Electriwhat?

So here's the situation. (Purely hypothetical, of course.) Let's say we have someone who just graduated from college. He's got a degree in New Testment studies, but was working part-time at his church as the sound guy. The church decides to do a building project, and suddenly our New Testament major finds himself designing sound systems, mapping electrical grids, and assessing wattage loads for the upstairs youth area. Stuff he doesn't have a clue about.

The last time I cracked open my Bible, I read about Christ's sacrifice and how he counted it joy to suffer on the cross. Amazingly profound. Applicable to life.

Unfortunately for our purely hypothetical sound guy, I didn't see anything about amps, ohms, watts, receps, and the like. And the Biblical Literature classes I took certainly didn't mention it.

But our hero has a decent head on his shoulders (I hope), and he calls other people who have some clue about this stuff so he can work things out. These other people give him solid counsel, encouragement, and more than one pat on the back. They say things like, "At least you're calling people who know. You already know more than most people do anyway, but you care enough about the job to be sure it's done right. Don't be scared."

Our hero knows more about this stuff than most people do?

Scary.

Our hero also has two weeks to order, receive, and install his new gear and be ready to show it off.

So back to this whole suffering on the cross thing... Hero or not, this is over my head. But at least I know I can keep my life, which was something Christ knew he wouldn't get to do. And if I believe the writer of Hebrews, Christ joyfully took on the cross. Some people say he lost; I happen to believe that he won. Either way, he did it with joy.

Joy. The experience of gladness. Christ took on the cross with gladness. Can I take on this project, inadequate as I am, and count it joy to do this? If Christ counted the cross as joy... Pass the pencils and graph paper.

We won't know if I'm a hero until everything is ready to go and we flip the switch, but I've got grace to make it there.