Bring Your Keys

Recently I posted something about some problems that occurred at my church, and the way God was leading me through them. I decided to take it down. There is a 0.001% chance that someone from my church might read my blog, and if they did, they might find what I wrote divisive. I don’t want to risk it.

It’s hard to know when it’s okay to give your testimony regarding fellow Christians who cause you problems. It has value as testimony, but it can also inflame them and their friends against you. It can also come off as self-righteousness or schadenfreude, which is a tempting dish Christians are not allowed to touch. The Bible says God may turn his wrath away from your enemies if you celebrate their defeat.

I don’t cook at my church any more. Very sad, but there it is. My role was suddenly reduced to the point where it would have been foolish to do all that work. I used to sell 15-20 pizzas per event, but I am down to 9, and the display area has been sharply reduced, so it would have gotten much worse. It reached a point where instead of making the church $250 a day (or over $10,000 per year), I would have been bringing in 50 bucks. In order to do that, I’d have to miss working as an Armorbearer, and the leader of the Armorbearers would really like me to spend less time in the kitchen. The economics don’t make sense.

My participation in special events was cut out entirely.

On top of that, I suddenly became aware that the church has a paid chef running the kitchen. No one told me about this until this week. Last I knew, we were all volunteers, and I answered only to the pastor running the cafe. I was exceeding my authority, but I had no way of knowing it.

One of the fundamental rules of institutional cooking is that there has to be a single authority in charge of any kitchen. I was an unnecessary hindering authority, and I didn’t even know it. I had been trying for weeks to get information on what was going on, but I couldn’t get emails or texts answered, and there were no meetings.

I also learned that although I had been encouraged to increase the professionalism of the kitchen workers, I was going to be expected to stop resisting the lack of order. I would have had to work in an regime that conflicts sharply with my work ethic. When you take joy in doing things right, and you’re passionate about it, it’s extremely difficult to work in an enterprise where low standards are defended and promoted.

Maybe I expected too much. I hoped to be a kind of Jaime Escalante figure, helping people rise to meet greater expectations. Instead, I learned that we were expected to go along to get along. I think the fear was that if we pushed people to excel, they would simply go home. And maybe that’s right, but I’m not suited to work in that kind of environment. I felt like Howard Roarke would have felt, pasting Parthenon replicas to the facades of his elevations.

In a nutshell, I faced a constructive discharge, and I left in order to avoid adding to the entropy. And there are other reasons why I couldn’t remain, but I don’t think I should reveal everything.

It’s still a sticky situation, because before I found out all this new information, I talked to the head pastor. We agreed that I would cook for visiting VIPs from then on. I doubt he has any idea I’m out of the kitchen, and it’s not my place to butt in and let him know. He’s in charge of the whole church. His word is law, but he runs the kitchen through a subordinate, and that’s the person I was under.

I learned some wonderful lessons from all this. I knew that the supernatural battle has to come first, and I was trying to implement this knowledge, but I learned that you have to get reinforcements sometimes. We’re constantly taught that God, in us, is greater than the world. But I learned that no matter how good your prayer life is, Satan is still extremely strong, and sometimes you will need reinforcements. Many Christians would consider that a repudiation of faith, but it’s reality. You can get in big trouble fighting strong spirits on your own, even with God on your side.

Someone sent me to meet with our church’s prayer team over the cafe mess, and it was like going to a hospital after being pulled off a raft in the middle of the ocean. I can’t tell you how refreshing it was. They had the kind of worship the main services lack. There was no rap. There was no rock. There was real worship music. There was prolonged prayer. There was serious teaching of scripture, not just the soft stuff we serve out front. I had been hoping to find this kind of atmosphere somewhere in my church, and on Wednesday night, I found it. Or it found me. I’m going to join the team if they’ll have me. This is what I really wanted. Working with your talents is very nice, but it’s garbage compared to working with your faith and drawing near to God.

It’s funny; the temple had a main area where ordinary people could come and go, and then behind that, they had an area for the priests, and behind that, they had the Holy of Holies. Our church has a sanctuary for services, but the prayer team meets in a smaller room behind it, pretty much where the priests would be in a temple. That’s where I want to be. That’s where things happen.

I also found out that a person who seemed to be causing most of my problems was actually a relatively minor player. The biggest source of chaos and strife was someone else. I knew Satan liked to fool people and pit them against each other, but now I have new respect for his abilities in this area.

My involvement with the Armorbearers is increasing. I’m back where I’m supposed to be, and it feels fantastic. I can’t describe the relief. I got some great rewards from cooking, and I’m sure my time in the cafe was God’s idea, but I am loving getting back to my earlier calling. And there are so many unpleasant repetitious problems I won’t have to face any more. I go in, I do my job with a spiritual crew that understands responsibility and authority, and I go home. It’s like a vacation.

I’m planning to work with the prayer team to fix the cafe. Some of us are thinking of going in when the place is closed and praying the paint off the walls. That will be fantastic. The leader of the prayer team is taking the issue to God, so I don’t know if the plan will be put to work.

When I was with the prayer team, several of them kept telling me I needed to go back to the cafe. The problem was that I had already made a commitment to the Armorbearers, and my leader and I had prayed about it, and I had prayed about it, and leaving seemed correct. I came to the conclusion that returning as a prayer warrior was the best thing. I’ll still be there, and I’ll be doing something extremely important, but I won’t be in the way, cooking and imposing my standards in someone else’s kitchen. The chef has to put her stamp on the place, if she is to succeed and get any kind of respect, and for that to happen, I have to be gone.

Things keep improving for me. That’s how walking by faith is. You grow and improve and gain strength. My tool chest gets bigger and bigger, thanks to God’s generosity and patience.