I received a special Father’s Day present this year: a hot-off-the-press kit for building a replica of the Cathedral of Notre Dame:

For some reason, the news story of its upcoming release pushed my button, and June said, “Shall we get this for Father’s Day?” “Why not?” So here it is: all 4,383 pieces nicely packaged into 34 bags and a L O N G instruction book. I look forward to building it; I’ll let you know when I’m finished.

In the meantime, I can see that there are lessons to be learned…of course!

Lessons for me:

• It will be an exercise in perseverance. The Lego expert who reviewed it said he built it in 10 hours. I expect it will take me 2-3 times that, so 30 hours, max, I think. We’ll see. I will have to persist over time.
• It will be an exercise in discipline. Some tasks require imagination and creativity. This one does not. It requires building the cathedral step-by-step, bag by bag, IN ORDER, from bags 1 to 34. “But I thought” doesn’t enter into it. I will have to discipline myself to simply follow the directions.

Lessons from the Legos people:

• There was A LOT of imagination and creativity from Legos to produce this product. To take an actual cathedral and figure out how to reproduce it with Legos.
• Having designed it, Legos needed to organize the construction. Can you imagine looking for one part among more than 4,000? Nope. Neither can I. The parts are organized into bags….
• Meaning, the manufacturing and packaging process is incredible: I don’t know how many different kinds of parts there are, but each has to be manufactured in quantity, then sorted.
• In short, Legos did the hard work so that I can engage and succeed.

Applications to disciple-making: we used to teach a 5-part process for churches to create a disciple-making culture. By and large, this Lego project makes a nice metaphor:

• Purpose: my purpose is to build the cathedral, not purposelessly play with Legos. The church’s purpose should be to make disciples, not just provide a variety of purposeless church activities to engage the members.
• Profile (or Picture): Legos is clear about what we’re building. Similarly, the church should have a clear picture in mind of what a disciple might look like. For example, disciples are people of the Word (John 8.31), they love and serve others (John 13.34, 35), and they bear fruit (John 15.8, 16). This Picture of a Disciple blog explains.
• Process (or Pathway): without a process, the cathedral wouldn’t have a chance. If someone came in and opened even a few of my 34 bags and mixed up the parts, the set would be useless. “Real” college courses have an order. Calculus before Differential Equations. Basic Economics before Microeconomics. Meanwhile, churches usually offer a smorgasbord of courses and say, “Take your pick!” There’s no clear connection between any particular course and the disciple we’re trying to make. As I write often, a mix of knowledge and skills is required. The In God’s Family Series (https://nav27series.org/) could be an important part of any church’s’ process.
• Participants: the Legos company doesn’t build cathedrals. People like me build them. To make disciples, a church needs to offer appropriate courses, and they must have teachers! An obviosity, as one of my math teachers used to say. If we think small groups should be a key element of our church’s disciple-making process, do we have enough leaders? If not, what’s our plan for producing them?
• Progress: is our plan working? In building the cathedral, the progress will be obvious. In the church, we try something and see if it’s working with our people. If not, maybe we need to adjust.

Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit. (Ephesians 2.19 – 22, NIV)

For we are co-workers in God’s service; you are God’s field, God’s building. By the grace God has given me, I laid a foundation as a wise builder, and someone else is building on it. But each one should build with care. (1 Corinthians 3.9, 10, NIV)