an observation

Crystal and i were in a child birthing class the past 2 weeks. about 30 people in my class and here was my observation that will blow your mind:

There were NO non-pregnant people in the child birth class.

Out of 30 people in this class, every single one of them were pregnant. (of course there were husbands there... but only husbands of pregnant ladies.)

i warned you that this observation would blow your mind, right?

OF COURSE there were no non-pregnant people in the class. that would be kind of weird. why would they take a child birthing class? That's not a class you take just to go ahead and be prepared BEFORE you get pregnant.

2 years ago... or even 1 year ago... or even 7 months ago if someone tried to get me to go to a child birthing class i would have looked at them like they were crazy!

but now... when we're pregnant - SIGN ME UP because i want to know this stuff.

it's all about timing. people don't take a child birthing class before they're pregnant because they don't need to know this stuff until they're about to have a baby.

this is the same observation my pastor has pointed out to me many times. it goes something like this. "People only learn on a need to know basis." they only pay attention and really want to know when the timing necessitates it.

like being pregnant necessitates some new knowledge... but i would have never paid attention to that before.

it's that way in all of life. people don't really feel like they need to know until they NEED to know.

so what could we do about that? how could we capture their attention before they feel like they need to know? 

when it comes to making some of the message of Jesus appear relevant (because it already is relevant) at certain times to people = is it kind of like trying to sell a birthing class to non-pregnant people?

and how can we sync the right people at the right time with what they need to know when they feel like they need to know it?

or maybe we just keep giving them the message and they'll come back to us when they feel like they NEED it. we can't predict the timing so we just set up systems to constantly give the message... so they know where to go looking when they feel like they need it.

i knew where to sign up for a birthing class.