:: In.a.Mirror.Dimly ::

Stephanie Spencer wrote this guest post about her ministry calling in the midst of a move to Minnesota. I’m grateful that she took the time to share her story and, by way of rabbit trails, envy the two latest additions to the Minnesota Wild. She brings a perspective to women in ministry that is a new, challenging angle:

Words are slung carelessly about the Internet every day.

We climb over each other in effort to sound the most eloquent as we share our opinions. We long to prove why we are right, and why others are wrong. It’s as if life is an extended debate match we are somehow better people when we come out the victor.

Arguments like this rage about the question of whether women should be in ministry.

One person hurls out 1 Cor 14:34-35 as proof that women should stay silent in church, while another shoots back that Paul’s greetings to women in his letters are evidence that they were considered among the leaders. One person launches the grenade of 1 Timothy 2:11-12 instructing women to not have authority over men, while another heaves language and cultural circumstances that point to these verses as not being normative commands.

All the while, someone like me stands in the middle. Sometimes feeling hit by both sides.

I am a female pastor. This debate is not just about theology. This debate is about my life.

God made me a woman. God gave me His Spirit. And His Spirit gave me the gifts of leadership, teaching, and wisdom. In the midst of the biblical debates, I had to decide what to do about that.

Some would point to my pursuit of a seminary degree, certification within a denomination, and subsequent pastor title as evidence that I have strayed from the proper understanding of Scripture and its authority in my life. Others would point to my pastoring within a denomination that does not allow for the full ordination of women as evidence of inappropriate support for a patriarchal hierarchy.

My heart has caught quite a few stray bullets through the years. The hurt of seeing people avoid my station for communion and prayer because I was a woman. The humor of receiving an invitation for my husband and I to attend a conference for “pastors and their wives.” The uneasiness of conversation about my career with people from the church in which I grew up, whose view on women is so restrictive that it does not allow women to vote on church issues.

But every time I was wounded, God seemed to send me a double dose of encouragement. The beauty of helping others see their lives through the lens of faith. The joy of facilitating volunteers to use gifts they didn’t know they had. The privilege of talking to people of all ages about how they are valued and loved by God. The power of others speaking words of affirmation into my life.

Through all the awkward and awesome moments, I have done my best to follow God’s lead. And after a year away from work, I have only felt affirmation that I belong back in church work again.

Yes, the Bible verses about women’s roles are complicated. And yes, it is possible that I may be interpreting them wrong. But at the end of the day, my deepest desire is not to be right. My deepest desire is to love. I long to follow the instructions of Jesus: to love God with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love my neighbor as myself.

To me, it feels like a bigger risk to let my gifts go unused in the world around me than to risk using them in the wrong setting.

And so even if I get wounded again, that is okay. Because I will keep my heart in God’s hands, with the prayer that my life would be a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to Him.

About Today’s Guest Blogger

Stephanie Spencer is a pastor in transition. She used to work in children’s ministry before a move to a new city brought her to fresh adventures. She is a wife and mom trying to enjoy these long and wonderful days of toddlerhood. Besides her family, her loves include coffee, travel, and good conversation. She blogs at www.everydayawe.com.

Twitter: https://twitter.com/everydayawe
Facebook: www.facebook.com/everydayawe

About the Women in Ministry Series

The Women in Ministry Series is a collection of guest posts that aims to:

• Provide an alternative to the women in ministry debates by telling the stories of women in ministry.
• Encourage women to explore their God-given callings.

Contributions Welcome: Contact Ed to pitch your post idea in 2-4 sentences.

You can stay updated on the latest post each week by signing up for the weekly e-mail list. (You also get a free E-book!)

Comment Policy: Everyone is welcome to leave a comment. However, this series takes for granted that women are called by God into every facet of ministry. This is not the place to debate that point and such comments will be removed.Women have been told “no” in far too many places. This is one place that is committed to saying “yes.” For more about the comment policy or submitting your own story, read here.

Next Week’s Blogger: Tracy Steel

I’m honored to have Diana Trautwein guest posting for me today while I’m on my paternity leave:

There have been days in my pastoral life when I’ve wanted to chuck it. Days when politics and personalities join forces to quench the Spirit, when trivia takes up more space on the calendar than truth, when frustration and fatigue invade body and soul. No doubt about it, parishioners (and pastors) can be difficult, demanding, prickly and pervasively apathetic. The church is not a perfect organism. How can it be? It’s made up of human beings!

But sometimes, those very same human beings can rise to the occasion. Sometimes they can look and act like exactly who they are as members of The Body of Christ. And when that happens, all you can do is take a deep breath and watch a miracle unfold. Three years ago, I was privileged to watch such a miracle during a time of deep crisis in our community, a time of trial by fire. Really.

On a late November Thursday afternoon, the wind blew hot and wild. I had just said good bye to the last of a dozen women gathered in my foothill home, when the phone rang: “Fire in the next canyon! Get ready to move out!” That very morning, the senior pastor had flown east to conduct a family funeral. I was now point person for a terror-filled emergency and our own home was in the line of fire.

So was the church. Staff who were still on campus evacuated a few things and then were sent down the hill by police and fire personnel. Members of our congregation who lived in Westmont College faculty housing were forced to leave everything behind, fleeing for their lives to local hotels and over-crowded homes and shelters. We drove south a few miles to sleep at our son’s for the duration and I began trying to gather church leadership for prayer and planning.

Throughout that long first night, it became clear that we had been hit hard. Over 120 homes were destroyed, another 100 damaged badly. Fourteen of our own church families were left with the clothes on their backs and nothing else. Another six had severe fire damage awaiting them. The flames raged on and the evacuation order stayed in place throughout the weekend. Arrangements were made to worship at a local country club, emergency funds were accessed, worship liturgies were written and as many people as possible were contacted and encouraged. We did this by email and telephone and one small gathering of staff and lay leadership. It’s amazing how fervently you can pray on the internet!

375 people came to sing, mourn, rejoice, pray and share stories that strange Sunday morning, and we managed to get Deacon’s fund checks written for each family who had lost their home. Then we began to dig in for the long haul of recovery.

We began by hosting weekly Advent dinners in our church gym for the entire foothill community, and at the first one, we gave away donated and purchased Christmas decorations to any and all who came. Surely not the most ‘practical’ gift at such a time, but one that was deeply appreciated by everyone who filled a bag full of beauty and sentiment.

We opened our campus to insurance agents and neighborhood housing organizations and city planners. We welcomed our neighbors and we set up meals and temporary housing for our displaced family members. Several spontaneous small groups took shape, offering a safe place to vent and share and pray. The Body worked hard, and it worked well.

As the New Year turned, it became clear that the road ahead was not going to be easy. Twenty families in a congregation of 350 people were displaced, and a few of them had no insurance. We found more money, we found furniture, we found hope. We also wanted to make room for grief, and as we moved into Lent in early February, we made plans for an unusual Good Friday service.

The faculty housing community now had about a dozen vacant lots in a neighborhood of 30 homes. We designed a walking liturgy, acknowledging the pain of this loss as we remembered the sacrifice of our Savior. We began and ended in a small central park, then walked up and down the hills, about 150 of us, stopping at each cyclone-fenced empty lot as a Station of the Cross, sharing in scripture, litany, and prayer. It was a powerful time of recognition, of understanding how deeply Jesus understood our bereft brothers and sisters. Our Easter celebration that year was particularly poignant and rich. The promise of the empty tomb spoke right into the bleakness of our loss, and together, we looked forward to new life.

Disasters are never easy – they are confusing, disorienting, frightening. But sometimes,

by the grace of God, a lovely light shines right through all the muck, all the heartache. Sometimes, you find a miracle – a whole series of miracles – when the community of the committed remembers who they are. Thanks be to God.

About Today’s Guest Blogger

Diana R.G. Trautwein is a retired pastor, a spiritual director, wife to a good man, mom to three adult kids and their spouses, and grandmom to 8 exceptional grandkids, ranging in age from 21 to 2. She also blogs at http://drgtjustwondering.blogspot.com. After raising her family, Diana experienced a call from God to attend seminary and dove in at the age of 44. While there, she was stunned to hear God say, “I want you to be my minister.” So after graduation, she served two congregations as Associate Pastor for a total of 17 years. She is ordained in the Evangelical Covenant Church. These days, in addition to entertaining a delightful 2-year-old two days each week, she and her husband are walking the last leg of the journey with their moms, each of whom suffers from dementia. Even there, God is. And even then, life is a gift.

For the most part, the Belonging in Church series has focused on telling stories about how to belong to community from the perspective of the pews, but today Rev. Angie Mabry-Nauta writes about the tension of keeping the peace even when we part ways with our ministers:

May 8 marked my two year anniversary of leaving congregational ministry. I remember it like it was yesterday, but have been reluctant to write about it publicly

Am I ready to dive into the church part of what led to my resignation? I ask this myself on a daily basis because I know that eventually I will need to. I am diffident because there was such ugliness in the end. I fear some of the congregation’s wounds are still open and that someone will respond in an attacking manner. The time spanning February to October 2010 was some of the worst I’d experienced in my life.

I was unaware of how bad things would get when I preached my last sermon, which was an utterly graceful gift from God. Because of this I was able to speak into the moment — the pain, the disillusion, and the possibilities of where the church could go from there. God had me preach from a text that encompassed my life verse (Philippians 4:4-7). I called the sermon "A Fond Farewell", most of which I recall here. I figure that rereading this sermon and reliving the moment in my head and heart are the best ways to be posthumously faithful to the time my former congregation and I shared in the presence and work of the Lord.

I urge Euodia and I urge Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord. Yes, and I ask you also, my loyal companion, help these women, for they have struggled beside me in the work of the gospel, together with Clement and the rest of my co-workers, whose names are in the book of life. Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice .Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you (Phil 4:2-9, NRSV).

Here Paul speaks to a beloved community following his departure. Leaving is always the hardest on the party that is left behind, I said to my congregation that day. It was a congregation that had seen the coming and going of five pastors (counting me) over their 40-year history; and now God had called yet another pastor away from them. How they responded over the following months and years was their concern, of course. However, the Spirit seemed to be speaking and offering options through the text.

• They could fight amongst themselves, as are Euodia and Syntyche in the text, and poison the congregation with residual anger, pain, and proprietary feelings (Phil 4:2-3)
• They could choose to fare well in the Lord (4:4-7) by riding out each part of the journey in faithfulness, knowing that there will be ups and downs. With this choice they would intentionally fare well/rejoice happy and challenging times and stay connected to God in prayer. Such a choice, says Paul, brings the peace of God that passes our own understanding.
• They could think on good things (4:8) by taking a glass-is-halfway-full approach and looking through the years we were together and asking God to reveal Godself in them. By doing so they would be more likely to learn from challenges and difficult times, rather than stewing and dwelling on them.
• Following the previous choice, they could celebrate the good that we did together and keep it going (4:9).

Then I tied it all together and shared what I believed to be most probable to happen.

Actually, it will probably be a process, probably a mixture of each of these things going on both within the congregation and for individual persons, and not necessarily in this linear fashion. Y’all might skip around, or perhaps you’ll be at a place somewhere down the road where you feel like you’re able to celebrate sincerely, and then something trips you up and puts you right back to the anger and bitterness again. This is okay. It’s called grief; and it’s a process. And the only way to healing, or a least living with it better, is through.

The person I’d become through the counseling and spiritual direction needed to be honest about what was happening that day; and so I concluded my sermon thus:

We have been in intense relationship with one another for 5 ½ years. And unlike Paul, I did not enter this community knowing that my term would be up within a certain amount of time. I came here to be your pastor: to love you; to lead you; to serve you; to challenge you; to serve with you; and to grow in faith with and glorify God with you. I wasn’t thinking of the end when I began; nor was I thinking of the end when I went on sabbatical. But here we are. And it hurts. Also, I know y’all don’t want me to linger here in the pulpit all day long because the potential that someone might feel abandoned is too much for me to bear.

But, here’s where the Apostle, Paul, the Good-bye man comes in to offer us another nugget from his vast experience with farewells. The last eight words of our text say this, “ … [The] peace of God will be with you.” No one is abandoned. Not you, not me, not our children, not visitors, not the church, not the community. The peace of God will be with you, and it will be with me. And that’s not nothin’, folks. Blessed be the name of the Lord.

Today I am mindful of all pastors and congregations who are presently or have in the past experienced painful congregational ministry times and relationships. I empathize with you, pray for you, and offer you encouragement that no matter how chaotic you may feel the peace of God is indeed with you.

About Today’s Guest Post

Angie Mabry-Nauta is a theologian, freelance writer and speaker in Plano, TX.  She is an ordained Minister of Word and Sacrament in the Reformed Church in America (RCA), and served in congregational ministry for six years.  She blogs regularly at her own website, "Woman in Progress…" and for the RCA at the Church Herald Blogs. Follow her on Twitter @Godstuffwriter.

When author Nicole Unice signed up for the women in ministry series, it just so happened that she could pick a date that coincided with the release of her first book: She’s Got Issues. That’s not to be confused with the sequel I hope she’ll write some day: She’s Got Tissues—hope for people with allergies. Whether or not she has tissues, Nicole has a story to tell, and I’m honored that she’s sharing it with us today:

In 2000, I was sure God called me to ministry. I was so sure about it, I traded a full scholarship at a local graduate school for a five-hour commute to seminary. With blank notebook and eager mind, I set off for what I imagined to be an amazing life in the church. I had never met a woman in ministry, but I was undeterred.

And then I took my first class. And I was a 23 year old female surrounded by men, professional forty-year old men. Pastors. I loved every word of the teaching but then a few of those men, the pastors, would speak up. They would quote bible verses to each other and talk about theology and they would sound like Pharisees. I would want to raise my hand and say, “excuse me, pastors, there is a professor here who actually has things to teach.” But instead I stayed quiet, and stared around that classroom and stretched my five-hour-commute legs and thought, God must be wondering how I heard him so wrong.

So I did what good Christian females do, and switched into the counseling program. There I was safe. I was with almost all women and a few quiet men, and the kindest and bravest professors who were both pastors and counselors, who taught me what it meant to be present in pain, to be a healing voice and touch, and to stop trying to cure when all I’m given is care.

And then I did what married women do. I got pregnant. I went underground and forgot about the call of 2000. I kept learning, but this time about childbirth and ear infections and how to parent with my husband and how to root deeply into community. And for a few hours each week, I traded my yoga pants for khaki pants and unlocked my counseling office door and received people. And it was ministry. And it was good.

I volunteered in women’s ministry and began to teach and a fire was kindled in my soul. Care was important, but counseling was never what I thought I would do in seminary. And then, nine long years after the call, I sat at a women’s leadership conference and listened to a woman preach with fire and with femininity and it was like nothing I had heard in any church and I began to cry. And I asked/shouted/cried to God:

Why didn’t you make me a man if you wanted me to pastor?

Why didn’t I stay in the pastoral program if you wanted me to teach?

Why won’t you bring me a woman mentor if you want me to make it in ministry?

And slowly, out of prayers of honesty and pain, what seemed wrong, God began to make right. I began to teach and to lead, to slowly integrate all I had learned in counseling with all I had experienced in ministry. I began to speak out with confidence, using the wisdom of years of listening to people behind my closed office door. And instead of one person listening to me “preach” with passion about how God loved her and listened to her, I taught groups.

Although I thought He had forgotten me, He never had. And although I thought my degree was wasted, it never was. And although I thought I was on the slow track, the mommy track, the wrong track, he was only shaping my path, using the twists and turns to smooth out the rough edges of my soul, to embrace myself as a leader and a follower, a challenger and a nurturer, a teacher and a listener.

The slow track pressed me to surrender, and I fought it. Surrendering meant God’s way of ministry, whether that involved a business card and an office or not. Surrendering meant it was not my job to change everyone’s mind about women in leadership. Because the way anyone in ministry changes the world is by looking like Jesus. It’s with gentleness, humility, and kindness. It’s with patience. It’s with a meekness that knows when to be strong and when to be silent.

These are not easy to come by for natural-born leaders, both men and women. But when I look in the rearview mirror of life, I don’t see one mistake. God used every bend in the long road to prepare me to fulfill the call of 2000. It’s 12 years later, and He’s right on time.

About This Week’s Blogger

Nicole Unice is a ministry leader at Hope Church in Richmond, VA. She teaches in a variety of capacities within the church. Her first book, She’s Got Issues (Tyndale) released this month. You can find out more about the book at http://www.ShesGotIssuesBook.com or follow her on Twitter: @nicoleunice.

About the Women in Ministry Series

The Women in Ministry Series is a collection of guest posts that aims to:

• Provide an alternative to the women in ministry debates by telling the stories of women in ministry.
• Encourage women to explore their God-given callings.

Contributions Welcome: Contact Ed to pitch your post idea in 2-4 sentences.

You can stay updated on the latest post each week by signing up for the weekly e-mail list. (You also get a free E-book!)

Comment Policy: Everyone is welcome to leave a comment. However, this series takes for granted that women are called by God into every facet of ministry. This is not the place to debate that point and such comments will be removed.Women have been told “no” in far too many places. This is one place that is committed to saying “yes.” For more about the comment policy or submitting your own story, read here.

Next week’s blogger: Harriet Congdon

We’re welcoming Jamie Wright as this week’s guest blogger in the Women in Ministry Series. You probably know about her incredible blog Jamie the Very Worst Missionary. 

I’m just gonna come out and say this: I never, ever, in a million years, wanted to be a “woman in ministry”. Never. And I never in my wildest dreams imagined that one day I would actually be one.

I grew up far from any church influence, so the very narrow example I had seen of women in ministry came mostly from television, where they were often portrayed in the form of nosy, judgmental, gossip-loving Bible-thumpers. As a teen, when I finally crossed paths with some real live women in ministry, I found them to be…well…nosy, judgmental, gossip-loving, Bible-thumpers. (“You know who’s going to burn in Hell? You, honey.” That’s how a youth pastor’s wife so gingerly shared the Gospel of Jesus with my 15 year-old self.)

Many years later, when my husband and I began the process of moving our family into full-time ministry, I wasn’t exactly aching for a chance to join the ranks of Pastor’s wives and Missionaries – at least not the ones I’d been exposed to, with their Bible tracts and sensible shoes, and their strong, loud opinions about who is going to burn in Hell.

The truth is, the women who ministered to my own wanting soul weren’t “women in ministry” at all. They were good neighbors and generous friends. They were soccer-Moms who took my babies off my hands for a few hours at a time, when I most needed help. They were steaming coffee dates where no subject was off limits, where laughter flowed freely and tears of anguish were met with tears of empathy. They were gentle spirits who whispered the Love of a Savior into my life, slowly and sweetly, because they understood that, through friendship, Grace abounds. It just does.

Those women didn’t work in churches. They had government jobs, they were part-time consultants, some were homemakers, one was a personal trainer, another ran a daycare. They taught me that there’s a really big difference between “women in ministry” and “women who minister”. And they showed me that a woman’s ability to deeply impact the world around her, her value in ministry, isn’t limited by her job title (or her husband’s).

That means that Missionary or not, I am a woman who is called to minister. Pastor’s wife or not, you are a woman called to minister. Sunday school teacher or not, your wife/sister/daughter/friend is called to minister.

Our neighbors and co-workers are counting on us to use our God-given gifts and abilities to bring Hope to this broken world. Our families and our friends are depending on us, with our uniquely feminine voices, to speak into their lives with wisdom and authority. And the God who created us, in all our girly glory, has released us to feed the hungry, care for the sick, love the unlovely, and guide the lost.

He has invited each and every one of us into ministry. Even the chick who never, ever, in a million years, wanted to be a “woman in ministry”.

About Today’s Blogger

Jamie writes from her home in Costa Rica, where she lives with her husband and three sons. She is best known for candid conversations about life and faith on her blog, Jamie the Very Worst Missionary.

If You Appreciate Jamie, Read This

I (Ed, the owner of this blog) couldn’t invite Jamie to contribute to this series without thinking of some concrete ways to support her and her husband Steve in their ministry. Jamie had no idea I was going to do this, but I’ve been plotting  a special ask of this series’ readers. Here it is:

1. Steve and Jamie are trying to figure out their next step in ministry. Will you commit to praying with them?
2. Whether they stay in Costa Rica or move someplace else, Jamie and Steve are going to need some serious bucks. They have poured themselves out in ministry to others, and I would like you to prayerfully consider donating toward their ministry. In particular, can you give at least $10? They have some major expenses coming up that we can help them meet so that they can focus on their ministry and family. Go here to donate: Donate at PayPal Now.

About the Women in Ministry Series

The Women in Ministry Series is a collection of guest posts that aims to:

• Provide an alternative to the women in ministry debates by telling the stories of women in ministry.
• Encourage women to explore their God-given callings.

You can stay updated on the latest post each week by signing up for the weekly e-mail list. (You also get a free E-book if you sign up in January)

Comment Policy: Everyone is welcome to leave a comment. However, this series takes for granted that women are called by God into every facet of ministry. This is not the place to debate that point and such comments will be removed. Women have been told “no” in far too many places. This is one place that is committed to saying “yes.” For more about the comment policy, read here.

Next Week’s Blogger: Alise Wright

Some people are talented at making money. I, on the other hand, have the unique talent of choosing highly specialized professions that don’t make any money.

When I started attending seminary, the typical conversation with my family was something like, “How will you avoid becoming a beggar on the street?” OK, it wasn’t quite like that, but way too many conversations had those overtones.

Thankfully, I had plenty of pastors to look up to over the years. They seemed like reasonably well-adjusted individuals with normal lives. It wasn’t until I started working in a church and saw pastoral ministry up close that I realized it wasn’t for me.

I kept my misgivings to myself and my wife, not wanting the “beggar on the street” conversation to further evolve. As I searched for a new path forward, I realized that the obvious answer was writing full time. This did very little to assuage the concerns of my family.

When I started to pursue writing as a serious profession, I didn’t know any writers personally. How does one go about making a living as a writer? I could handle the part where I pounded out 5,000 words in a day, but the part where a paycheck ended up in my bank account eluded me. I had never seen the life of a writer up close and personal, and I had no idea how to go about pursuing my calling.

Enter writing blogs, books, and magazines. For years I inhaled Writer’s Digest, The Writer, and a bunch of writing blogs and books. These stories of professional writers became my lifeline. When people wondered how I could ever make it as a writer, I received support and encouragement from the stories of writers who kept up the struggle and dreamed up creative ways to make a living.

Without those stories, I would have given up on my calling a long time ago. If I didn’t know that there were other crazy people like me who loved to write and didn’t mind the spare pay checks, I would have been forced to settle for a soul-crushing job that didn’t tie into my passions.

Without stories, it’s hard to know if we’re on the right path. We need to know that other people have faced similar circumstances and have kept up the fight. We need to know that it’s worth the struggle.

As I’ve thought about the importance of the Women in Ministry Series that will be launched this Friday, the value of stories have been at the forefront of my mind. Women who feel called to ministry need to read stories about those who have blazed the path ahead of them. Women who have been told “no” all of their lives need to read stories that tell them “yes.”

Perhaps the most difficult part of this process has been contacting some very talented storytellers about contributing, only for them to reply that they don’t have any stories to share about women ministering in their lives. It never occurred to me that there are women who simply haven’t seen a God-empowered female ministering as either a pastor or a lay minister in the church.

That left me wondering how many women are struggling with a nudge from God that they simply can’t process. Are there women who sense a call into ministry, but they can’t sort it out because they’ve never seen it modeled for them?

As I think and pray over all that this series of stories about women in ministry can be, I hope that it will become a lifeline to women who need models. I hope that readers can share links with those who need encouragement and a few examples of what it’s like for God to work through women in the church.

And then, when a well-meaning relative asks a young woman, who is planning to go into ministry, how she will eat or find a place to live, she can smile and know that she has a treasure trove of stories assuring her that God will show her a path forward.

I used to work for someone who usually ended the week saying, “Thanks for all you do.”

That used to drive me crazy. What was he thanking me for? Eating my lunch? Getting a project done on time? Checking my personal e-mail while on the job?

I know this wasn’t what he meant, but I interpreted his encouragement catch-all as: “You’re not important enough for me to take the time to find out what you do well.”

Some weeks I wondered if it would have been better if he’d said nothing at all.

Sometimes the wrong kind of encouragement leaves us worse off than we were before.

In order for encouragement to actually work, it needs to be specific.

Be Specific or Else…

I think about this a lot since I volunteer and have managed volunteers for years. A big part of appreciating volunteers and ensuring they continue to help out is to give them specific encouragement. Specific encouragement is the fuel that keeps us going.

Encouragement that affirms something a particular will empower others to keep going. It’s so critical for volunteers and for ministers that I don’t think anyone can continue to serve effectively for a long period of time without it.

I would go so far as saying that encouragement is one of the ways God’s Spirit guides us in our service—it’s an outside validation that we have heard from God correctly.

Without mentioning something specific, our words fall flat and may even communicate that we don’t care.

Critique without Encouragement

I actually have a rule I try to follow, especially in church. I don’t let myself critique anyone unless I have encouraged that person first.

This is a worthwhile goal because many volunteers and ministers don’t hear feedback from people until something bad happens. Back in my worship leading days I’d guess that at least 80% of the feedback was negative—usually critiques of my song choices.

Critique without encouragement tells others that they are probably doing something terribly wrong. Even if someone is serving in the wrong position, look for what that person does well, affirm that, and perhaps suggest that he/she may be more effective somewhere else.

Critique alone could just leave a person feeling lost.

A Practical Step Toward Encouragement

If I could make one last suggestion for a practical way forward, I’ll be teaching a course on equipping volunteers for ministry at Biblical Theological Seminary outside of Philadelphia on August 12-13.

We’ll cover a broad range of topics related to supporting volunteers for ministry, and one of the major topics will be appreciation. You better believe we’ll talk a lot more about what effective encouragement looks like.

For more information, contact the academic office at 800.235.4021 or e-mail academic@biblical.edu.