Be A Fungus

Guest post by Sarah Thames

Some wise friends who are in our Men’s Ministry recently presented an equipping paradigm to me that I found helpful during the fall sports season. It’s a more patient one than my personality tends toward. It’s also far less weighty than a one-to-one hundred, business culture, top-down model and more like the “culture of development” discussed this month (in the CSO Network Webinar).

Just as a fungus spreads gradually unseen and then seemingly all at once takes over, we want passion and priority for relational outreach in our leagues to spread one to one among our leadership, our coaches and managers and volunteers, affecting the spirit of the entire league. As we carry out our responsibility of putting the mission ever before the people we serve, we should keep Jesus as our model. He addressed and cared for the crowd at large while concentrating on just a few disciples. And those 12-plus are the ones he relied on to carry on the mission of spreading the gospel throughout the world.

So we set the vision for all in leadership. Then we find these people who are already “fungus”, connect them, share the knowledge and experiences, and help it to grow. We rely heavily on the Spirit to work in and through us.

Another wise friend said, “Be a piece of sandpaper.” Scrape, scrape, scrape… consistently shaping with small marks, patiently awaiting the transformation.