“The Bucket Test: Build as many bridges and tear down as many barriers as you can.”
Our AFM student missions trainer told us to Imagine there are three buckets arranged one above the other. The top bucket is where you put things that are requirements—things you must do. The Ten Commandments, for example, go here. The lowest bucket is where you put things you absolutely cannot do under any circumstance. This would be things like murder, stealing, things that go directly against God’s law. The middle bucket is for things that are neither prohibited nor required—the grey area.

Everyone decides what goes in which bucket in their life. Going to church, eating between meals, spending money selfishly, using coarse language, drinking alcohol, swimming on Sabbath. Two people who are Bible-believing Christians and both follow God could potentially have different answers for some of these.

The goal is to prayerfully make your bucket choices to build as many bridges as possible and tear down as many barriers as possible. For example, if you put eating cheese in your bottom bucket, and you go around telling people they should not under any circumstance eat cheese, this could create a barrier that is really unnecessary and not strictly biblical. It would be better to put this in the middle bucket. It’s not a requirement to eat cheese, but it’s not against God’s law to eat cheese, either. Of course, this is a silly example, but it shows the principle.

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