The 10 Reasons Why Someone Serves at Your Church (Part Two)

Check out PART ONE of this post here.

So let’s keep going. Here are 5 more reasons why I believe someone serves at your church.

6. To join the mission of the church.

People want to be a part of something big. There are thousands of causes and charities that people endorse and give time, money and energy to. What better mission is there to serve than the local church? If your volunteers know and believe the mission of your church, they will give of themselves toward seeing that mission accomplished.

7. Your vision is compelling.

Volunteers don’t respond to “need” as much as they respond to vision. Cast compelling vision and people will follow you. No one likes to be guilted into serving. They want to serve because they want to contribute to something meaningful.

Think about the Braveheart speech – you know the one – “They may take our lives, but they’ll never take our freedom!”. Now think about your church announcement time where Sister Myrtle comes to the podium to beg for more volunteers in the 3rd grade Sunday School class…”If you love Jesus and don’t want to see these precious little children of God burn in hell for all eternity, you’ll think about serving with us.” I know these are extreme examples, but you get the picture – lead your team through casting compelling vision.

Suggested Tweet: "Cast compelling vision and people will follow you. @carlbarnhill"

8. To find community in relationships with others.

People want to belong. They want to feel apart of a group. They long to be cared about, served, and loved. When you create an exciting culture, people want to be apart of it. They want meaningful relationships with people. They want genuine friendships that last. Although you can’t make people be friends, you can provide opportunities for friendships to happen.

You can plan events as a team (Read my post “8 Event Ideas for Your Production Team” here). You can provide serving opportunities outside of production (get members of your team to serve the community or another ministry area in your church together). You can provide a Production Headquarters area with cards, board games, and food where people have an environment to hang out and get to know each other. If you’re not providing these opportunities for community to happen, don’t be surprised when your team members don’t know each other.

9. There is joy in loving people and giving back.

Jesus is Love. When we love others through serving, it is natural for us to feel a ‘spiritual tingle’ – you’re being Jesus to others! We feel joy when we give. That’s why the giver feels more blessed than the receiver most of the time. Don’t rob your volunteers of the joy of serving. Create more roles and more opportunities on your team for people – you’re literally giving them the gift of joy.

10. Serving can be fun.

Do your volunteers have fun when they serve? I have so much fun when I serve in a production of some kind – I’ve been involved in theatre productions, directing TV and Radio programs, producing live events, you name it and most of the time, it’s a blast! Sure, there are stressful points, they are some events I like more than others, there are positions or tasks I like more than others, but serving with a team to produce a show or event can be a whole lot of fun.

Are you having fun? As the leader of your ministry, you are setting the tone. If it’s fun for you, people see that and feed off of that. Create an environment where it is fun to serve!

When creating your volunteer culture, it’s good to know why your volunteers are there in order to know how to minister to them.

Think about each of these reasons and evaluate your team. Are you providing opportunities in each of these areas?

The more time you spend creating systems and opportunities in the areas I’ve mentioned, the more your volunteer team will thrive. Your team members want to be involved in something that matters and what we do in ministry matters for eternity!

Let me know what you think.

Feel free to leave a comment in the comments section below or share this post with your community!