Joel and I have been reading Confessions of a Reformission Rev.: Hard Lessons from an Emerging Missional Church by Mark Driscroll for about the past week. On our drive to and back from Indiana yesterday, I read several chapters aloud to Joel. This book has made me think about what my role as a leader should look like. The two comments that he made that have influenced me the most are:
1. Those that are in leadership positions should be spending their time working on the ministry, not in the ministry.
2. Sometimes you have to cause some “strategic chaos” to motivate people to become leaders.
Joel and I talked at length (I talked and Joel listened) about these two ideas and how they could, perhaps should be affecting my role in RivKids. Here are some of my thoughts. I hope that I can put them down in such a way that makes sense.
1. RivKids struggles for committed volunteers. Don’t get me wrong, we have some absolutely wonderful volunteers who serve with all their hearts and give generously of their time, talents and finances to RivKids. But still every Tuesday morning we sit and discuss who can we call to fill the open spots in the schedule. If no one can, Missie, Tricia, Susan, Debbye or a few other select people constantly fill the spots. (This doesn’t count all the times they have to fill spots when people just don’t show up.) During the week the “RivKids team” puts in hours and hours to prepare lessons, crafts, games, backdrops, memory verse mania besides planning all the extras that the kids enjoy so much. But when do we every have time to train up others to be able to serve effectively in RivKids?
I’ve been convicted of this. I need to be spending my time teaching younger girls/women how to be effective leaders in RivKids. I need to share with them my passions for these children, let them see it lived out in my life, and push them to cultivate their own gifts.
It saddens me that we don’t have more high schoolers helping with RivKids. During high school, I was given the opportunity to run, along with my best friend, several children’s programs at my church. At age 16 I got to learn how to run a vacation Bible school, how to run a Sunday evening children’s program for ages 3 through 5th grade. --- not just help with, but fully run --- plan, organize, recruit helpers, pick curriculum, deal with “classroom management” and everything else that comes with ministry. Now sometimes I look back and think, “Were the elders of the church crazy to leave such a big ministry to two high schoolers?” But I learned a lot. I wish the high school students at Riverview could have the same experience. But mostly likely, they won’t have it unless I or someone else comes along and helps them. Serving isn’t something that just comes naturally to most of us.
Furthermore, if the RivKids team were able to spend more time bringing up committed leaders, perhaps we’d be more energized and not wondering if we are burning ourselves out. Sometime go and ask Tricia, Susan, Missie or Debbye when the last time that they went to church services two Sundays/Saturday nights in a row? I bet most of them wouldn’t even remember! That’s commitment!
Missie has so many great visions for RivKids, but because we spend so much of our time cutting, copying, coloring, stapling, and accomplishing the weekly tasks that we’re left wondering how great those ideas would be if we only had time to put them into place.
I have more thoughts on this, but I’m sure you know by now how I feel.
2. Maybe we need to do something crazy or outlandish to make people see that they need to be maturing in Christ through servant hood and leadership. Should be cause some “strategic chaos” so that people see the need that we have and rise up to meet it? Perhaps if we canceled RivKids for two weeks and had all the kids sit in the service, people might begin to understand the need for RivKids and be willing to spend two hours two times a month working with the kids.
I feel like we have to do something get people to the point where they try serving in some area. I’ve been talking about RivKids because it’s my passion. But I’m sure the coffee team, greeters, ushers and every other ministry feels the same way. How can we get people into the rooms to see the kids and build relationships with them? I love it when I walk down the hall and some 3 or 4 year old runs up to me and gives me a hug because I was their large group teacher the week before. I might not even know their name, but they’ve made a connection with me and are so excited when I acknowledge them and ask them about their life. Just this weekend I was working at a garage sale when I saw one of the 3 years I had in my class the week before. I had only been in her class one week, but she was so excited to see me -- especially outside of Riverview. We have amazing kids at Riverview and I just want people to have the chance to get to experience how wonderful it is to build a relationship with them and to watch them grow and change as they move from one classroom to another. These kids matter to Jesus, so they should matter to us.
So maybe this tangent of mine makes no sense to you or maybe it does. Maybe you stopped reading it a long time ago, or perhaps by the end you were crying like I am. But either way, I just needed to share my heart.
