In some cases when you're building a ministry from the ground up it's important to try to get men in your ministry for a few fundamental reasons. I'm not picking on women, mind you, but it is very important that we get good strong men involved. Why?
1)Superhero
Men need to be seen as heroes and set an example within the ministry of your children. Boys need someone to look up to. Girls need a guy that they can look up to and say, “I need a husband like that when I grow up.” Boys need a champion they can aspire after. Someone they can model their lives after. Men provide the image of "protection" and "provision" within the children's ministry as well as in the family. In most single parent families, the single parent is a mom. For that reason there needs to be men in the church that don't necessarily take on the "Father" figure, but honestly, besides the streets and schools you're probably the closest thing to a dad that kid will ever have.
2)Big Brother
Most of the kids have two parents and need a "Big Brother" Someone to guide them. Those of you with kids in the 5-8th grade age know that sometimes your children just won't listen to you, however they'll listen to someone else. How often do your kids listen to their older siblings like every word they say is golden? My older brother was the wisest person I knew. Sometimes that “older brother” can turn out to be that male volunteer in your ministry. If they not licensed as a Pastor or Counselor, then obviously they can't give advice and dictate direction, however it's possible for them to guide answers and motives in the right direction.
There's a number of reasons why men hate the church. More men than women are diagnosed with learning disabilities and what do we do? We give them an onion-skinned bible written in size 5 font, double columned and translated in poetry. What? No wonder men don't get into it.
Worship pastors make them sing "Love" songs to Jesus. I heard it best from David Murrow,
“If I were in a boat fishing with my buddy, and I said to him, ‘I’m desperate for you. I’m lost without you.’ He would throw me overboard and go home.”
Don’t forget that though God may be without gender….Jesus was a dude. Most men often associated God with the male gender. So to some of us God is subconsciously a dude. We don’t sing love songs to other dudes. Now, yes there is a time for that, but there are praise and worship songs out there that express that. Yes we as men love one another, but not in a singsong Sound of Music sense.
In Children's ministry in the early 90's and later 80's there was a transition of, "Jesus loves you, and you are the bride of Christ, and Jesus loves children, and you need to love children, and if you don't it's not so nice." And then the movie Terminator came out. Which do you think more men chose to do?
So what is the common denominator in these senses? LINGO! You have to be careful how you phrase what you do, especially to the men in the church that just sit back and don't say anything. Chances are they do that because they already feel like an outcast.
Sometimes this happens in our approach to getting men involved in Children’s Ministry, and I will be the first to admit that I had started with this issue. It was how I heard things in the church when I first started out at age 14. Fast forward four years later and when I was in college back in 2005 and took on an unpaid position as the Children’s Ministries Coordinator at a small church in Chisago Lakes, MN, I used this tactic to get volunteers.
I try to stay away from phrases like, "We are in desperate need of guys to help out!" or "Oh my kids would absolutely love having you in on Sundays!"
Guys don't want to be part of a sinking ship. When you throw in the word, "Desperate" it sends an immediate sub-conscious red flag. Now there will be those that will try to save a sinking ship and join in, but if they find out that by sinking ship, the leader meant that they need a man in the room amongst a bunch of women, then they get uncomfortable and leave. Or when the job is, “Fixed” and no longer in “Desperate” mode they think they are done and move on.
How can we change this? Simple phrase changes can make a big difference.
“Hey! I see that you are good with your hands. I need someone to take on a building project and help our kids through it. It’s a small craft, but I figured that you would be great for it. Can we talk about it over coffee?”
Simple. Set up an appointment to discuss it. Be honest, but don’t sound desperate. Take an activity that appeals to more women than men and turn it. So now, at your meeting, discuss your end result of what you want this to look like, have him help you get an approach to it, and then have him lead it. He might think that he’s doing it just once, and who knows? Maybe it is just once, but maybe you are also planting a seed that God wants to cultivate and sculpt.
Here’s another killer. Lovey dovey language. This is an immediate killer for most men.
"Oh my children would just LOVE you!"
“Oh, you are so sweet. Our Children’s Ministry would just adore you.”
Now it may be a true statement, but something about having a bunch of kids love on you may be cute, but for a lot of men it can make them uncomfortable. I like to switch out the word, "love" with "admire," "respect," or "look up to." That changes how a man reacts. We want to be admired! That's why we get jobs and fix our house and can take all the bags from walmart, roll them up our arms, and walk in the house with 100lbs of groceries. We like to be admired! Men CRAVE respect. If a man doesn't get respect, it starts to wear away at them. That's why if men don't feel like their respected at one place, they'll look to another. Respect can take a man a long way.
Look through the Bible. I can guarantee that if you read any story about God calling a man, then it starts out with God giving them respect.
"Abram, I will give you this land."
"Joshua, I will give you this city."
"Saul, You will make a mighty king"
"David, You will make a mighty king, and your line of descendants will be great"
"Solomon, Ask for whatever you want and I will give it"
Now to anyone else it might look like, "God's not giving them respect, he's giving them bribes!" Well in part....yes. We as men do respond to rewards. An end to justify the means. It’s a big part of our human nature. Notice wives, when you tell a man to fold the laundry he gives a groan. If you tell a man, “Fold the laundry and I’ll make you hot wings.” We’ll have that laundry folded so fast that the clothes will catch on fire and we’ll have to buy new ones! Okay, maybe I’m the only one that gets THAT excited over hot wings. However when you think about the men in the bible from a man's perspective, "Wow. God's really willing to give me this kind of power?" Which is a huge form of respect.
So that's my first recommendation. Respect and admiration is key. Love and caring is not so much. There will be some guys that respond to that, but for the rest of us? Not so much.
So let’s go through those example above and switch out some words and make it more man friendly.
"You’ve got some leadership skills! The kids would just take to you right away!"
“I enjoy your company. Honestly? I think you would be a great addition to my team. I think you have a hidden potential for working with kids.”
Did you know that the words, “Kids” and “Children” can have different effect too? The word “Children” sounds more feminine than, “Kids” why? And it’s a true fact.
The letters “Ch” are a soft “sh” and we associate the softer side of things to be more feminine. “Chartreuse.” “Chardonnay” so on. The letter, “K” has a hard consonant sound after it. This harder sound appeals more to men. “Kill” “tool-Kits”
Something new to ponder!
Ladies, please don't get angry. We as men are just built this way.
HOW DO WE COMBAT THIS MALE PERSONA?
Well the first problem with that question is the word “Combat” When you fight a man, he’ll most likely fight back. Work with a man and he’ll work with you.
Now this example is from building the ministry from the ground up. With not a lot of help, resources, or budget.
I’ve only been in my position as a Pastor for Celebration Church; Stevens Point, for about 3 years now. When I first started there was a split in the volunteers of the children’s ministry because I was the new guy, but I had a faithful few that still stuck around. They were all strong gifted women, but I wanted more men. This I knew would take a bit of time.
I was brand new to the Stevens Point area. So I couldn’t just go asking men to help out, or really anyone to help out, with not knowing anyone in the area. If I walked up to a guy and said, “Hey. You would work great with kids.” He would think I’m weird. Why? “You don’t know me…”
So the first year I spent attending different events as a participant and as a leader to get in the view of other men. Then after I friended one, he introduced me to a couple of other guys, and a circle of friends had started. Then I began to talk to other guys in the church on Sunday Mornings by just striking up idle conversation, and then next thing you know, I have a friend with most of the men at the church. This process took a while because at the time I lived 45 minutes away and gas was $4 so traveling a lot was difficult. That was the first year.
The second year I had just filled my staff with enough people to cover different positions, however it was mostly women. Not a problem for me, mind you because I love the older sister/mother/grandmother figures in the ministry, and we NEED women in our children’s ministries too. They are the nurturers and the caregivers for the kids. But I did get some men involved, but not involved on Sundays or Wednesdays, which worked out better up front.
After I got my guy friends I started thinking of different building projects. I knew I needed a storage room, and my children’s ministry space was really long. So I commissioned a buddy to help me build a wall about 4 feet from the front wall and we made it a stage. We built a window, a door, and mounted two flat-screen TV’s. The new space between was my storage room. That was a volunteer position.
I wanted to do a boys night at my apartment and a girls night at one of my female lead’s apartments where we could just hang out and be our genders. I asked one of my friends if he could tag along and help me grill and throw a football. I didn’t say, “Watch the boys” or “hang out with kids” because if they haven’t done so yet, why would they change instantly now? That night he grilled, we watched a movie, and we threw a football and he had a blast. He was a volunteer.
The children’s ministry was starting to get more attention from men in the church. As I was appealing to the masculine needs with more men others wanted to get involved. Fundraisers, carnivals, games. When you find a specific need for men, the men will usually find you. There was a dad by the name of, “Todd” in the church who was about 29-30ish that had a boy in the children’s ministry. Todd confronted me and asked if I needed help on my Wednesday nights and I said, “Yes.” I told him what positions I’m looking to fill. He agreed to take part in the 4-6 grade small group coach. Each Wednesday I would have one of the ladies take part in the storytelling and during my time offstage, instead of prepping or mosing around, I sat next to Todd and we talked about what was going to happen next, and then just some idle guy talk. This was me showing him respect and making him feel like a part of the team.
Then on Sundays more of the boys in the youth department were starting to get involved. I had boys on stage during worship helping out with actions and I allowed them to be somewhat goofballs. That made the boys in the audience laugh and get involved and now the boys in my ministry were doing actions and getting involved in the ministry.
After Todd was more involved I was talking to another guy by the name of Rick. He worked at the Foundry in Waupaca and worked 50-60 hours a week. He was exhausted. I never asked him about getting involved or even made mention of the children’s ministry. He knew who I was and what I did though, but not through me. We talked during men’s breakfast and just enjoyed being guys. Finally one day he left his job out of the blue. There was some bad blood between him and the boss and he finally said, “Enough!” and left. When he did we were talking about it and he said, “You know. If you would like some help in your room, I’d be happy to now that I have more time.”
So there’s another regular!
Now ladies, it’s usually considered “inapproparate” for you to spend this much time with a dude that's not your husband and is usually frowned upon, so you might ask, “How do I do this then?”
If you have even one guy in your children's ministry, you can turn him into the recruiter. If you don't have a guy in the children's ministry find a project that needs to be done. If you don't have one then make one. Have a paint job that needs touching up, or a small platform for your room to become a makeshift stage. Whatever it is, find something that a guy likes to do. See if he is willing to get some of his guy friends involved. If you get a chance to talk to a guy after church, just by changing your lingo to something more guy friendly you will start to see more results.
If a woman asked me to come in and work with kids at first I might have been a little weirded out. Even as a teenager the thought of babysitting doesn’t appeal to me. However if I’m asked to build a graphic for the children’s ministry I’m grabbing my laptop asking where I get started.
You start by appealing to the interests of men by showing respect, and then you get more results.
So here’s what I’m doing now that this ball is rolling.
Every other Tuesday I throw a man's night in my garage. I pull out the poker chips, play some Led Zepplin,and when the guys get there we talk about EVERYTHING. No holding back, just be dudes and talk, but (except for me telling you now) We keep it underground. No one talks about man-night in the church and the only way in is via invitation handwritten and passed along to a group-voted in member of the church. Why the exclusivity? One reason is I don't have a ton of room in my garage for 100 men, and 2, when men feel like they are part of something like this it builds their ego. And if we don't advertise it, then men don't get offended that they weren't invited. It's a simple concept. To make it more like we’re doing something greater I issue bi-weekly challenges. Last week’s was a random act of kindness in secret. The person who you are giving the RAK can not be aware of it. Mine was paying for the drink behind me at Starbucks then driving off before a “thank you” could be given. They don’t know who I am. Then as a result of these I rewarded the men with an extra 1000 in poker chips. (NOTE: The poker chips are not resemblance of money. We do not illegally gamble. They are just clay discs that are colored and worth x-amount of points.)
Men want to be a part of something bigger whether they realize it or not. So many men get caught up in the superhero movies because the hero usually starts out as a nobody, then after some radical transformation they become part of a bigger picture. That being said, how does it apply to Children's Ministry?
I use it as a tool to recruit male volunteers. I get them involved in my circle of friends (After all, a team of children's ministers need to be able to co-exist in a room) and then after they've been working with me a while I throw out, "Hey, I could really use a tough guy like you to be a role model in my ministry." or "The way you relay your stories is amazing. My 5th grade boys would admire a guy like you." and it piques their interest.
I’ll share something with you. One of the guys in our guy’s night came up to me and said, “It was amazing to finally hang out with a group of guys that weren’t already drunk by the time I got there. I got more out of this experience than I ever have at a bar.”
Now, he’s not involved in the kids ministry mind you, but know if I have a project that needed some help, he would be one of the first to jump up and help out.
I just want to disclaim that I in no way am undervaluing the importance of women in the children’s ministry. I think the role of a woman in ministry is a valid and needed position. Children need strong Godly women to follow as well. I just know that in America a lot of people I talk with have had problems recruiting men into a new ministry or a current ministry. Smaller churches also struggle with this a lot. So this is merely a guide for people to start learning how to relate to men.
Have a GREAT day.
-Eric Riskus
