I’m almost finished reading Me, Myself, & Bob, the story of VeggieTales and Big Idea Productions by Phil Vischer. It is an excellent read and helps us understand Phil’s journey with the company.
Chapter 20 outlines some lessons learned from the entire experience. I like lesson #5: “Bigger is no longer better.” I usually add to that statement by saying “slow and steady wins the race.” In the tortoise and hare race, the tortoise took it easy, started off slow, maintained a steady pace throughout the entire race, and although he wasn’t always in the lead, he finished first. The hare took off quickly, ran out of steam quickly, decided to rest and thought he would be ok since he had a big lead on the tortoise. While the hare slept, the tortoise steadily slipped past him.
Ministry is like that. We don’t have to be the fastest or the biggest. We do need to be smarter doing things slow and steady. We need to make sure our batteries are charged with communication with God through Bible study, prayer, and fellowship with others. Just like cell phones need to be charged each night to have power for the next day, we need to charge our batteries each day, not allowing our batteries to get too low of power and run out of steam and energy like the hare. We need to keep a steady pace of energy like the tortoise.
We need to keep a steady pace of activities and programs in our ministries as well. Too many programs or programs moving too quickly can be like the hare and run out of steam quickly. We need to focus on a few quality programs and activities that will run steadily like the tortoise.
Remember: Slow and steady wins the race!
