DukeDeJong

Let’s face it, no one thing can make you wise.  Wise people tend to have many key attributes, things like a willingness to work hard, being resourceful, having specific knowledge, etc.  For me though, I think one of the top characteristics to being wise is your ability and willingness to learn, and just as importantly, putting yourself in a position to do so.  Those who I consider wise people are always trying new things and learning, or regularly spending time with those who may have more expertise or experience than them.  A big key is to always be ready for an opportunity to learn more.

“A wise person is hungry for knowledge,  while the fool feeds on trash.”
Proverbs 15:14

A few months back, I had the opportunity to attend the Guru’s of Tech conference with my primary focus being renewing my passion for technical arts as well as connecting with tech artists from other churches.  A key portion of this conference was breakout learning sessions, one of which I gained a great deal from.  While I’ve been mixing sound for many years and have had some success doing so, I know I can learn more so I took full advantage of a session taught by a sound legend, Robert Scovill.  Had I not been hungry to learn, I would have missed many fantastic nuggets of wisdom that I believe will make me a better sound guy.  But it’s not only in the moments with influential people where I learn things about audio, video, lighting, or life.  Sometimes it’s in a conversation with a musician, a beginning camera operator, or a friend who knows nothing about production.  The more I surround myself with good, smart people while staying willing to learn, the more wisdom I gain.

“Walk with the wise and become wise;  associate with fools and get in trouble.”
Proverbs 13:20

Many young adults get out of college and think they are set with everything they need to know in life.  In fact all of us, regardless of age, can fall into this trap at times, thinking we know everything.  We must continually be open to the wisdom of others.  As soon as we get trapped into thinking our way is the only right way, we become foolish.  We must stay open, mold-able and ready to embrace a new perspective.

“Fools think their own way is right,  but the wise listen to others.”
Proverbs 12:15

Are you hungry for wisdom?  Are you walking with other wise people?  Are you open to the insight of others?

Over the past three weeks I have found myself spending a lot of time with church tech and worship artists as well as those who serve those artists.  In fact I have spent so much of my time investing in these relationships that I have spent little to no time on Twitter, Facebook or creating any new material for this site.  Even though I have missed these things (which are good things in my opinion) and have traveled more in three weeks than in the past year, I find myself re-energized and more focused on God’s call on my life as a support to the artists that serve our church.  After thousands of miles, being home 5 out of 21 days and burning the candle at both ends I actually feel more passion and energy to pursue what I’m doing than ever and it’s simply because of community.

We were never meant to be alone in this life.  In Genesis 18 God says, “It is not good that man should be alone…”  In fact God created Adam so that he could live in relationship with God.  Eve was created so that “Man would not be alone.” We not only can’t carry the load of life alone, but we as people are better when we live in community.  When you are around people who “get you,” you are renewed and ready for a new day.  After a discussion among people who all share similar beliefs and convictions you might feel ready to take those ideas to the world.  When we are connected with people in community we experience love, acceptance and often times a renewal of our sense of purpose.

In ministry, we must find ways to refresh, renew and keep our purpose in front of us and the best way I’ve found to do this is to be in community with other like minded people.  This week I was blessed to attend the Southern California Church Technical Director Round Table meeting where 24 or 25 lead technical artists gathered to encourage and support one another in our mission to serve our churches and communities well.  Those who attended gave rave reviews of the event, not because we had an jam packed agenda (we didn’t) or some great gear to demo (though we did), but because we got to spend time with one another and had some great discussion about what ministry should and should not be about, how to be successful as a leader and how we can support our churches and Pastors better without burning out ourselves.  It was an experience I’ll treasure for a long time to come and one that has given me a lot of energy and renewed passion as I transition.

Have you been feeling run down or a little lost from your mission?  What opportunities are you taking to be in community?

Many years ago I came to the realization that recruiting artists (musicians, singers, techs, etc) doesn’t work with traditional methods.  Announcements from the stage, volunteer drives or bulletin blurbs might get me a person or two occasionally but rarely did I get good people out of it.  It was around this time that I realized that artists need more than a simple “we need you.”

This is a highly condensed version of what I teach on why I gave up on recruiting but it will give you an idea of the shift that happened for me in how I grew my teams.  Instead of simply trying to recruit artists I realized that we need to focus on the heart and the desire of artists in order to get them to join and stay with you.  Nearly all artists want 4 things.  They want to be connected to other artists (even introverts need this), feel like their art makes a difference, to contribute to a great cause but with a clearly defined role and time commitment, and to feel loved and like their art is accepted.  These 4 concepts literally changed how I did ministry.

Concept 1 – Create a Community of Artists
Our ministry was like most, we simply asked for the help we needed, did our jobs together and went home feeling good about the work we did.  There is nothing inherently wrong with this, we just never saw the growth we needed to get ahead of the game and do the things we wanted to do.  We had people who were relatively committed to serving in the ministry, but we needed to create a community of artists that would be the ministry.  .  There’s something about the Bible, food and praying together and for one another that really helps create that sense of community.  When I initially made this shift we started meeting as a team 30 minutes before service to have some breakfast and do a short Bible study and pray for one another.  Not a single person scoffed at the idea of being there earlier in the morning and a few people even thanked me before we got started.  We also began doing a short meet up after services to discuss anything that needed to be addressed but mainly so we could pray over our team before they left.  It was this regular, quality interaction as a group that really helped each team grow closer together.  We not only served together but shared life, spiritual lessons and each others burdens.  Each team really became its own community of tech artists doing life together.

Concept 2 – Making a Difference

Artists have a longing within them of wanting to make a difference.  Especially for Christian artists, we have a desire to make a difference for God with our art.  As an arts leader I need to not only encourage artists to serve God with what He gave them, but I should help them see the difference they make in our church.  As leaders we often forget to encourage those serving alongside us with the stories of lives that have changed because of the work we do.  As an arts leader I am incredibly blessed and proud when I hear of a life that was impacted through my art.  All artists, not just leaders need to hear of changed lives whether it’s an email to a Pastor on staff, a baptism service or simply a time of testimony.  Share these wins with your artists as it will provide motivation and inspiration for even better and more impacting art.

Concept #3 – The Cause
When I started to make this shift I called a meeting of our volunteer and staff leaders.  In fact I sent out this meeting notice to all of our team in case someone thought they were or wanted to be a leader and they weren’t on my radar.  After filling them in on the night’s plan, the first thing we did was brainstorm everything that our ministry currently did or wanted to do in the future.  This was a big list and it was awesome to dream, but more importantly it was important for all of our people to know what the whole ministry was already doing and where the whole ministry needed to go.  It wasn’t just about the video people, or the audio or the lighting.  This was the grand vision for the entire team.  Next we discussed what the minimum commitment from every person on the team should be and what staff and leaders had to commit to our volunteers.  This volunteer commitment covered things like expecting to serve once every three weeks, being on time for the production meeting, replacing yourself if you had to cancel, attending occasional full team social gatherings, etc.  The discussion of what should be expected of the leaders included training, effective communication of changes/needs, job descriptions for each position and leaders that aren’t too busy to care for team members.  We then charted out  how many people it would take to fill every role of both our current and future/dream needs if everyone was serving once every three weeks.  With this vision and organization chart nailed down and communicated, our team nearly doubled in size over the course of 2-3 years.  Our people knew what we were about, could see exactly where we were short-handed, could see the job description of the needed spots and could quickly step in.  Also, since the people we already had were fired up and focused many would invite their friends to join their team.  Anytime someone asked about involvement we had this information ready to share and find their fit within our ministry.

Concept #4 – Being Accepted

Artists in general tend to be bad accepting and encouraging each other.  Whether tech or musician, writer or singer, we tend to be judgmental perfectionists who are quicker to point out the faults than we are to encourage, thank and love on each other.  That’s not to say we should simply be simply happy that people show up and tolerate fixable mistakes, but if we want people to learn and grow they must have the grace and encouragement of a leader along with the correction they need to help them get there. If you have someone committed to the cause and vision of your ministry but they feel like they are getting beat up or aren’t good enough, they will not last.  If someone is not working out in a role that’s one thing, but I would much rather see a leader lovingly help them find the role they can fit into instead of coming down on them.  The world is already critical enough of artists.  We should be willing to love and accept artists for the gifts that God has given them regardless if we agree with or enjoy their art.  This is an atmosphere that artists will want to be a part of.