I write everything I am about to say with all due respect for the people who work really hard as volunteers and who get done all of the many jobs necessary to run any organization. However, there are ways to do things and then there are ways not to do things! Bottom line- why make life more complicated than needed.
For nearly twenty years, I have gathered up the sheets where you register your attendance at church. I don’t remember why I started, nor who asked me to do this. My son Jon was a little boy and as with most things in our family, all three of us would go from pew to pew, tearing off the sheets and then I would carry them down to the office where a really old couple would be waiting to manually register the attendance in the “big book” that I assumed God checked on Monday to see who was in church and who wasn’t.
After Tim took the job as sound and lighting guy and Jon was videoing the services, I moved to the balcony to be near them but I continued to gather the attendance sheets. By now the old couple had retired and a new, really sweet lady had taken over the task. She and I would gather the sheets together. If I knew I would be on vacation I would tell her the Sunday before and she would do the same. Since Tim was always there, if school pulled me away I would remind him to get the sheets from the balcony and help if he could. Very rarely did it happen that she and I were both gone at the same time and if so even then, Tim would take up the slack. For years we have rocked along just fine.
Last week I gathered up the sheets from the balcony and headed downstairs. The lady I usually worked with was nowhere to be seen and as I began the section that I usually do another member of the church came up to ask what I was doing. I told her I was doing what I had done pretty much every Sunday for nearly 20 years- gathering the attendance sheets. She looked at me oddly and said, “Oh! Do you still want to do that?” Well, I had never thought about whether I wanted to do it- I just did it. It takes 10 minutes and is so not a big deal that it is an easy way to serve and I had done it for so long, I didn’t even think about it! “I guess” I answered her, wondering what she had to do with it! I looked around for my friend who was no where to be seen. The lady grabbed my hand and took me across the sanctuary to meet the new people who were now doing this job.
Today, I gathered the sheets from the balcony and headed downstairs without thinking. My friend was there gathering but so were lots of others. I asked her what in the world was happening. She said she had agreed to do this originally thinking it would be a once a month or every other week thing but had ended up doing it every Sunday and she was tired of it. Certainly valid if that is how she feels. But after she said that she was told the next week she was not needed except on the 4th Sunday of each month. Evidently, I am no longer needed at all. And that is fine- I am about to be out a few Sundays for rehearsals and performances so it works out.
I just got home to a phone message from the lady who had questioned me about wanting to do this. She was asking if I wanted to be put on her “team”. She wanted to know if I would be available to be on her calendar. It sounded like committees and meetings could be involved and I told Tim- “I’m out!”
Now I know there are big jobs that take planning and meetings, committees and calendars. This is not one of them. I know that organized, take-charge women are what keep large churches moving forward. I used to be one of those women before I went back to school and turned in my volunteer badge. But I also know you can get too gung-ho! Sometimes you can just do things, you don’t have to plan and meet, just do it. It is a ten minute job that a five year old used to help me with before he grew up and took over harder jobs involving technology. It always got done with no fuss. So yes, if it is about to become this big thing them I am done.
Just remember people, sometimes you can just do something with no officers elected and no meetings scheduled. Just do it! And when you decide to change a system, at the very least be gentle with how you handle the people who have been actually doing the work for many years. They asked nothing for the work they did, no notoriety, nothing but a little consideration for quietly doing a simple job. Don’t make EVERYTHING so complicated!
