I’m starting a new monthly series called the “Leadership Nugget.” The purpose of this is to offer my readers an article or thought provoking “nugget” that they can place on walls in their ministry area, in newsletters, as encouragements to volunteers, or as recruiting material. I hope these tools will help your church better understand the priority of children’s ministry!

This month, I’m offering a resource I wrote called “No Other Ministry.” I hope you could post it on a wall outside your office or include it in a newsletter. If you do copy it in a publication, please be sure to credit my name and web address. Thanks and please pray for me. On Thursday and Friday I will embark on a journey of doctoral exams lasting a total of 8 hours. Yes, I have to write for 8 hours (at least I get two days to do it!). Should God grace me with a passing grade, I will be a doctoral candidate and will finish up the rest of my dissertation so that I may graduate (for the last time ever!) in May! You can read more about the Doctor of Education program I am in here.

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Church budgets always seem to be tight no matter what the state of the economy. However, if you can prove to those in your church that you are budget-minded and tenacious at being frugal with church resources, they may just crown you as the King or Queen of Savings! Here are a few tips across the various areas of your ministry that can save you money:

Events

• Get several quotes from equipment providers (buses, inflatables, t-shirts, entertainment). Getting a few quotes takes a couple of extra minutes and you can often save hundreds of dollars. When I came to Grey Stone, I did this and cut the VBS t-shirt budget in half!
• Partner with other ministry areas to slice the costs in half. We did this for a volunteer banquet. The education ministry and children’s ministry did a somewhat joint thank you banquet for our volunteers. We got a better deal on the food (b/c of volume) and we split the entertainer fee.
• For camps or events that require parents to pay for their kids, many of us build a portion of this into our budget to subsidize the one’s who can’t afford it. I have found that a simple announcement in the bulletin explaining the need for scholarships draws a good bit of money. I explain exactly what it would cost to send one kid to that event so they have a concrete figure. I also have several “givers” in my contact list who have been very gracious in the past that I can call on for assistance. Try this one for extra camp spending money for needy children too!

Large Projects

• Sit down for 20 minutes and brainstorm about volunteers who can help you get the project done. We did a $10,000+ renovation project for our elementary worship room for around $5000 b/c of volunteers in our church who did things for free or at cost.
• Do the work yourself. Plan on spending 60-70 hours a week at church over those 2-3 weeks and show the church some hard work ethic!
• Schedule volunteer “work days” to help get the grunt work of large projects done. Schedule them at key times in the project plan and on days and times which working people are easily available.

Curriculum

• Use free curriculum, especially for short run programs, like Wednesday nights in the summer, or for Christmas/Easter lessons. Go here to find out about links to many of these free curriculum resources. Another great resource for this is Open from LifeChurch.
• Partner with a local sister church to alternate the sharing of curriculum. This would cut your budget in half. Even with dated curriculum, a few tweaks would make this very doable.
• Have teachers meet weekly to discuss their resource needs. They may find that someone else has what they were going to ask you to buy the next day!

Consumable Resources

• Three times a year, make a wish list known of items needed for your nursery or resource room. Put this list in your bulletin or newsletter. Want to make it even more successful, have some adult Sunday school classes adopt a particular area of “resource needs” and do a two week drive toward the end of the summer to get ready for the new school year.
• Steal them. Just kidding…I wanted to see if you read this far!
• Cut out the amount you feed children at church and have a rotation of families provide that snack or breakfast.
• Buy wholesale. Get a Costco, BJ’s, or Sam’s membership. You really do save a ton on things like cookies, cups, napkins, and plates there.
• Lock the snacks up so the youth don’t eat them!

I not only like to provide free resources on this blog, but also free “nuggets” that you can use to make your ministry more healthy. This month, I’d like to share with you some awards that I give to volunteers each year at our volunteer banquet. I have the volunteers nominate people for these various awards. When I present them, I speak a few words about the individual, and present them with a nice certificate (which you can find here). The awards are:

• Cardiac Award: The volunteer with the biggest heart for kids.
• Legacy Award: A volunteer who has committed a great deal of years, time, emotion, and energy to your ministry.
• Rubber Band Award: The volunteer who shows an attitude of flexibility each and every week.
• Boy Scout Award: The volunteer who shows themselves to be the most prepared every week.
• Lexus Award: The volunteer who shows a commitment to excellence in all that they do.
• Up and Coming Award: Goes to a new volunteer who shows unique promise in doing great things in Children’s Ministry.
• Spirit Award: Awarded to the volunteer who is a wonderful example of godliness to the kids and other volunteers
• Out There Award: Goes to the volunteer with an extra measure of goofiness and ability to relate to children on their level.

You may also be interested in:

1. No Other Ministry Promotion Poster
2. Volunteer Performance Evaluation

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One of the priorities in my prayer and planning day earlier this month was to develop a communication time line. I started thinking that I not only need to communicate about events that happen from year to year, but I need to communicate other pertinent reminders throughout the year. I thought this time line might be helpful for you. It is in an editable format so you can adjust to fit your ministry needs.

What would you add to it? Send me some comments to make it better!

One of the biggest blunders that we make in ministry is offending the masses with a poorly implemented change. I’ve learned through personal experience and the study of a few good books (the business sector calls change “innovation”), that change can be done in ministry in an effective way. Since almost quitting 4 years ago because my volunteers rejected our background check mandate, I have sought out how to initiate effective change and I think I have a good resource for those of you on the same journey.

The link below will lead you to a worksheet that will help guide you through effective change in your ministry. Before you speak a word of change to someone in your ministry, work through this guide first. I think it can be a big help to making your “innovation” a success!

Initiating Effective Change Worksheet