I’ll give you a tip before you head out to your next wedding reception…

The last couple years, Heather and I have attended and/or been a part of some weddings.  And maybe this idea is not a new one, but it was new to us.  The DJ, in order to try and get people to the dance floor for some fast dancing, uses the tactic called ‘Snowball!’

The music starts to play, and the wedding party is already on the floor.  Then the DJ shouts ‘Snowball!’, and each wedding party member heads into the land of the circle tables and sitting people, and grabs someone by the hand and brings them to the floor.  The group of dancers grows.  The DJ shouts ‘Snowball!’ and now you have double the dancers going out to get someone else up with them.  So they typically go back to the same table they came from, and grab someone to join them.  And on it goes until the floor is packed and the you have people dancing who would’ve never strolled up to the floor on their own.

Public fast dancing at a wedding reception can be awkward to say the least.  If a decent enough group of people don’t get out there and go first, the DJ is left on an audio island, more less begging people to come onto the floor.  While the people remain in their seats and stare.

On a side note, at one reception, when the ‘Snowball!’ began to happen, Heather and I locked eyes with one another, leaned in, and faked the most engaging conversation as to try and avoid getting ‘Snowballed!’  It worked btw.

There is power in the Snowball! though.  There is power, because it is through relationships and personal invitation.  The DJ can beg and plead all he wants from behind that mic, he can play the best late 80’s and early 90’s hip hop, he can set the lights low, and turn the music up loud, but I’m not moving.  Now, don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed some cabbage patch and running man back in the day, but nowadays, it is going to take more than just a little Kris Kross before I jump, jump.

Now what will get me to move is someone personally inviting me.  Someone who locks eyes with me, and says, let’s go.  I would even have to break up a fake conversation because I’d been invited.

Throughout the New Testament, we are given the picture that the church is like a family.  And the church is like a body.  And if a part of the body, or a member of the family isn’t engaged in serving and ministry, then the body or family just isn’t what it could be.

1 Peter 4:10:  Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms.

It says, ‘Each of you,’ not some, or a few, but ‘each of you’ who are in Christ have been gifted by God.  And you’ve been gifted by God to serve others.  Not to sit on your gift, not to try and save it, not to hoard it.  But to use it in order to serve others.

As a church, from the stage, and in communications, and in classes, we’re going to invite you to get involved in serving.  But you know the most effective way to get someone else involved?  It is to personally invite them.  To go and lock eyes, and say, let’s go.

The same could be said of getting people involved in your community group, not just in serving.  Or personally inviting a friend or loved one to meet and give their life to Jesus.  Or personally inviting a friend to turn from that sin with you by their side.  The list goes on and on.

My point…personally inviting someone is not only effective, but Biblical.  We follow Jesus together, alongside one another.  We were not made for isolation, or passive living in the Body of Christ, but engaged, active, Kingdom advancing living.

So this week, who are you inviting to serve with you?  Who are you inviting to be in community with you?  Who are you inviting to come to church with you?  Who are you inviting to know Jesus with you?  Who are you snowballing?

There is power in the Snowball!

PS:  If you and I are at a wedding reception together in the future, you can’t use this blog post or its’ words against me.