Bucket Filling
Hebrews 10:23-25
October 1
In Uniontown, Pennsylvania, a little league baseball coach was accused of offering an 8-year-old money to intentional throw pitches at his own teammate, so he couldn’t play in a baseball game.
The 8 year old boy was supposed to bean an autistic teammate so he couldn’t play. In September, a jury convicted 29-year-old Mark R. Downs Jr. of corruption of minors and criminal solicitation to commit simple assault. Fortunately for the coach he evaded more serious charges.
The coach offered to pay one of his T-ball players $25 to hit a 9-year-old autistic teammate with a ball while warming up before a June playoff game.
The 8 year old pitcher testified that the coach offered him money and said he purposefully threw a ball that hit the autistic player in the groin, then threw another ball that hit him in the ear - - all on the coach’s instructions. The autistic boy also testified about being hit by the balls thrown during pregame warmups.
The coach denied he did this, but the jury did not believe him.
Can you imagine being the boy who had pitches intentionally thrown at him? What does that do to your sense of worth? How can an instance like this possibly impact you for the rest of your life?
Well, today and for the next 2 weeks we are going to be talking about community – – what it means to not only care for one another, but to care about one another; and to demonstrate that care and love in real and tangible ways. Earlier in the year I read a book called “How Full is Your Bucket?” This book speaks about the need for positive interactions. That we need to have our buckets filled; and when we fill someone else’s bucket by saying nice, complimentary, encouraging words, we help someone else feel good about themselves. But not only does that person feel good about themselves, we also feel good about what we have done, so we end up adding to our bucket.
Howard Hendricks is a professor at Dallas Theological Seminary; and Hendricks taught one of my doctoral classes at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. The class was about mentoring relationships and Hendricks told this story about a student in one of the preaching classes. He said this young man did virtually everything wrong that you could think of in his sermon. It was presented in a classroom setting before teachers and his peers. When the sermon was over the teacher would go over the sermon with the student and highlight the positive and what needs work. The teacher on this day outlined 28 things this young man did wrong. He did not say one positive thing to the student. How do you think the student felt? Would he ever want to preach a sermon again? Maybe this would even cause him to rethink his call to ministry.
Hendricks said when he led that class, if someone had a sermon which bombed, he would find at least 3 things to compliment them on. Then he would ask them, “if you are willing, I would like to help you build on some of the good things which you have already accomplished.” At this point, the student would be much more willing to get help, than possibly, turning the other way and walking away dejected.
The writer of Hebrews wrote ~ 23 Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. 24 And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. 25 Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another — and all the more as you see the Day approaching.
What does all of this mean for me and you? What does this mean for us as the church?
Have you ever gone through a day and needed someone, really, just about anyone to say something nice to you, but nobody does? You feel like your bucket, your life, your heart, your soul is draining, it’s slowly slipping away.
And when your bucket is feeling REALLY low, isn’t it hard to add to someone else’s? Someone else does something really good, and to tell them “that was great!” is not always that easy. So, you see, when we don’t have our buckets filled, it is also difficult to fill someone else’s bucket.
You see this is all about how we treat one another. It’s about how we may send emails to one another that are not overly nice, or emails that have messages between the words. It’s the way we talk to one another, the way we hold our bodies which speak volumes about another person’s worth. It’s walking past someone and not even acknowledging their presence. It’s easy to be guilty of this type of behavior, but this is not a message about condemning . . . this is a message about loving. It’s simply a reminder of who we are called to be in Christ. And we will talk about that at length next week when we look at Philippians 2.
We are relational beings and we want people to relate to us. That’s how God created us. It’s how we are all wired. Some need more contact, more encouragement than others, but we all need one another. Adam was the great creation of God, yet on his own he felt all alone, he wanted another person to share life with, another person to live in community with, to share dreams and hopes and just simply . . . life with one another. I believe Adam, and ultimately Eve, needed one another and needed one another to be an encourager.
It’s interesting that one of the spiritual gifts is the gift of encouragement. I find it unique that God saw fit to really make some people gifted in knowing how to say the right things at the right time in order to encourage others.
After reading that book and another by Donald Clifton, called Now, Discover Your Strengths, it seemed to me the writer of Hebrews had bucket filling in mind with the words that were written in this and in other sections of Hebrews. He tells us we need to consider . . . consider how we can spur one another on toward love and good deeds. After rereading this passage, I don’t know if it hits you, or if you find it strange, that the writer of Hebrews used the phrase, LET US CONSIDER. It seems like a simple little phrase, but why not just say,
‘Let us spur one another on toward love and good deeds.’ That would have been more direct and to the point, but that’s not what is said. We are reminded to consider, to think it over, to study . . . how to spur one another on. When was the last time we gave it some serious thought about how to encourage one another, to say good things to motivate someone and to help them feel good about themselves.
You see, when we are encouraged, we are much more apt to want to do good things, we are more apt to feel better about ourselves, and when we feel good, it becomes more difficult for satan to throw those road blocks in our way. We find we have that extra skip in our step. And it feels good.
We need to be encouraged, nobody is immune, we all need it and you know what, it’s contagious. Imagine a church where people are focusing on the positives, a work place where people are not filled with griping and complaining, an activity that is just plain fun.
We had that yesterday, at the Sheldon’s, we did a lot of laughing as we celebrated Octorberfest at day early. We have people in this church who are encouragers,
people who are looking for the good things, we need to celebrate and party in the name of Jesus Christ.
Oh, dear friends, in a few moments we will take communion, we are reminded of the encouragement Christ offers us, what His life and His death and His resurrection mean for us. That is the same life giving hope that we are also called to give to one another.
So, as we come to the end today, we will literally take 2 minutes in silence and take out that drop that is in your bulletins and write a note to someone. Write a quick note to someone in this church, to someone in your family, to a good friend . . . and remind them of their beauty as one of God’s children.
SILENCE for 1 MINUTES
Then on your bulletin, write down the names of 5 people. 5 people whose buckets you will fill this week. And next week, we will write down more names, and I’ll ask you and you can ask me if we accomplished our goal, the goal to fill other peoples buckets with a drop of encouragement, a drop of hope, a drop of life.
You can get these and print them or send them electronically at www.bucketbook.com
Since I cannot write out a drop for each of you, I have sent and email to the church with one drop on it ~
It’s on the screen now, and it says,
Brothers and sisters in Christ ~
Thank you for the privilege of being your pastor.
I love you!
Positive Impact Questions
I have helped someone in the last 24 hours.
I am an exceptionally courteous person.
I like being around positive people.
I have praised someone in the last 24 hours.
I have developed a knack for making other people feel good.
I am more productive when I am around positive people.
In the last 24 hours, I have told someone that I cared about her or him.
I make it a point to become acquainted with people wherever I go.
When I receive recognition, it makes me want to give recognition to someone else.
In the last week, I have listened to someone talk through his or her goals and ambitions.
I make unhappy people laugh.
I make it a point to call each of my associates by the name she or he likes to be called.
I notice what my colleagues do at a level of excellence.
I always smile at the people I meet.
I feel good about giving praise whenever I see good behavior.
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