Laughing my face off right now, because God has a sense of humor!!!
I hadn't even asked Him for this yet...but I have been a little worried about overseeing the nursery AND all the other kids' programs, too.
Lo and behold, I was sitting at my desk today, and this lady comes in and introduces herself. She says, "I'm really interested in helping coordinate the nursery." Because of her work schedule, she can't be at church every Wednesday night...so she can't commit to teaching a class, but she really wants to serve in the church in some way. And she thought that putting together nursery worker schedules, being another "go-to" person, volunteering herself a couple Sundays a month, etc., would be a great way for her to serve!! Of course this needs to go through our SP first, but wow! I haven't even started really recruiting workers yet, and they're starting to come up to me. I've only been THE children's pastor for three days now, too (the other guy's send-off was Sunday)!
In the words of Little Orphan Annie, "I think I'm gonna like it here..."
Wonderful! You have (hopefully) just come upon a gold mine. If your pastor approves her for this position, just a word to the wise...
Appreciate the daylights out of this woman. Do extras for her beyond what you do your other workers. This position is generally harder to fill than all the others. Unless you have somebody come into the church whose "thing" is the babies, and they love it more than anything else...most people do not like to be out of "big church".
So, if this is the one...do all you can for this woman. If I were children's pastor in this situation I'd honestly probably give a little "love gift" once a month or quarter such as a little bag of things from bath and body works, or a small gift certificate to Starbucks. Just little things every few months to show her you appreciate her. Then when she is in a group setting such as a training or any children's meeting, make sure to give her a word in front of the other people such as (not sure of her name, but...to illustrate...) "Wow, Jan sure does a great job of keeping the nursery organized and as children's pastor I just can't thank her enough!" At the end of the year, I'd definitely do something such as you and your husband take her out to dinner.
Hopefully you have something in the children's ministries budget where you can do a few things like this. They are not "huge" but they do make a huge difference.
You probably already know all this, but I thought I'd say it anyway. The thing is, you DON'T want to lose your nursery coordinator. This takes an incredible amount of work off of your plate. So do all you can to keep her.
YAY!!! The lady who volunteered to work as my nursery coordinator is a member of the church in good standing, and has the full blessing of my senior pastors to work in that ministry .
Now I'm involved in a giant game of phone tag with her to set up a meeting. I'm very happy...because honestly, I am getting a little bit overwhelmed by all of the departments I'm in charge of. I know I can do it - it's just a matter of getting settled in and figuring out a rhythm. Same as any job. But it is very encouraging to have someone come up and volunteer to help with a major chunk of one of those departments!!
