot for the church, but she is open to God changing her direction. As she prayed over the brochure, she realized that if she said 'yes' to another official church ministry, she would not have as much openness to the wild Spirit saying, 'Bake that.' It suddenly occurred to her, if I'm telling it right, that the ministry of getting up and baking the cakes was exactly where God needed her to be.
I think about that a lot. Not because I'm called to bake cakes - that's Kim, not me. I do realize, however, that a lot of what God calls me to do involves the willingness to get up and just do what it is in my heart to do.
We invite people to ministry at Trinity in many of the same ways other churchs do: brochures, announcements, visuals, nominating calls. We have important positions that must be filled: ushers, greeters, Welcome Center hosts, children's and youth leaders, tech team - I could fill a brochure myself with the list. But just as we need greeters at the doors, we need every single solitary one of us to greet each other. Just as we need Welcome Center hosts, we need every single solitary one of us to welcome the stranger and help them feel at home. The children need leaders, but they also need everyone who was there at their infant baptism to guide and encourage them, sit and eat supper with them at TNT, ask them about their day.
I'd like to nominate everyone, myself included, for the ministry of 'Getting Up Off Our Butts." I know it's crude, but it's how I think of it. I have a lot of good intentions. Most people do. Most people don't sit in church determined to be unfriendly, or want to trip the children who dance down the hall. Most of us aren't stingy on purpose, with our time or our possessions. We just don't act on the good intentions of our hearts. It's so much more comfortable to observe. It's a lot harder to get in the mix. But in the mix is, usually, where God is waiting.
I will if you will. Will I, even if you won't? I learned from 12-step ministries to do one thing for someone else every day, even if and especially if I don't want to. Do one thing you don't have to. Do one thing to bless someone, to grace the world with love instead of hate, with kindness instead of meanness. Not because it will make a difference, because that might not be readily apparent. But because God is for us, with us, every single day regardless of our deserving. How can I be so 'sit back and watch' about that?
Hey, Kim. If you are reading this, thank you for being such an inspiration. I can't eat cake, but your caring feeds my soul.
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