I am often asked what is the secret behind a great children's ministry.
Awesome videos? No.
Great praise and worship? No.
Cool Bible lessons? No.
Vision? No.
Incredible facilities? No.
Crazy fun games? No.
The secret behind a great children's ministry is...
A GREAT VOLUNTEER TEAM.
Show me a great children's ministry and I will show you a team of great volunteers who are making it happen.
The success and effectiveness of your children's ministry depends on the strength of your volunteer team.
Without volunteers there is no children's ministry.
If you want to have a great children's ministry, then get great at building a great volunteer team.
Scripture makes this very clear in Ephesians 4.
"Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. Their responsibility is to EQUIP God’s people to do His work and build up the church, the body of Christ. This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ."
Your most important job is to EQUIP God's people to do His work.
If your children's ministry is struggling, it's probably because you are doing the ministry instead of equipping others to do the work of the ministry.
This afternoon, I am meeting a volunteer at my home church (I volunteer there when I am not traveling). We are going to spend a couple of hours preparing for this weekend. I'm going to equip him to lead a crucial part of the ministry.
Want to know how you are doing with building your team?
Here's how you can know.
Step back into the shadows and watch how the ministry does without you. If it runs well by a volunteer team and nothing misses a beat...you are doing a great job. Keep equipping. It makes the difference.
If you step back and the volunteer team struggles, then it's time to recommit yourself to equipping your volunteers for the work of the ministry.
New children's ministry leaders ask me this question.
What should I focus on? What should I pour my time and energy into?
I always tell them this - "Focus on building volunteer teams. More than anything, you've got to be able to build and lead a volunteer team."
Building a great volunteer team can often be a challenge. But don't give up. Keep building.
In my book "The Formula for Building Great Volunteer Teams" I share 5 key areas you need to focus on if you want to build a great volunteer team.
What sets this book apart? The formula works. I have personally seen this work. At one of the churches where I served as the children's ministry leader for 9 years, we built our team from 300 people to over 2,000 people serving.
You often see people writing and speaking about building a volunteer team. But most of the time, they have never actually built a great volunteer team themselves.
The formula I share in this book will help you build a volunteer team, no matter what your current church size is. It has been called the best book ever written on the subject.
In closing...how is your volunteer team doing?
Are you struggling to get enough volunteers?
Do you sometimes go into panic mode on Sunday morning because several people have called out?
Are you using people to build the ministry or are you using the ministry to build people?
Get this book today at this link and build the volunteer team you have dreamed about.
