In the course of leading our teams in children ministry (or any other ministry), we will come across 4 kinds of volunteer. We need to know who they are, so we can lead them carefully to ensure effective mobilization for Great Commission impact.

Volunteer with Heart (but little Skill).
Don’t give up these people. They have the heart and its reflected in the promises and things they want to know and do. They perhaps lack the skill and often self discipline to match their enthusiasm. Treasure them as they are with you in the same journey together. Their lack needs our encouragement and our belief in them to overcome. They will often appreciate it if we can take ownership of our influence over them and work through those problems with them with care. With heart, skill will usually come with time. We need to be there for them to teach and show them the way.

Volunteer with Skills (but little Heart)
People with skill is great to have in the team as they add value immediately to the ministry. If they do not have heart, it’ll just mean that they will be harder to get along or work with. But don’t be in such a hurry to address their heart to the extent that their skill is not acknowledged and they are not celebrated as persons. Heart and character change is a long term process and requires partnership with God. You have to be patient with them and pray with/for them.

Volunteer without Heart and without Skill.
What? We may just rule them off. Why are we wasting our time? Maybe they are not hopeless but they are just without hope. When we involve them in ministry, we have a shot at helping them to be instruments for God. It’s a hope we can give them and its worth a shot. Their doors do not open on first knock, we have to be patient and keep knocking. Maybe they are in the wrong role. If so,faciliate to help them find a more suitable role.

Volunteer with both Heart and Skill
They will be Great instrument of God. Just get out of the way.

Jeremiah 1:17
“Get yourself ready! Stand up and say to them whatever I command you. Do not be terrified by them, or I will terrify you before them”

I prefer the God’s Promise Translation which says “… Do not be terrified in their presence or i will make you [even more] terrified in their presence”.

The Lord spoke this verse to us this morning at our VIP Huddle. It was so piercing that we laughed. Great cure for stage fright in children’s church.

So folks, never be afraid of what you do for God, otherwise what you do for Him will terrify you!

4 Things To Know So That You’ll Not To Be Scared of Kids
(or whoever you are scared of)

1. The Lord wants you to lead them. So Raise Up!
2. The Lord has something for you to tell them. So Listen up!
3. The Lord has given you courage to speak and lead. So Wise Up!
4. The Lord wants you to humble yourself to understand their world. So Buck Up!

I was blog surfing this morning and read a post about HopeKids and children’s ministry from irrevocable. It was so uplifting that it gave me an extra ounce of energy for our last LOST Sunday. If you read right down to the comments, you’ll hear from pastors, worms, former worms and hopekids all in there. It’s great to know the impact of our former team to folks today.

Irrevocable is blog you should check out of our youth pastor Shirley where she rants about dark chocolate, italian footballers and most importantly all that life in the Kingdom from an exciting, youth-minded and gung-ho perspective.

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Meanwhile, on ground zero, things are moving. I received 2 mails (amongst all my spams and junk mails) from Andrew that the new North East bus is kicking off this week. Andrew and the team has been doing such fantastic job with the transportation ministry and its great to see it raise another level higher. It’s no easy job coordinating with the bus company, the parents, the care leaders and me (yeah, the biggest headache).

Jesus must be real for all these guys to do what they do.

Mong Cha Cha was an accidental visitor to the service 2 weeks ago. She works in the Pet Circus and was lost on her way to work. So she did a routine for us on stage and it was … quite interesting!

Yung and I sat down to talk and dream about HopeKids in 2009.

Yung is coming on board fulltime comrades in ministry. She will have a special mission to develop our HopeTots and HopeKinders services. We have a philosophy of hiring shepherds (or proven people with a heart for God and His people) and Yung is a great one. She has tirelessly served with us all these years and shown herself to be a great merchant of hope. 

So we looking forward to having her as part of the staff team in September.

We featured an SX bass* in service this morning. Singing “Christ in the Vessel” has never been so cool. Freedy and his team (which include his young ’sheep’ bassist) did it again!

This is the first time we feature a electric bass guitar in regular service! It was a new WOW in the praise atmosphere! We wish to have SX bass or any bass in service because children’s church deserves some good thumbing bass.

* The SX bass is of course the cheap knock off of the famous Jazz bass, that plays like a dream. It is the same one I have in ragsstudio as shown in my post “How to be cool” below.

Visited a child in the hospital who’s diagnosed with a rare illness. Wan Yueh, Hannah and I spent sometime with the mother yesterday just talking. Our role during the visit is to be more a listener than to talk. Our role after that is to have hope and expectation of God’s power to act according to His will than to be sad.

It was truly a great service today! I was humbled, I have nothing to say but that God was great. God put in all the ingredient of one. Lots of visitors, great atmosphere, great worship, teamwork and fun! I wish I had photos but we were too mesmerized for trivial things like that.

The media team did exceedingly well and my jaw dropped right to the ground. And for the record, Gift Shop has never opened more than 1 week per quarter, now it has been/is going to open for 4 weeks in a row. If God is not working why would the team work like this? I cannot wait for the next two weeks.

HopeKids rocked the Henderson Wave. I was surprised its such a good place to meet old friends, bumped into at least 4 church groups and I into 2 old friends.

We had a great time and I did try to have a little bit more.

We walked pass Toys ‘R’ Us yesterday. The kids wanted to just go in to take a look. I was standing behind them and notice how much choice the kids have today. And they have a great time selecting and the parents have a great time choosing for their kids too. However, I think the fun is in the choosing and in the keeping for just a short while. These things will only engage the kids for an hour, a day or at most a week.

However if we introduce them to someone who is priceless like Jesus, He will ensure they are engaged for life. If parents and all of us guide them right, they should never get bored of living a life in the Spirit and that, I think is truly a greater gift.