The Equipping Church - Is It Time To Celebrate?

by Charlene Armitage

Everyone loves a good party. We all love to celebrate our accomplishments and enjoy our successes - not to mention relishing the flattery of our peers. Relish... That reminds me, we're going to need almost a dozen grills and we'll probably have dessert catered by that ice cream shop down the street. Let's see, we'll need the hospitality team and the kitchen crew. I need to form a leadership team to delegate the responsibilities to the team captains of lay leadership...

I've often been there. Have you? The times where even celebrations - times of worship, relaxation, and enjoying one another - seem like too much work to be worth it. Here's the tension: It's too much work without volunteers, and equipping volunteers is too much work. The process of equipping others to serve and lead in the local church is challenging, but it should also be rewarding for everyone involved.

I serve in volunteer leadership as the Director of Equipping at my local church, Pleasant Valley Baptist Church in Liberty, Missouri. Over the past several years, God has moved within our people to create a culture of service that we would not have dreamed possible.

We celebrate the fact that each person has a special God-given purpose in life, and we as a church body have the awesome privilege of supporting, encouraging, training, and equipping each person to fulfill that purpose. This celebration results from much more than just a nominal belief that each person is special.

We passionately believe that:

• Equipping and developing people is biblical.
  
• Each person is made in a special way.
  
• Each person deserves special attention.
  
• We must commit to each volunteer that they will have training, be affirmed, receive feedback, know expectations, have an opportunity to help evaluate ministries, and experience the joy of recognition and reflection.
• Hundreds of volunteers would love to be asked to serve.

With each belief comes a challenge that causes us to ask the question, "Are we just mentally on board with the principles of biblical equipping, or does our belief cross the line of conviction that results in action?" My passion is so strong that I left my position in the secular marketplace to give my life to equipping the people in the local church. I have never been so fulfilled, rewarded, or challenged - all coupled with the sense that I am doing exactly what I was made to do. I believe you can help your volunteers tap into that same belief and passion.

The intrinsic motivation for inviting people into ministry must be pure. It would help to be clairvoyant! But fortunately, God blesses leaders in the local church with the spiritual gift of discernment, guiding us when inviting someone to a specific ministry. You can be certain that you will be successful in matching each individual with his/her specific design if you truly have the other person's best interest at heart and desire that the Kingdom of God is glorified. I find myself experiencing great remorse when my attitude falls to what I can get from an individual rather than what I want for the individual. One of our favorite statements is, "We are not about inviting people to fill roles, but roles to fulfill people!"

Culture of Doing or Equipping?

How do things get done? Is the staff paid for doing tasks or equipping people? What if we measured our success by how often and how well we equipped people? What if, rather than adding volunteers, we were multiplying leaders?

Before I could answer any of the above questions, it was crucial for me to ask myself: Do I want this person to help me accomplish a task, OR do I have an intense desire to help them reach their God-given potential? How can I serve them and help them realize their purpose?

When I crossed the line of genuinely being more interested in the person rather than using them to accomplish a task, our church began to experience fulfilled volunteers who could not wait for the question... where are you connected in serving? We then saw a shift in our culture toward being one of equipping rather than doing.

From a practical perspective, it is challenging to move from a "doing culture" to an "equipping culture." As you make the change in your belief system, there are sequential pieces that must be in place to facilitate the change from a doing culture to an equipping culture.

You must have:

• Strong top-level advocacy and embodiment of the vision and values of equipping ministry
  
• A point person who is passionate about equipping coupled with a tenacious willingness to nurture others through the equipping process
  
• Intentional steps to take each ministry from the 'doing mentality' to the 'equipping practice' (discovery class, ministry connectors)
  
• Comprehensive systems that serve the people and connect everyone to meaningful ministry
  
• An environment that rewards equipping people for ministry rather than doing ministry (hire leaders, not doers)
  
• Consistent teaching/refinement in all areas of training, affirmation, feedback, evaluation, recognition, and reflection.

Phases of Equipping

You can spend countless hours reading books, attending seminars, conducting training, and mobilizing people - and you should. Our development as trainers and leaders should never stop. As I heard Dr. Howard Hendrix once say, "I don't want to die until I'm dead!" And he's right on. There is never a time we will grow out of development. God's work in us (thankfully!) is never finished. It is for this same reason that equipping should never be viewed as just an event or class, but rather a powerful and pure beginning to a life-long process of developing people. As elementary as this sounds, creating or enhancing a culture of equipping must begin with what you have. I know...duh. But stick with me, we're talking fundamentals.

Beliefs

Question to Self #1: What is the culture of my church when it comes to developing/equipping others?

We won't have much of a celebration if we don't have volunteers to equip or resources in place. So, what is in play? Who's already on the field? Exactly how many volunteers do you have and what are they doing? Our first step was to clearly delineate what the equipping terminology meant. I met with each department leader and made sure everyone was on the same page. Then we made some solid progress.

When you have made an honest assessment of how your leaders think/work - which I might add can be painful - you are in position to meet them where they are. You must be ready to articulate your passion and the reason you believe equipping God's people is nonnegotiable. As indicated above, a key component in relaying this passion and creating buy-in and culture change is active championing from the senior and (if applicable) executive pastors. This is more than just agreeing with the mission and passively acknowledging the purpose. The senior leadership must engage in meaningful equipping of those they expect to go and equip others.

Adapting the principles that Paul gives in Ephesians 4 and having these principles modeled by my senior leadership is a mandatory foundation for building a culture of God-honoring service to others. If this process takes longer than you expect, encourage your people, but let it take no more or no less time than it needs. This process also taught me that there was no substitute for a compassionate attitude toward the progress of each staff member or key leader. After assessing our leaders' their previous thinking...I was then able to take the next step.

Matching

Question to Self #2: Who goes where and why? And when they get there, what do they do?

Once the fuse is lit and God begins to work, you will see the leadership equipping other equippers and positive synergies emerging. Your people will get excited. The needs of a church and the gifts of the people are spiritual waters that require prayerful and precise navigation. This is exactly the reason for our discovery class, Finding Your Niche. Each person who completes the four-week class is honored with a personal interview by a trained consultant who then refers them to a ministry connector to ensure a meaningful ministry engagement.

Ironically enough, this is where God's model of equipping gets really exciting. These are the times you will look back on with goose bumps as you share with others the awesome work of God's hand. You will see sparks in people that you thought were quite possibly made of asbestos. These sparks will catch fire with dozens of others or remain a small blue flame of service and encouragement for others. After years of equipping, studying, and working in this area I am still joyfully amazed at the work God can do in the lives of anyone who will let him. Everyone is a piece in God's jigsaw puzzle. Sometimes we have to smooth a few edges, but every person does have a place.

Commitment

Question to Self #3: Is my organization ready to follow through, in the short- and long-term, with a culture of equipping?

The plan is in place. The people are serving. Under the pressures and weekly demands of ministry, it is easy to enlist and forget rather than follow through on equipping. Here is where the work of equipping can get tricky (or trickier). Today's successful program is tomorrow's plan for mediocrity. Encouragement wears off. Wisdom can be forgotten. Needs and people change.

Herein lies the deep need for a commitment to equipping. What you do at the beginning stages of equipping used to meet the need, but now you have equippers who are equipping others to equip. Mind- numbing, I know. Fortunately, most organizations don't go from zero to a well-oiled machine of 500 volunteers overnight. We at Pleasant Valley have been so blessed to experience God's providence to challenge us enough to learn, inspire us enough to vision-cast, and energize us enough to connect people with God daily through meaningful service in His Kingdom. Currently, we have a care chart tracking system in place that allows us to know the name of each person in each ministry who joins or leaves the ministry each month. The care charts allow us to personally stay in touch with our nearly 1800 volunteers.

Pre-launch Checklist

A simple, sequential scenario must be in place not only to establish an equipping culture but also to retain the vibrant sense of a new beginning. I wouldn't pretend that I could put together a list of detailed steps that would be the perfect recipe to equip any church. However, the questions below will help serve as a reference for the fundamentals of the equipping process. When you begin equipping others to serve, there are two things you can count on: First, with diligent work your fundamental needs will harmonize, but not in the first week! Second, there will be joy in the process!

1. Do our staff and key leaders embody the authentic principle of Ephesians 4?
   
2. Do we have the philosophy of "whatever it takes, we will equip all saints" according to Ephesians 4?
   
3. Does our senior leadership lead the charge in equipping others?
   
4. Do we have systems in place that will ensure each believer the opportunity to discover how God has made them and exactly where they can connect in meaningful service?
   
5. Have we designed meaningful feedback guidelines for each service/ministry opportunity?
   
6. Do our volunteers discover who they are in Christ and become empowered to engage in meaningful ministry?
   
7. Do we train all of our volunteers?
   
8. Do we affirm and celebrate all of our volunteers?
   
9. Do we recognize each volunteer for who he/she is and what he/she does?

I trust that these thoughts will not only challenge you to live out the equipping principles in Ephesians 4 but also encourage you to know that you and your church can actually experience the joys of equipping. As you begin the process, you will be challenged. As you continue through each step, you will experience incomparable joy watching each believer discover their purpose and connect in meaningful ministry. This is great cause to celebrate!

"This article is used by permission from Dr. Dan Reiland's free monthly e-newsletter 'The Pastor's Coach' available at www.INJOY.com."