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Hello Jesse,
If you’ve had a chance to attend MDS Leadership training, you know we use the metaphor of a puzzle when we talk about how a project comes together. At the MDS Canada office, this is major puzzling time. If I were to take the metaphor further, I’d say at the office we begin by working on the edge pieces.
Firstly, the corners – four pillars. Where do we have meaningful work? How is our volunteer pool looking? What about accommodations and what might need to happen for setup? Is funding available for materials? That’s always a big question.
The other ‘edge pieces’ might be our leadership volunteers. Do we have cooks, crew leaders, project directors and office managers? Sometimes these positions come as couples, so it can be difficult to fill in the cook position until we know if a couple who wants to serve as cook and crew leader confirm their time of service.
Once the edge pieces are all (or mostly) in place, we look to fill in the centre with the many weekly volunteers who will put in lots of servant work.
As I observe our Canadian projects coming together, sometimes it seems like a we are working on a 5000-piece puzzle. Other times, it seems as simple as looking at a piece and saying, “I know exactly where that should go.”
One thing is for sure: it is richly rewarding to look back at what once seemed like chaos, to see a picture emerge. A picture of beauty, love, faith, and hope restored.
Many of you are one of our puzzle pieces – volunteers and donors who fit into the MDS puzzle. Thank you for being the hands and feet of Jesus. Thank you for your patience and prayers as we work hard at this coming season’s MDS Canada project puzzle.
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