Encouraging Millennials to volunteer is amixed experience for church leaders. For many church leaders, they arediscouraged when it comes to getting Millennials involved. For other churchleaders, they have had success connecting Millennials to the life of theirchurch.
Regardless of your experience, it’s vital for the longevity of your church toencourage Millennials to volunteer. Millennials are the largest living generation in theUnited States, which means you need to have a strategy (likeyesterday) to lead Millennials to volunteer.
To help you along your way, here are five ways you can encourage Millennials tovolunteer at your church.
#1.Lead with purpose
Millennials are more inclined to supportcauses; not specific organizations. Practically speaking, as you strive toencourage Millennials to volunteer, connect with their passion for working withspecific causes, which leads us to the next point.
#2.Share stories
Millennials tend to be pragmatic. They want tosee how your church is practically extending the love of Christ to your churchmembers, community, and around the world.
To illustrate God's work in and through yourchurch, you can do several things, such as: Encourage the members of yourchurch to share how God transformed their life, highlight stories fromdifferent ministries of your church, and invite missionaries or leaders orvolunteers of community services to share stories.
Sharing stories will illustrate God’s work inthe life of individuals and his work through the church in the community, whichwill help Millennials to see that their efforts are not in vain.
#3.Provide ongoing opportunities
InTheMillennial Impact Report, the researchers discovered thatMillennials prefer to volunteer on a continuum basis. In other words,Millennials desire to engage in many different ways instead of serving in oneongoing position.
To meet this need among Millennials, be opento providing opportunities to volunteer that don’t require additional training,short-term opportunities to serve, such as a few days or for a few weeks ayear, and digital opportunities, like helping your church to raise money online.
#4.Make volunteering wholistic
In a healthy trend, Millennials view theirlife holistically. In general,Millennials prefer for everything they do to connect with their vision andaspirations for life. To tap into this desire, you can do two things as achurch leader.
First, Millennials are more likely tovolunteer when they can use their skills. In The Millennial Impact Report from 2015, theyshared that “77% of millennials said they’re more likely to volunteer when theycan use their specific skills or expertise to benefit a cause.” So, toencourage Millennials to volunteer, find ways to connect volunteeropportunities to their skills.
Second, Millennials are interested in self-improvement.As a church leader, you can connect with this aspiration among Millennials bychallenging them to learn new skills and face unique challenges in newvolunteer opportunities.
#5.Hire Millennials
This year, Elevation Church was considered oneof the 100Best Workplaces for Millennials. At the time of this survey, ElevationChurch employed 165 Millennials, which makes up 80% of their entire staff.
After observing Elevation Church’s work andstaff, Brady Shearer of Pro Church Tools said, “If you want to reach Millennials, then you need to hireMillennials.”
To move your church in this direction, createvolunteer leadership opportunities for Millennials, and hire them as you areable. Having Millennials on your staff will not only help your church reachother Millennials, but it will also help you to encourage Millennials tovolunteer.
How doyou encourage Millennials in your church to volunteer?Share your experience in the comments below.
