There are no free kicks in ministry. In other words, everything comes at a cost or has a trade-off. All ministry takes energy of the physical, mental or emotional kind. And though some ministry over time may almost become reflexive or second nature, or low effort due to skill developed, familiarity or temperament, there is always a ceiling. No person has infinite resources or time, nor does a team have infinite scalability. Hence, there are no free kicks. The language of saying something is free when in fact it takes such effort also diminishes the perceived value of the people doing the work, and the work itself. All costs and trades should be acknowledged appropriately.
Not free, but effortful.
The idea of having free kicks in ministry is in some instances just a poor equivalent for the term low-hanging fruit. It’s picked with ease, but is picked nevertheless. The language varies, of course. The sentiment that I’m addressing could be summed up with “just…” or “only…”. One may be told, “It’s just a small event.” “It’s only an hour a week.” Another form of language is “opportunity”. “It’s a great opportunity to make the most of.”
Events are a helpful example. People may speak of an ‘opportunity’ and how it’s easy to run and put together, and if we all just chip in, it makes it even easier. People come along and perhaps get invited to church or hear something from the Bible. All of this is nothing to complain about. But it is surely idealistic to put it so simplistically as I have. Yet it is so often put too simplistically. Volunteers need to be organised, perhaps by another volunteer or staff member. In the background, someone has to keep in mind the legalities of insurance or space, or broader partnerships for an event. The logistics are being managed depending on the complexity of numbers, spaces, groups, money, timetables, schedules and bookings. If one person does one of each of those, then someone is managing all those people.
Now, on top of all that, there is a sort of organisational overhead tax. That’s to say, when you add an element to an existing job or role, you don’t get 1+1=2. You get 1+1=2.5. There is a tax for now managing two tasks or projects. They don’t equal two separate matters. That is because one person (or the people managing, who are never just doing one thing at a time) now has to organise the organising, not of two projects, but the organising of organising two projects, a different skill set to narrow single project/task management. But it’s never just two, is it? Volunteers and staff are managing many projects! My guess is 4–5 large jobs or roles. Volunteers have full-time jobs and then family, and then church, and then hobbies, etc. This is why, if you don’t see this management tax coming from multiple projects, you will be (and they will be) constantly frustrated by the expectation/experience gap. They, or you, are told it’s just a simple, single, contained job, only to discover it is, but it really isn’t because you don’t see the invisible management tax that compounds. 1+1+1=5 suddenly! And that’s conservative maths.
The Goal: People
Then there is the real goal of ministry matters such as this (or a key/essential goal): people entering into the kingdom and being transformed. Now, if any event or project, or ongoing job in ministry, is fooled by language of containment, perhaps it has not taken into account one of the most fundamental desired outcomes of what we do in ministry – to see people enter and be transformed in the kingdom by the gospel.
Each person’s life is as messy as yours! Probably messier (because each of us is better than average). But getting someone into church as a narrow goal for, say, an event or ongoing ministry is half of it. And that’s not easy as it is. Often, just seeing that happen is rare. The narrow metric of attendance at an event is one thing. But then the broadened horizons of follow-up, regular attendance, conversion, perseverance and serving… These matters are anything but free kicks or low-hanging fruit. Broadening out puts all we do into better perspective. None of them are givens. All of them are hard work (humanly speaking).
Yes, we need to focus on simple tasks and jobs in the more day-to-day running of ministry. But we certainly cannot do that and that only, or habitually lose sight of the deeper, more essential goals. Simple task-orientated mindsets will give narrow focus. But reverse-engineering our hopes of a transformed life and what it takes will see that we are under no illusions as to the cost of discipleship, not only in the macro but in the micro.
Low effort, high yield. Or just effort.
The best objects for such a description fit low-effort but (potential) high-yield situations. However, are there such situations? And what of the value of high-effort, low-yield? And is that not all situations (potentially)?
If you hired someone to do all the ‘low-hanging fruit’ jobs, what would you pay them? Nothing? Half a wage? Peanuts? The job description might be: run the Easter and carols events, and weekly SRE, and the interdenominational prayer meeting, the random baptisms for community members, the funerals and weddings of non-attending community members, run the website, the kids’ playgroup, and anything else the minister asks. I’ll give you a packet of peanuts.
Each task, one might argue, for the right person, in the right stage of life, with the right gifting and optimal time management, is simple, low-hanging fruit. Practically free kicks, all of them. Because in all of them, there are opportunities practically asked of us to present the gospel simply and clearly to the community who have volunteered themselves as a captive audience. Some are theologically unsound, like baptising unchristian children. Some are just blatant gospel opportunities in the guise of cultural events like the funeral (they don’t know what they are in for!). Some are even government-sanctioned, like SRE.
But none are low effort. And even if you find them easy, they have far-reaching effects and consequences, maintenance and, God willing, kingdom growth. SRE comes with a consistent time commitment, no matter how easy you find it. Christmas and Easter can become focused solely on the outside at the expense of some of the most significant moments for Christians to remember or celebrate. Funerals and interdenominational events come with reputational awareness, which is sometimes good and sometimes bad and often mixed together.
But all of it should be pretty easily managed by a one-day-a-week role.
Intentionality and principle.
A mindset that treats these matters simplistically, that they are low cost, practically free, does come at a cost – intentionality. With such vast opportunities, simple direction and intentionality are diluted and lost. Focus is essential if we understand that we and everyone else have limited resources. Not just time or money, but energy and motivation.
Certainly, we make the most of every opportunity, but intentionality would mean that over the course of time we seek to make more opportunities more available to us that are of the nature and kind which we think would be the most beneficial (to gospel growth) given our context and resources at this stage. Basically, strategy. Under God, we would also call that stewardship. This is a reflection of proper evaluation: valuing time and effort exerted over the long term (often slowly, though sometimes there’s revival) towards genuine gospel growth in terms of conversion, maturity, perseverance and sacrificial service.
