Its been far too long since I updated the blog here, I thought I would do a series of articles on a subject. This time it will be on the matter of volunteer leaders. Some of what I will post over the next few weeks will be from a series of articles that were originally published in Youthwork Magazine in the UK. Those segments will cover things like recruiting, training, and keeping leaders on your team.
To start…a few thoughts on the importance of a team. Far too many youth ministry folks try to go it alone or without the support they can garner with a team. I have had too many conversations over coffee or lunch with youth pastors who lament how they cannot find anyone in the church to get involved with the youth group. I know how hard it is to find quality people and get them plugged in. It takes a lot of time on our knees and I don’t mean begging. It also requires the support of the church leadership, starting with the rector or senior pastor. A team will share the workload, relate to more students, and diversify the talents and skills available to get the ministry done. I’ll say more on the benefits of a team later as well as explore the Biblical mandate for it. The bottom line is that there has to be people in the church who are capable and willing to get involved. They either don’t know the need or see the opportunity. Some don’t know that their gifts would be useful to your ministry. Others don’t realise that they can relate to and connect with teens. Really the issue that often needs to be explored is in the heart of the youth minister. Why can’t I draw people into this ministry? Or why am I afraid to ask people to be involved? Am I willing to share the ministry and trust others to lead? Some of those conversations over coffee or lunch where youth pastors tell me that they cannot find volunteers really boil down to an inability to build a team and lead it. Some soul searching is needed there because I am convinced that if God calls you to be a youth minister, he will equip you to build and lead a team.
The other aspect of this issue is that we need to use leaders. More than once I have served as a volunteer leader under someone who did not use my gifts and abilities. Both of these at times in my life where I had a lot of experience to offer. In fact, my Young Life director used me when I was in college more than the youth pastors in these two situations. Early in my career, I learned from those who quit my teams that I needed to use leaders and let them use their gifts or face losing them on the team. Few people want to be wallflowers. What I am not sure I understood then or even much later is that when we don’t use our leaders we actually set them up to fail. Without a task or reason for being there, adults sitting in a youth group can be awkward or make the group uncomfortable. They are not seen as a full leader when they do little to nothing in the meetings. The group does not really get to know them in the setting of youth group meetings. My advice to any volunteer not being used is to quit. That may sound harsh, but I think it is in the best interest of the volunteer to not be sitting there wasting their time or enabling a youth minister to lead without building a team or sharing the ministry. Let me qualify that with two thoughts. First, if the volunteer was recruited just to be another adult present, like a chaperone for the sake of meeting child protection laws, then sitting in the room without sharing the leadership was the original arrangement to begin with. I am not speaking of that sort of situation because I don’t think that is wise stewardship of human resources to begin with. The other qualifier I would add in suggesting an unused volunteer to quit is that they need to have had several conversations with the youth minister offering to help and given ample opportunity for them to have taken up the offer. The bottom line on all this… use leaders! God gifted them and if they are on your team, it is your responsibility to engage those gifts!
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