I just finished watching myself on our television. I will never – ever – reconcile myself to this. It was just a training video that I filmed last October for Standard Publishing’s Jungle Safari VBS. I was honored to be asked to participate not only in shooting this video, but Noah and I were included in the promotional materials because of my work on the team that wrote the materials. It was an honor to help pioneer a “special needs friendly” VBS curriculum for Standard, just as it is my honor to host their blogtalk radio program twice a month and write for Shaping Special Hearts Newsletter. But still, I become anxious just thinking about the implications of being touted as the “special needs expert.”
I’m so uncomfortable with it, in fact, that when asked to contribute Key Ministry’s blog as a guest blogger, my entire post was dedicated to defaming “the expert.” Read “Some Assembly But No Expertise Required” here. I’m still just Noah’s mom. I learned him and the other children with special needs in the ministry I was charged with and just made it work. Now, some years later, “special needs expert” follows my name in programs, videos and on promotional posters. It just doesn’t seem to make sense to me. And next week I’ll be even more perplexed, wandering around Disney’s Coronado Springs Convention Center realizing that people are there to hear me present materials about special needs ministry as “the expert.”
As I continued to take apart my presentation and put it back together for the sixth time (while fighting off an anxiety attack) I frantically opened my desk drawer to find two simple rubber bracelets that brought hope and perspective.
These were issued to us last year at INCM’s Children’s Pastor’s Conference. They were simply a way to identify ourselves and our area of expertise so that if anyone saw us at a networking function they could easily identify what kind of ministry to children we are involved in. For example, my grey band reads “serve by example” designating me as a person in leadership. The blue band, more significantly, reads “serve special needs.”
Even though I received them last winter, I kept them in my desk drawer as a reminder of my greater mission. You may be wondering why I need to remind myself that I am seen as a leader or involved in ministry to people with special needs. But it isn’t that designation that prompted me to keep the bands. It is the first directive that has inspired me throughout the year – serve. This theme for CPC and INCM refreshed me not only during the conferences, but also throughout the year. They simply phrase it “serve serve serve.”
When I have been tempted to become completely overwhelmed by any project I am writing, I remind myself that my goal is to serve. Last year as I completed my thesis, I would wrap those bands around my wrist and ask God to use my feeble words to serve his Church. Before my first radio show, first radio show last spring, I donned my bracelets and uttered a prayer. As I have written for PURE Ministries and helped develop resources for our network, I absently run my thumb over the word serve and find peace and solace.
I’m not going to CPC next week to be the expert, I’m going to serve. I’ll serve Standard Publishing at their booth as I answer questions about the curriculum to which I contribute. I’m happy to serve alongside a team of editors, consultants and marketing managers with vision for equipping the church. I’ll serve cmconnect as I talk with fellow leaders about the possibility of interviewing them on the radio show this year. And most of all, I’ll serve the children’s ministry leaders who attend the conference. I don’t have to “wow them” with brilliance or come across as this world-class expert, I’m there to serve.
Once when Jesus’ disciples were arguing about being the greatest (maybe we can read being “experts in the kingdom”) he brought it back to this truth.
Sitting down, Jesus called the Twelve and said, “If anyone wants to be first, he must be the very last, and the servant of all.”
So I’ll serve gladly and be better for it. And I think it will feel like home.
vangierodenbeck 