Warning: this post will be more serious than most. Abort now if you're looking for something more "It Happened One Night" and less "It's A Wonderful Life".
UpStreet is the name of our elementary-age kids program at church. And as of yesterday, I am now the Children's Pastor in charge of this awesome environment...as well as several other things, but this is my primary gig.
This has been a long time coming, and I'm ever so excited and relieved to be in this new position. It's been one month shy of 7 years since I came to CenterPoint Church as the Worship Pastor. In those 7 years, my job has grown far beyond the confines of worship pastoring, and the worship pastoring job has grown far beyond the initial responsibilities it entailed when I arrived.
Like being a portable ministry for 3 1/2 years.
It's a small thing: moving a trailer load of equipment in and out of a facility every Sunday, then getting it all set up, hooked up, powered up and making it look like our Sunday service is nearly effortless to those who come.
News flash: it's not effortless. It's effort-ful. And for a great variety of reasons, I've lost the joy and passion I once had for leading worship. And if a person is going to put forth all that effort, he'd better be pretty passionate about what he's doing or it's going to lose it's allure.
It did.
I still love Jesus. Actually, through this whole "dark night of the soul" as I've pondered, contemplated, fretted and even whined about possibly quitting, I've found myself leaning on Him, longing for His voice and resting in Him more than I have for quite a while.
Too long a while, actually.
And it's because I still passionately love Jesus that I want to keep working in this church. And why I'm so content, revived even, to be working with our kids and leading them in worshiping and learning to follow Him. Because I still know that there is nothing I'll do in this life, and nothing those kids will do, that will ever satisfy me if it doesn't find its center in Him.
So I gratefully say goodbye to something I've done in various capacities and degrees over the past 20 years...leading worship. Yes, I'm still leading worship, in a different way, a different paradigm. But no longer in the context that I've known it for these 2 decades. And I'm grateful for that.
Grateful that I've been given the freedom to move my focus without moving my location. Grateful that I'm still allowed the privilege of working full-time in ministry, in this church, in this community. Grateful that God has provided a passionate, talented and Christ-focused man to take over the worship ministry. Grateful for the assurance God has given me over and over that I'm great with Him, that Jesus really does love me, that I'm utterly freakin' joyfully accepted no matter what. Grateful that my friendship with Him is not predicated by my performance, my lack of performance, my attitude, my ability or my inadequacy. Grateful that my imperfections are not a wall that blocks my connection with Him.
So I'm happily skipping on down to UpStreet, eyes wide open for great experiences with Jesus.
And hopefully, some kids will be skipping right along with me.
4 comments:
We are so excited about it!!!
Rich and Karen, I just happened to take a moment to read your post. Interesting that I chose this day but what a blessing! Rejoicing with you that in the midst of God's service we experience His green pastures and still waters.
Blessings!
And we're grateful for you Rich, in any and every capacity you're called to serve in the CenterPoint family!
Rich, thanks for your authenticity and transparency...you are so easy to love and such an amazing leader! It is a privilege to serve along side you and your amazing family.
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