Thursday, September 1, 2011

I love volunteers

This year brought a lot of changes to my ministry. Not the least of which was having to cut 6 part time staff members and move to a volunteer based "staff".  Managing that level of change was demanding. There was a lot to do and organize so that each job could have someone step in and know what to do and how to do it and where to find necessary supplies.  It took us about 3 months to work fully through the transition and work out the major kinks.  And now, we have about 20 volunteers who come in weekly to help with everything from scrubbing toilets, to leading the choir, to children's ministries, to running the office.  And, most of our volunteers are regulars--they volunteer each week to do the same or a similar task.  And they do a wonderful job.  

As part of that transition and then getting ready for maternity leave, I had a lot to delegate.  And in delegating, I realized just how many things I had been doing.  And I realized how few things I had been delegating before it was "necessary".  In a lot of ways, I had been hindering the ministries of the church by not allowing more people to take part, and take leadership, in the various ministries that we do.

As I prepared to come back from maternity leave, I was afraid that many people would want to abdicate their responsibilities and I would be left returning to all of the administrative items that were eating up my time (and not feeding my soul in the ways that other ministries tend to).  Fortunately, kept doing what they were doing, and they did a great job.  Now we have folks swing by just to see if anything needs to be done. It's so awesome to see their willingness and to not have to do the things that suck your time away!