April 2022 Mobile Monthly Mission Challenge

By Kat Silverglate Copyright 2022

Eleven months younger than my sister but born in the same calendar year (January and December of 1960-something), my parents raised us as twins. By that I mean, they decided to bump me up to kindergarten a year early. We wore the same outfits. Walked out the same routines. Had the same homework. But I wasn’t the same. I was behind developmentally by almost a full year, a huge gap at that life stage. Physically, I was smaller. Almost a head shorter than most of my peers.

When I felt overwhelmed by the race to keep up with my gifted older sis or cried because I was the runt of the kinder litter, my sassy Irish mother would scoop me up and whisper in my ear: “Good things come in small packages.”

She’d then start to list small packaged items with a seriousness that acknowledged my ache. “Crayons. Gum. Hair bows. Perfume. Wedding rings. Bow ties.” I’d nod in agreement snuggling into her safe hold, eventually adding my own ideas. “Barbie dolls. M&M’s. Lolli pops.” She’d nod in agreement slowly pulling me away so I could see her now mischievous grin. The list of deliciously small things was about to turn silly. “Milk of Magnesia. Peas. Olives.” Happy again, I’d shoot back, “Yuck, yuck and yum.” She knew I loved olives. These “small talks” restored my confidence.

We live in a world obsessed with big. Big outcomes. Big following. Big titles. Big results. Big names. Big moves. Big awards. Big wins. Big deals. Small, for the most part, doesn’t make headlines. Doesn’t garner attention. On life’s radar screen, small doesn’t even wiggle the needle.

Which is stark by comparison to the way the Lord so frequently rolls in our one ridiculous life. He leaves the 99 to go after the one, knows the very hairs on our head, and calls us by name. He celebrates mustard seed faith and compares our lives to mist, grass blades and sparrows -- the smallest of birds. He sends the youngest to defeat a giant with a few small stones and refuses to speak to Elijah through a trilogy of THE largest weather terrors: tornados, earthquakes and fires; instead choosing a small gentle whisper. The slightest genuine turn in His direction results in a full scale, opened-armed sprint toward our prodigal existence. And to the wee little hand willing to move its dinky digits from a closed-fisted I’ve-earned-this-grip, to a needy open palm -- He gives life.

"For whoever has despised the day of small things shall rejoice...

Zech 4:9

In February, when the theme, title and packaging for this “small moves” mission were already well underway, a friend made a seemingly small move in my direction. With no knowledge of the mission subject, she sent me a text: “If you have time while in AZ...” followed by a 6-minute video link. I was racing to get out of town for an event that had been more than a year in a planning.

“I’ll look later,” I told myself.

By mid-March, I still hadn’t looked. In the whir of the event, I forgot about it. Last week, she popped in my mind and so did the unopened YouTube link. It felt like a gentle poke from above. So I responded… by opening it.

Two men appeared on a split screen. The man on the left, Dallas Jenkins, began to introduce the man on the right. He could only get eight words out before he was overcome with emotion:

“So, this is Alex, and Alex is the man….”

He’s unable to finish the introduction. As he struggles to compose himself, he pats his chest and says through a cracking voice and hot tears,

“I’m going to get emotional. I didn’t expect that.”

He eventually gets the story out. Dallas, a film director, had made a movie that flopped. The investors were done. He and his wife were processing the reality that his career as a Hollywood Director was over. His wife felt strongly that God was pressing the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000 on her heart. As she talked about it, she said the phrase, “God does impossible math.” So, in their grief, they read the parable of the loaves and fishes together. They cried. They prayed. And while the story gave them some comfort in the moment, they had no idea what it meant practically for their future.

That night, at 4 a.m. while typing a ten page memo summarizing everything that went wrong so he could learn from his mistakes, a message popped up on his Facebook feed:

“Remember, it’s not YOUR job to feed the 5,000. Your job is [to] bring your bread and fish.”

It was from Alex, a man he’d never met in person or spoken to on the phone. They met on Facebook and had communicated maybe once a year. Alex had been the movie buyer for a store and loved the

preview of Dallas’ movie. Then he heard the movie flopped, he was bummed for Dallas. While walking home from the grocery store in Romania with his mother, Alex says he felt like God was prompting him to send the sentence quoted above about the feeding of the 5,000 to Dallas.

“Really God? I don’t know this guy,” Alex thought. He decided to send the message anyway.

In an expanded interview[1], Dallas says that it seemed almost as if his computer had been recording his conversation with his wife earlier that evening. That someone was listening in. Within seconds of reading Alex’s message, he responded.

“If you don’t mind my asking, what led you to say that?”

Alex replies, “Wasn’t me… I felt led to tell you that right now…”

Dallas says he can describe his life as life before that moment and life after that moment. That was the moment he realized that the results were not up to him. His only job was to do the best he could with what God put in his hands - his ability to make films - his loaves and fish. Everything after that was up to the Lord. He was free.

Dallas would go on to make the largest crowd-funded series in history -- The Chosen, a series about the life of Christ. Raising more than ten million crowd-funded dollars for the first season is apparently how “God does impossible math.” And to think, because Alex made a small move - sent a one line message - Dallas’ faith exploded and millions have been touched by his work. You are reading this story right now because my friend made a small move - sent a text message with a link to the interview. That small move impacted my faith in a big way.

Our Mission this Month:   

In your mission pack you will find moving stickers like the ones in the graphic at the top of this post. They identify rooms in a typical house. We use these types of stickers when we make big moves, marking where things will go in a new home. We are going to use these items to reflect on the small moves we make daily – going from the bedroom to the bathroom; the bathroom to the kitchen; the kitchen to the study, etc. All day long, we are making small moves. Now imagine during the course of your “small move day” God nudges you to respond – send an encouraging message; call her; help him; know Me, the Lord, better; visit that friend; etc. Can you stop right where you are and respond? Maybe write it down so you don’t forget? Alex was walking from the store to his Mom’s house. He made his small move when he got home.

Look at mustard seed. It’s pretty tiny, isn’t it? Do you have faith small enough to respond? Faith the size of a mustard seed?  Mat. 17:20.

In your mission pack, you’ll also find a small zip lock baggie with a few mustard seeds and a sticker with the words “Small Moves, Big Faith.” Keep this in a place where you can reflect on the size of those seeds. Each time you find yourself making a small move in faith, write it down. We’ll be using a snail symbol on social media this month to reflect our small moves. Feel free to respond to any of our May 2022 posts with a snail emoji. You don’t have to give details. We’ll know what it means – “I made a small move in faith today.”

And as always, our “donate story” link is open 24/7. If you have a small move story you’d like to share, perhaps your share will impact another’s life of faith. Dallas and Alex’s choice to share theirs on Youtube certainly impacted mine!  

[1] Links to the six minute and expanded interviews can be found here: six minutes and here: eleven minutes