The Stacking Chairs Principle
On Sunday I mentioned the “Stacking Chairs” principle that we’ve adopted here at Port City Church. The basic premise is that none of us—elders, leaders, members—are above any task…including (and maybe especially) stacking chairs. Each week we set up 220 chairs and put away 220 chairs. It’s one of the occupational responsibilities of being a portable church.
What I love about this principle is that it embodies the serving mindset and heart of the early church. In Acts 6:1-6 we read…
Now in these days when the disciples were increasing in number, a complaint by the Hellenists arose against the Hebrews because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution. And the twelve summoned the full number of the disciples and said, “It is not right that we should give up preaching the word of God to serve tables. Therefore, brothers, pick out from among you seven men of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we will appoint to this duty. But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.” And what they said pleased the whole gathering, and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit, and Philip, and Prochorus, and Nicanor, and Timon, and Parmenas, and Nicolaus, a proselyte of Antioch. These they set before the apostles, and they prayed and laid their hands on them.
What’s so humbling about this list of men is that each of them was in essence “overqualified” to do the job they were assigned to do. Stephen, for example, was an incredible student and orator of God’s Word (see his sermon in Acts 7). And yet no task or church responsibility was below him.
Stephen did not wait tables and serve widows because it was the fun or convenient thing to do…he did it because it was necessary. This is the heart of the gospel. Jesus did not come down to earth because it was convenient or easy - but because it was necessary. If stacking chairs is below you then I would argue you don’t fully understand the heart of Jesus.
As the early church grew, they needed men and women to fulfill a variety of roles in order to see the gospel continue to advance. As Port City Church grows, we need an army of men and women to fulfill a variety of roles if we want to continue to see the mission of God move forward in our city and beyond.
Years ago I saw a ven diagram that helped articulate how to think through where you can serve in the church.
Skill - God has gifted every believer with various gifts to serve the church and expand the Kingdom (see 1 Corinthians 12-14). What are the things that you find come most naturally and easily to you? For some it’s music, for others it’s hospitality, or teaching.
Passion - not everyone is passionate about the same thing. God has wired each of us differently with different areas of ministry that we are excited about. I love seeing people in our church excited about leading middle schoolers because I know…that is not an area of ministry passion for me. Who has God given you a passion for?
Need - too often this is the one that gets passed over when this is the area that probably should lead in one’s decision about how to serve. As we noted about Stepehn above…he and the other deacons served because of ministry need. The truth is in a growing church there are a lot of needs and often not enough hands involved in meeting those needs.
One of my favorite quotes that gets to the heart of need in the church is from Jackie Hill Perry. She said, “Sometimes we are waiting for doors to open in the church that we feel gifted in but your position in the church is to be a servant of the church…so where does the church have a need? Show up and do that.”
So yes…do the work of identifying where God has skilled you and do the work of knowing what you’re passionate about. But let’s not do this at the expense of meeting the tangible needs that exist right now. And at Port City we have plenty 🙂
If you are not currently serving in some capacity or if you’re interested in knowing specifically where we have needs - I would encourage you to visit our Serve Page or fill out this quick form and someone from our team will be in contact with you.
Pastor Jeremy
