Let me ask a question.

The leaders that you have coming to your services, do they just show up or do they know WHY they show up?

I ask this because this is something in which our team began to ask a little over a year ago. I know we had a bunch of adults coming to be a part of the student ministry, they cared about the students, but it seemed like some of them didn’t really know if they were being successful in our eyes or not.

Now that is not their fault, it was actually my fault.

As the leader, it’s our responsibility to make sure our people know what their wins are.

Without this clarity no mater how “in” your leaders are they are always going to wonder if they are being useful, successful or effective as volunteers in your ministry. We need to take the time in order to really hash out “the wins” because then you will begin to see your leaders really have a pep in their step.

For us, we have three main ministry areas, all of which have easily defined “wins” for leaders so they know if they are headed in the direction we want to go. Also, all of the “wins” in one section point towards movement to another section in which we think are signs of growth in that particular student.

Here are three areas and wins in those areas:

MIDWEEK SERVICE

  • Connect with a new student: Now this could be a brand new student or it could be a new student to them. Someone they might have not known really well. We want our leaders to know we value connections and relationships. Students will come to a great program, but they will stay for the relationships that are made.
  • Connect them to Jesus: The goal is not just to hang out with them. The goal is to connect them to the Savior. This could be accomplished in many different ways: a conversation, asking about the message, praying with them, connecting with them outside a Wednesday etc.
  • Connect them to a small group: This is our action step. We want to see all of our students in a group and all of our leaders should be encouraging students towards growth and we think the next step of that is moving past a Wednesday night and joining a community.

SMALL GROUPS

  • Help students grow on their own: Now that they are in a group and studying the Bible, the purpose of the group is to help students begin to grow on their own. It’s helping them take responsibility of their faith and helping them know how to read and study the Bible, be in community and seek accountability and to be authentic.
  • Help students grow by serving on a team: When you are being discipled and growing in the Lord, the next step is taking that head knowledge and putting it into action. That would be serving. In our groups, we push our leaders to serve once a quarter, exposing students to getting out of their comfort zones and begin to put faith into action. So leaders know this is something we are wanting in the spiritual growth with our students.

SERVING

  • A student makes an impact: We provide a number of opportunities each year for our students to live out this commissioning. Some of these opportunities are close to home. This could include serving in our kid’s ministry, cafe, parking on Sunday mornings or jump into any of the food pantry outreach we do once a month. Other opportunities are not so close to home… like our church’s once a month Mexico outreach trips. We also would push students to go on one of our church-wide mission trips to Africa.
  • Reaches a friend in One-Life: At our church we have a One-Life. One-Life is one person in your life who does not know Jesus and you are intentional with your relationship with them, being there for them, praying for them, inviting them to church or small group and it’s how we focus on evangelism. We know serving our peers will help expose them to the Gospel and we want them to know it’s an important part of their faith. Which this bring their friend right back to the beginning of going to service where our leaders will then begin the whole process again.

Each area has “wins” and it is amazing to see that when your leaders grasp them in each area, they are laser focused and know what needs to be done.

I am not saying you need to have my “wins”, but what I am saying is you need to think through your “wins” for your leaders. Do your best to get rid of any questions they might have if they are being successful

 

@justinknowles3