I have often joke/dream that I am going to write a book, about the secret lives of the mega church staff.  In this dream writing is actually I skill I possess, unlike in reality where I play a writer on TV my blog. My writing would be witty and quirky, and while it would be a little strange it would be unique and true enough to be catchy… like say John Acuff.

Well reality stepped in to my dream the other day because the first chapter of the book practically wrote it self right in front of me. One of our first impression staff (who shall remain nameless to protect the innocent… for now) made an off handed comment about “estimating banana consumption based on the availability of bagels” and I said to myself “if that isn’t a quirky chapter title Acuff would be proud of, I don’t know what is.” The phrase just struck me as so oddly fascinating that I had to get more details. So, intrigued I journeyed down the hall to hear more.
It turns out making sure the multi-site volunteers have food is one of the responsibilities this person has, and she was trying to figure out how many bananas would be eaten if other food was available. When put that way it doesn’t sound so strange, but when I hear “I am trying to estimate banana consumption based on the availability of bagels” my mind flashes back to high school math class and word problems with a trains leaving such-and-such traveling at something-or-other ect…
Just the fact that this was a legitimate quandary someone seriously had, someone not only cares about this but is diligently exploring a way to come up with a potential solution to the banana consumption query. How many people in the congregation know that someone on staff takes a part of their day and dedicates to trying to discern how many bananas will be eaten by volunteers this weekend? How many people who even eat the bananas think about the fact someone on staff came up with the idea they needed to feed the volunteers, had to come up with a budget for said food, and then procure the food. The little detail tasks like this eat up so much time for church staff its amazing that we can get anything done at all. It’s like a death by a million paper cuts, no single one is going to do much, but collectively it’s another story.

What little time consuming paper cuts do you have?