Sorry to burst your bubble, but this weeks ReFuel in Review will be a little different. You see, Sarah found out Friday that she was going to need a medical procedure done on Wednesday afternoon. Now before you ask, there are no baby Stapletons on the way...nor was the baby Stapleton-making process shut down...it wasn't that kind of procedure. (Sarah's going to love this blog)
Fresh off the weekend sickness debacle, I decided to make sure that I was prepared for anything. You see, the procedure was supposed to be at 2:30, leaving plenty of time for me to get back to church in time for it to start. I thought I'd AT LEAST need some help getting some students picked up from the school. James Runnels, our Associate Pastor/Music Minister filled the job greatly!
 |
| Josh, thinking about eyewear |
I do want to say that we have plenty of other volunteers who I know would have also done an excellent job!
Well, as I was driving Sarah home at 6:45, I was incredibly thankful that I had made such plans. From all reports, everything went really smoothly. We almost always have glitches/freezes with our video stuff, but there weren't even any of those, plus we had tons of visitors! Although I don't like being gone and am not very often, I am very excited about what happened when I was gone.
Its good to remember that:
- Church wont fall apart when I'm gone
- My equipped volunteers are AMAZING and can handle a lot
- My volunteers are way better at this stuff than me
- My volunteers drive our ministry
- Jr. High boys might just eat me
I wish I could steal some of your adult volunteers. We are in desperate need over here. We actually have many student leaders, about 1 per 4 students, so that helps, but half of them are still in training...and you know...they ARE still adolescents! :)
ReplyDeleteIn your experience, when you "introduce" a new adult leader/volunteer, about how long does it take your students to "warm up to them" and accept them? Just curious, because hopefully we'll be doing this soon...thanks!
We are blessed to have about 5 solid and really committed (graduated) long-term volunteers. Sarah, Tim, Jenni, Jeremy, and Danielle (and me?) have really been the backbone of our team for 3 years.
ReplyDeleteWe are also blessed to be near ETBU. Our college volunteer base just recently took off. We have one who is our awesome drummer who has been with us for a year. At the beginning of the school year he brought some friends. The next week they brought some friends, and before I knew it, there were about 12! Our college minister was kind of peeved that I 'stole' his class.
In an effort to make sure they get to serve, we began the table format. I taught and the students sat at a table w/these volunteers. I wanted to give them a greater role, so we tried out the Tuff Stuff DVD series. In them, Kurt talks for about 2-3 minutes, then small groups discuss stuff, and then the process repeats. The study came with some pretty easy leader discussion sheets. I later changed a big-group series' (church as it should be) to follow this type of format too.
I really just plugged in our volunteers into this setting. The students got to know them by being taught by them. It may have been a little awkward at first, but they got to know each other pretty quick. I'd say that it took a month...but the true relationships are built during hangout time before/after and at events the volunteers attend.
wow...long reply!
ReplyDelete