A little pity...

...can go a long way. Tonight I had my first youth team meeting. Finally, after a year of youth ministry, I have a total of 6 volunteers to help with Bible study, special events, and fundraisers. So tonight we had our first planning meeting. The goal was to plan the next year of ministry for our youth--including Bible study/education, worship, evangelism/outreach, fellowship, fundraising, mission, and conference events. One of the leaders made dinner for us and we talked over dinner and then got to work. We started with scripture and then prayed for our time together and planning. For our check-in, I asked each person to share why she is there and either what she is looking forward to or what she is anxious or concerned about in regard to working with the youth. I found at that 2 of the 4, who later roped in their partners, at the table began helping because they felt sorry for me! They either saw me as over worked or stressed or whatever and decided to lend a hand because they pity me. So, apparently I looked pretty pathetic in my ministry almost a year ago now, but the upside is it won me 4 really great youth workers! So, it wasn't all bad. =)