Pretty much the highest praise I can give a book is that it is both deeply thoughtful and highly readable. Every Good Endeavor: Connecting Your Work to God’s Work by Tim Keller (2012) earns that praise. Deep and thorough, itRead more…
Review: But Now I See. . .
Sometimes life throws us a curve — health or job changes, a world-wide pandemic, a midlife crisis. They often cause us to wonder if and how it all fits into God’s plan for us. In But Now I See: FindingRead more…
Tool, a Look at Serving
How’s your serving going? This tool helps you take a look at your overall serving, or an aspect of it. Download it by clicking on the image.
Grow in Serving
Tool: A Look at My Serving
What would my life look like if I saw everything I do as serving Jesus? What if I could serve more intentionally, joyfully, impactfully and faith-fully? What if my church family were to do this? What if Jesus’ followers throughoutRead more…
Grow in Serving
How to Grow in ServingRead more…
The Covid Pivot
Covid has brought change — tragic changes in health and employment, and inconvenient change, like mask-wearing and limits on eating out. At church we’ve dealt with change in how we worship, share communion, celebrate marriages and bury loved ones. FewRead more…
A Caregiver’s Education for Life-Long Serving
Sunday, June 29, 2010, at age 89, my mother-in-law moved in with my husband and I, at our invitation. Monday, Dec. 2, 2019, at age 99, God called her to the home she longed for. In the intervening 9 years,Read more…
Simplify Your Serving
Some of us don’t need to be encouraged to serve. We’re serving at church and elsewhere so much so that we’re running nonstop. If you’re overwhelmed by obligations, if a relaxed family dinner is a rarity, if you say ‘yes’Read more…
From Compassion to Action
Her commute home from work — that’s what prompted Cheryl Bokelmann’s 17 years of service in St. Peter’s PADS ministry. Every evening, as she walked from her downtown Chicago office to the Metra station, she noticed the homeless; so manyRead more…
Time & Talent & Spiritual Gift Surveys
Time and talent surveys and spiritual gift inventories are two common data-gathering tools in churches. Information about a volunteer’s skills, spiritual gifts, and preferences is always helpful. It allows us to direct our recruitment effort to those most likely toRead more…
Good Stuff: Helping Men Serve
What percentage of your volunteers are men? What types of volunteer opportunities do we offer for men? I asked myself these questions while reading “Men Adrift,”a thoughtful, and lengthy, article on how cultural and technology changes have affected men withRead more…
They ARE Volunteering
You know who volunteers in your church. But do you really know the volunteering behavior of all your people? “A new federal study shows that 1 in 4 Americans volunteered through an organization and two-thirds helped their neighbors last year.”Read more…
Lord, What are You Calling Me to Do?
A worksheet on calling Read more…
Sharing My Gifts
Sample “Sharing My Gifts” form from St. Peter Lutheran, Arlington Heights, IllinoisRead more…