Small things...

How often do we overlook the little things. When I did my first couple of camps with Cobb iI had the privilege of shadowing him. The camp consisted of about five hundred peeps, students and staff. And Cobb was the one running the whole thing. Even though he had me and the staff running at a pretty high pace doing a million things at once we knew we had to manage. And no matter what I was doing, he would always make sure to pull me from wherever to watch him make the big decisions, you know, concerning program, discipline issues or even finance stuff.

One of the things that he always did was a written critique of every message that was given by the camp speaker. It was awesome. I had seen him do this while I was in his ministry in high school, but now I was on the staff side of it. Over the first coule of years he would ask me for my comments on his critiques before he gave them to the speaker. And then one day he asked me to do the notes on my own. Now, whether he really wanted me to do it or he just didn't have enough time... the point is that he had me do it. It was actually pretty overwhelming. But Kev knew where I was in my ministry and that I could handle it. He trusted me and I did ok the first time. From that point I continued to do it. And I got better with time.

It was something small, but it was significant and meaningful to me, and I knew that Cobb was looking out for me. He never let me get comfortable. It was stuff like that which allowed me to get better at ministry. So I guess my point is for you not to overlook the small stuff. When you are doing ministry and running hard, you will miss stuff. If you do not have someone who is mentoring you to see the stuff that you cannot, I would suggest that you reach out and make it happen. No one is responsible for your growth as a pastor or youth-worker. But if you get a guy like Cobb then you already have the upper hand. Where do you need to improve? The best places are the ones that are pointed out to you cause you don't even know.