When I started working with the student ministry worship team 2 years ago I walked into a ministry of overused student volunteers. What I mean by that is the team worked together to help produce 2 programs every week, both middle school and high school. They had little experience with being a part of a church because all they ever did was put on church.
Since I started that job I’ve worked very hard to make sure that never happens again. I never allow a student to serve on the team twice in one week and I always ask them to come as a normal student at least half the time. It doesn’t always work out that way, but those are the goals I’ve had in mind. For me, more than I care about them as a part of the tech team or care about them becoming better guitar players, I care about how they interact with church.
In my experience, most churches are very good about using people to do ministry, instead of making people the ministry.
And this is the shift in focus I’ve made with the worship team. I constantly have to battle with putting on a better program using a greater number of volunteers or doing what’s best for those people and working with a smaller team so that we can better serve the rest of the team who need to be a part of the church.
If church is a community, then our goal with the involved people is not to use them to do ministry, but make them the ministry, in which more ministry flows out.
My goal, as difficult as it is to complete, has always been to care more about the students as people, than I care about them as volunteers. Once I flip those, I start using the students toward the end of my job description and ultimately failing the church.
In your experience, how do you value people before valuing them as volunteers?
