Finding Your Niche

I had a great conversation yesterday with Kris McLendon, our awesome children's ministry director. She attended a children's ministry workshop in Dallas last week, and I wanted to hear all about it. While I hoped the workshop would be helpful and informative, I was just impressed that Kris had taken the initiative to sign up for it and attend. When a person is that proactive about something, you know they're passionate about it. I was struck by that passion, listening to Kris talk about what she learned, the people she met, the encouragements and the challenges she sees in our ministry to kids and families.

Each of us is in one of two camps right now. Neither camp is bad, and both have great people in them. One camp includes Kris; people who are really passionate about what they're doing and identify with it as a calling. The other camp is populated with people who are helping to establish the church and desire to minister to people, but they don't necessarily identify personally with what they're doing. Their motives are right, they're doing a great job, and they're very much needed, especially now when the church is in its infancy. But my prayer is that everyone will find their way to the camp where Kris now finds herself. When you identify with what you're doing as a calling, and are passionate and excited about it, it's a whole lot more fun and, frankly, you're much more effective. I believe God wants both of those things for us: excitement and effectiveness. So how do you get there? Here are some of the major ingredients:

• Kingdom Vision. It's not all about finding your niche. Before that, it's what you think life is all about. If you catch a vision for what God is wanting to do in your community, you can clean fish in that effort and be more fulfilled than most people. Conversely, if it's still all about you, nothing you do in the Kingdom will be fulfilling. You may already be in the right place, doing the right thing, but a change God works in your heart will be the spark that changes everything.
• The Obvious. Whatever your role is in the kingdom, it's already there, right in front of you. You've probably been passionate about it for a long time. Maybe you think there's no place for it in the kingdom (my wife, for instance, was an actress for years before she knew there was any ministry value in it).
• Trial and Error. Sometimes you just have to try things out until you find the right fit. Nothing wrong with that. So throw some stuff on the wall and see what sticks!
• Confirmation. Don't miss this one. This is the church's job. Your Christian community plays an important role in your calling. They will confirm or deny it, and unless there is some moral reason not to, you better listen to them. Confirmation from the church is our protection against embarrassing ourselves (think American Idol tryouts--there's nothing more pitiful than someone running out there to do something when people around them can plainly see they're about to humiliate themselves; I often wonder, where are their friends and family?).

A couple of pitfalls to avoid:

• It's not all about Sunday morning. For just as many people, it may be about an aspect of neighborhood life, serving people in need, praying, providing hospitality--making the lives of others better in any number of ways. Churches often make it seem like joining a ministry team in the church's infrastructure is the only way to really serve God. The early church hardly even had any infrastructure--certainly had no committees--and they seemed to get along just fine in the 'impacting the world' category. Your niche might be with kids, like Kris's, or teaching and leadership, like mine. And it might be something completely different, which is more than okay.
• Don't go it alone. Nobody serves in the kingdom alone. Never have, never will, never should. Serve in your Christian community. Serve in and with your neighborhood group. Serve at your table. Serve your family and your friends, and serve with your family and friends. None of our gifts or callings are that great by themselves, but there is amazing Kingdom synergy when our various gifts are employed together. When Paul said, "You are the body of Christ," he meant all of us together, not any one of us individually.

"Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms." 1 Peter 4:10

If you've found your calling, leave a comment and tell us about it--it might help someone else in their discovery process. If you're still looking, ask a question and see what come back.