Prepared for Nothing

They didn’t know what was coming. In their wildest dreams, what was about to occur was 100% impossible.

But that’s God’s specialty.

These grief-filled, faithful women did what they knew to do. Luke twenty-four records, “On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb.”

We usually focus on the first two phrases of that verse. But what struck me as I read it in my daily devotions was the last phrase:

“...the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb.”

And I thought, “Sometimes we make spices…for no apparent reason.”

I haven’t read any account as to what happened to those spices. They had invested good money to purchase the myrrh and aloe and had labored in their grief to prepare them properly. Maybe they were saved for another occasion?

As a worship leader, that feels familiar. I am reminded of a special intro we had rehearsed that got axed in the service (probably because I decided to start the song differently in the moment); or of an entire song that we had to cut (probably because we repeated the bridge twelve too many times on the last song, or because the leader rambled on too long in between songs). But we had worked on it, labored at rehearsal until it worked, and yet, in the end, that work was… for no apparent reason.

Or was it?

What does the very act of preparing do to us?

See, I believe nothing is wasted. Every time we work on our craft, we improve. When we invest in our musicianship, our team wins. We become more fully equipped when we add another song or another style to our repertoire.

If you write a song together at a rehearsal but never use it on a Sunday morning, it’s not wasted. If you jam on a reggae version of Goodness of God, but it never sees the light of day, it’s not wasted. If you plan a set, but the service gets snowed out, it’s not wasted.

Preparing, experimenting, and faithful fulfillment of duties is a good process. A worthy process.

So when something gets canceled, gets cut, or doesn’t go the way you thought it would, question the idea that it was for nothing. Take camaraderie with the brave women who pushed through the pain to prepare the spices…for no apparent reason.

-Dave Helmuth
(purchase my book, "Worship Fertilizer: (the first hundred)" HERE)

Prepared for Nothing (Nº 318)