Taken from my preparation for doing the offering invitation this morning in the adult services:

Many offering sermons start out with a reminder about Luke 6:38. They are very future-oriented. In other words if you need a blessing, then be a giver and believe for the promise of Luke 6:38.

Luke 6:38 “Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” (RNIV)

This is all good, and I’ve many times stood on this verse for provision. However, it’s also important to give out of thankfulness for what God has already done in our lives.

Psalms 107:8 “Oh that man would praise the LORD for his goodness.” (KJV)

We do such a good job of keeping track of what we give. We have the church who reports how much we’ve given at the end of the year, other charities keep track of your gifts, and then we add them all up and apply them towards are taxes. We take satisfaction, and rightly so, in what we give away. Some of us have even probably thought that to have more money would open more doors for us to give. (I said some of us, not all of us.) In plain words, we do a good job of keeping up with what we give; but we do a worse job in keeping up with the blessings of God. We seem to forget his provision and his meeting our needs over the years.

Not remembering these things affects our overall perspective. We need to keep the blessings of God in front of us at all times. Look at the warning given to the Israelites in the book of Deuteronomy.

Deuteronomy 8:10-19 “When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the LORD your God for the good land he has given you. Be careful that you do not forget the LORD your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you this day. Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the LORD your God . . . “You may say to yourself, ‘My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.’ But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth . . . If you ever forget the LORD your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed” (NIV)

The blessings of God will keep his will close to our hearts, and help us to remember where he has brought us from. Showing these blessings to our children, help them see a God that is intimately involved in the lives of His children. We give out of thankfulness for what he has done in the past; as well as what he will do in our future.

Earlier we talked about what an unhealthy volunteer looks like. It’s not as easy as just firing all those who bring a spirit of unhealthiness to our ministries or arena’s; but I can begin to change the environment that all my volunteer exist within.

I present my Top 6 things to Never do or say to a Volunteer.

1. Never ask a Volunteer to help “YOU.”

• Ask them to help the church, or help in a classroom. Don’t make it a personal favor to you. Personal favors won’t stand up over the test of time.

2. Never thank a volunteer for helping “YOU.”

• Remind them of your overall vision and purpose when saying Thank You.
• “Thank you for helping us reach all these kids this morning. You’ve been a great help to all of us!” vs. “Thanks for helping me out. I don’t know what I would have done without you!”
• And… the church name should be prominently displayed on any thank you correspondence. Make it about the Church or organization, not me!

3. Don’t ask the same volunteer to do the same thing over and over.

• Don’t abuse the willingness of one person to ALWAYS help when needed. Mix it up!

4. Don’t praise volunteers as a guise for criticizing other volunteers.

• There shouldn’t be any teacher’s pets. We all have our favorites, but make sure to no alienate any one person, just so you can praise another. (Or take one volunteer out to lunch, without investing in all of them equally.)
  (Refer to Point 2 for a how-to.)

5. Never show displeasure with church leadership to Volunteers.

• Teach the Power of Buy-In! Representing our leader’s choices as our very own. This shows our volunteers that we are a strong team, and are working together for a common goal.
• Even if it is someone else’s fault, make it our fault. If everyone would do this, then rumors and displeasure with leadership would be stopped early and often! (Of course there are some sins that cannot be covered by us and in those exceptions just refer to those above us in leadership.)

6. Never ask “How did it go today?”

• “How did it go today?” is a dangerous question. It will provoke answers about classroom behavior and numbers.
• Asking about numbers and behavior makes it all about the teacher (You’re basically asking if they had an okay time and were able to manage); asking about the spiritual growth redirects it to the kids.
• Instead ask specific questions like, “Did the kids remember the main point today?” or “Did they understand how the craft related to the main point” or “Do you feel that the kids seemed to ‘get it’ today” or the greatest question of all “Did you pray with any kids to accept Jesus this morning?”

Over the past year I have spent a lot of time trying to recruit new volunteers (or whatever you call them) into the growing Children’s Ministry here at the church. I’m not a big fan of stage announcements, or volunteer campaigns. I’ve always felt those can easily be interpreted as “The Ship is Sinking, Get on board!” Which is not the idea I want attached to what we do each week. In my thinking about how to get more Volunteers, I’ve come to realize that I really must spend more time creating a healthy environment for my current Volunteers; before trying to increase my numbers. In my prayer and study about creating a healthy environment for those that volunteer I’ve come up with some things. I’ve never truly had an original thought, so if you think you’ve heard this before; then I’m sure you have.

The first thing to figure out is, What is an “Unhealthy Volunteer?”

An unhealthy volunteer is:

• A Volunteer that serves the church as a favor to the person who asked.
• A Volunteer that displays loyalty to the Leadership and not to the kids in the classrooms
  • They would leave with the leader if the leader left.
  • “If so and so ever leaves, then I’m out of here quick. So you had better never get rid of so and so .”
• A Volunteer that never recruits other Volunteers
  • “All About Me” syndrome –They’ll complain about a lack of help, yet they are in more direct contact with people and parents in the church than many leaders. Despite their connections they never gather their own help. They would rather just complain.
• A Volunteer that strays from the direction of the leaders guide and/or study materials
  • Why would someone do this?
    1. Uncomfortable with the changes to what they did in the past.
    2. Lack of training in how to do the “New Thing.”
    3. Unprepared to do what is requested of them. Without a plan teachers/volunteers will always resort to the lowest common denominator or teaching.
    4. Absolute Rebellion. (Very rare, in my experience)

Next I’ll tackle the top 6 things I try to avoid ever saying or doing in front of a Volunteer. And how NOT doing these things actually go a long way to creating a healthy Volunteer Environment.

James 3:3-6 (The Message)

3-5 A bit in the mouth of a horse controls the whole horse. A small rudder on a huge ship in the hands of a skilled captain sets a course in the face of the strongest winds. A word out of your mouth may seem of no account, but it can accomplish nearly anything—or destroy it!

5-6 It only takes a spark, remember, to set off a forest fire. A careless or wrongly placed word out of your mouth can do that. By our speech we can ruin the world, turn harmony to chaos, throw mud on a reputation, send the whole world up in smoke and go up in smoke with it, smoke right from the pit of hell.

As I was reading through James 3 this morning I was reminded of the famous quote, “Better to stay silent and be thought a fool, than to speak up and remove all doubt.” (I’ve seen this quote credited to everyone from Will Rogers to Abraham Lincoln.)

If James 3 tells me the negative and hurtful ways that my words can damage and injure those around me. It got me to thinking about my positive, life-giving words. Can a carefully thought out word extinguish a forest fire in someones life? Can my words make the world a better place, and turn chaos into harmony? Could my words build up the reputations of others? Could my words help send people to heaven?

Powerful thoughts…

—————-
Now playing: Hillsong United – Tell The World (Jakarta, Indonesia)
via FoxyTunes

I got an email question today, from someone in and/or around the church.

Why do bad things happen to innocent children?

I have my opinions, but I wanted to speak some life to a difficult question. Responding to an email is always tricky, because I don’t know what circumstances birthed such a question; or what assumptions the questioner is bringing along with the question. So I perused online for some opinions, asked some of those around me, and added some of both with my own ideas for an answer that I think addresses this issue. As well as it can via email.

In regards to your question about why very young children who are helpless and trusting get abused, I can say that there are no easy answers to the question of the purpose of suffering and evil. The tendency is to blame God for these conditions, but He did not create them. They came as a result of man’s disobedience to God, beginning back in the Garden of Eden; (Genesis 3:16-19). Often suffering and adversity are brought about by disregard of God’s will or by the direct efforts of Satan or by natural disasters in a physical world which is also affected by man’s sin and the resulting judgment. God, however, has offered the most effective solution possible by giving His Son to die for all. Jesus Christ paid the ultimate price when He suffered and died on the cross, having taken upon Himself the sin of the world and all of its horrible consequences. When Jesus returns in power and glory, there will be a new world completely free from sin with its sorrow and suffering.

We can be sure that God in His divine purpose desires to bring about in us the greatest good and to allow suffering to be a means of discipline through which love, patience, grace, and faith may be cultivated in our lives.

So is my answer different than yours might have been?

Thanks and credit to the BGEA for some great scriptural answers to tough questions.

—————-
Now playing: Waterdeep – Hush
via FoxyTunes