Please... No More Volunteers

I can't help myself. Every time I think of volunteers, I am reduced to thoughts and images of mis-matched, often woe-begone recruits being manipulated to accept some mission that will take them ill-equipped into uncharted territory, usually in the dead of night, with little, if any, likelihood of survival. Heroic efforts sometimes do prevail and the wounded, beaten, often diminished troops return, perhaps to face yet another mission. True, great movies are made of such stuff - unfortunately, great churches are not!

Personally, I think it is way past the time for us to be thinking in terms of volunteerism in the church. A new model is needed... and desperately so!

Let me first address some key issues regarding volunteerism before turning to what I believe is the Scriptural alternative - even mandate. And yes, you heard me right. I am indeed suggesting that the concept of volunteers with which the church has lived, promoted and honored is anything but Scriptural. Not only so, but the mindset it fosters within the congregation introduces a myriad of practical land-mines. Those who are at all familiar with the life of the average Parish know well the extent of the wounded, burnt-out, and walking dead amongst us, and those of us who are robust have become rather adept at finding excellent excuses protecting us from volunteering for the next "mission'.

Volunteerism suggests a casual approach to the work of the Kingdom that both creates and fosters an environment of passivity and mediocrity.

After all, volunteers need to have the mission mapped out for them by others, usually the "generals" who know full well what the mission entails and would not for the sake of their own lives "go there". More often than not, it is simply a work that someone declares needs to be done. We like to call these works "ministry" - it sounds so much better - even Scriptural. Subsequent problems are not unexpected. We all understand the difficulty in maintaining high quality control over the "ministry" and what quality control there might be is in most cases applied from without rather than arising from within. We settle for whatever is offered and make all sorts of excuses as to why we cannot expect more from our volunteers. In all of this, the church suffers for lack of initiative, passion and integrity And what we call "ministry" might in the final analysis be not much more than a dead work requiring more CPR than anyone is able to give. [Of course, I am exaggerating to make a point.]

Scripture knows little of volunteerism. We were all bought for a price [lCor.6:20; 7:23].There is a call upon our lives [Eph. 2:10; 1Pet. 2:9-10]. We are not our own. Even the most familiar of scriptural images argues strongly against this volunteer mind-set. We are the Body of Christ [1Cor. 12:27]. The heart, the liver, the hands, the mind - these do not "volunteer" for service - in fact, if they do not by their very nature actively participate in the body's function, we declare them to be impaired in some way. The key in all this, to be sure, is that the organs of the body each "know" their special place and the responsibility that is solely theirs. And to this responsibility they apply their all.

A new direction is needed in the church, both individually and corporately.

Corporately, as a local congregation, I believe we need to rethink the way we do the business of the Kingdom. For too long when we have raised folks up it is only to pigeonhole them in the narrowly defined ministries of the local body. Sadly, we have failed for the most part to raise people up in such a way that they can truly respond to the invitation the Lord has placed before them. Many in our congregations have yet to understand the call to a destiny the Lord places before each one of us. We might have taught on spiritual gifts, but usually when we have, it is little more than a cover to find those who we can place in children's ministry or on vestry or in some other institutionally defined area of need. We seek - if indeed we do - to raise up eagles, only to place them in boxes.

But what if we were to think and act differently? What if the local congregation embraced as its sacred responsibility - even privilege - the role of raising up God's people for Kingdom service, regardless of whether such service specifically benefited the local church at all? What if our most pressing concern was to release highly skilled, fully equipped, Spirit-anointed folks for ministry wherever and however the Lord had called them? What if our resources were to be spent on people rather than programs? In a fundamental sense I am speaking of turning the church inside out. I am talking about no longer professing to be an apostolic church as much as becoming one: that of raising up and sending out a holy priesthood to offer significant ministry done with excellence.

As individual saints within the Body of Christ, what if we understood the need for, and belonged to a fellowship that took seriously, ministry that arises from gifting and passion, from personal values and life experience. What if our focal point became the exploration with, and equipping of, each and every individual until he/she embraced a sacred call - responding to the invitation of God Himself to be His transformational agent in a world so broken?

Imagine a local congregation that truly understood itself to be a holy nation, a kingdom of priests, where no one thought him/herself outside the Lord's plan and purpose
- where indeed every one knew his/her specific role and function - and where all was revealed by the Father of light. Gone would be the coercion, the manipulation, the guilt, the reluctance, the passivity, the mediocrity so prevalent within the church today - all to be replaced with a passionate people equipped, empowered and released - the fruit of apostolic process in action.

At the heart of the gospel is the call to service [no - not the 8:30 or 10:00 am service] - a call to infiltrate the world and especially our local communities with the grace and the transforming power of the Lord. There is a call to local congregations through its five-fold ministry to equip the saints for the work of the ministry. Here is a call to be lead by the Spirit issued to every believer. So please… no more volunteers!