In my last post, I mentioned that we are getting ready to replace the sound system in one of our venues at Willow. We have been looking forward to this for so long and we have been placing so many of our hopes and dreams on getting something new and shining that will solve all our problems. It is time, and the old one is horrible, but I predict that the new system will lose its luster, it won’t be perfect and we’ll move on to the next thing that is wrong, and put our expectations on the next thing that is just around the corner.
As technical artists, our forward-looking selves are generally wanting our equipment and personnel issues to be solved or to pull off the next amazing production. We look forward to the day “if I only had HD cameras”, or “once the newest version of ProPresenter comes out” or “this Christmas is going to be amazing”. Not that any of these things are bad, it is just that they don’t really solve all the problems, they don’t make life perfect, they will let us down.
Waiting for everything to be perfect is a fantasy. Putting our hope in “things” cannot fully satisfy, and it is at odds with the very message of the gospel. The new equipment that you are longing for will let you down. Solving one problem will inevitably raise other, newer problems to the surface. The next big idea will provide you with a great adrenaline rush, but then comes the crash.
In Psalm 42, the writer talks about how our souls long for God, yet he asks the question: “Why, my soul, are you so downcast? Why so disturbed within me?” The only solution to this feeling of being let down is to “Put your hope in God.”
Our jobs as technical artists in the local church is to push and strive for technical excellence; to look for new equipment, to recommend new ways of doing things, to push our current normal onto something special and extraordinary. It is how we fulfill our role in the body of Christ. We must also not put our hope in any of this. Reach. Strive. Work your butt off. But don’t place your identity in something new and shiny or flashing and amazing. Put your hope in God. Allow him to be your motivation. Let him fill you up because the adrenaline will wear off.
