How to Build a Strong Volunteer Team for Your Church

In Genesis, God saw Adam and said, “It is not good for man to be alone.” He created Eve not just for companionship, but to help Adam fulfill the calling placed on his life. Ministry is no different. God never intended for us to carry out His work alone.

If you’ve ever felt the weight of doing ministry solo, you’re not alone. Many leaders have asked, “Where do I even start with building a volunteer team?” Let’s walk through a few foundational steps to help you build a strong, spiritually-grounded, and mission-driven volunteer team.

1. Your Vision Is the Volunteer Magnet

You have to have a clear vision for the ministry team. If you are trying to lead someone somewhere, but you yourself have no idea where you are going, how are you going to expect to lead others there? Ask yourself, what is the goal, the purpose, the vision of this ministry? Once you have that nailed down, you will be able to communicate that to others that you are inviting to your team. 

2. Invite with Intention

Recruiting is more than filling slots; it’s inviting people into a mission. 

When your ministry’s vision is clear, it becomes a filter for who you’re looking for. Ask yourself: Who would thrive here? What passions align with this ministry? When you talk about recruiting, be specific: Don’t just say “we need help”—say, “we need people who love students, who want to greet guests, who care about creating safe spaces, who want to teach kids about Jesus.”

Use themes, visuals, and photo ops to create energy around serving. A few things that could help:

• Celebrate new volunteers publicly.
• Decorate your space to reflect the theme.
• Make sign-ups easy with QR codes, clipboards, or digital forms.
• Involve your current leaders in the setup and promotion.

At Life.Church, one strategy we’ve used is called Get in the Game. It’s one of the most effective strategies we’ve found for recruiting new volunteers. This tool can transform what would normally be a regular weekend service into one of your most successful volunteer recruitment efforts of the year. All of the resources to implement Get in the Game are available for free on Open Network.

3. Help Them Take their Next Best Step

Once you’ve recruited them, make sure that you have an effective onboarding strategy! Onboarding is important as you walk your new volunteers through your ministry’s values and mission. 

At Life.Church, our process begins with an initial face to face conversation. During this conversation, we:

1. Get to know their story.
2. Get to know their passion.
3. Build a relationship with them.
4. See if they’re a right fit for the ministry.
   

If they are a right fit, we send them over to a ministry-specific orientation. If they are not a right fit, we work with them to help them find their next step. Remember: the goal is to build a strong volunteer team, but also to help lead your attenders to their best next step. If you need more onboarding resources, check out the resources that are available on Open Network. 

4. Equip and Empower

Once you bring your volunteers onto the team, the journey isn’t over! It’s time to make sure they are equipped to lead, and empowered to step into what God is calling them to do. Have a plan for training them during their ministry-specific orientation. Your new volunteer shouldn’t have any questions about their role, what is required of them, what time they need to be there, etc. It’s up to you to make sure your volunteer is trained on the basics. 

One way to consistently do this is by creating space to have weekly huddles with your volunteer team. This is a great opportunity to cast vision, be vulnerable, get to know your team, or lead through a specific training. 

Once they are trained on the basics, that then creates room for you to help empower them on how they can uniquely impact the ministry based on what gifts God has given them. This could be empowering them to lead their peers, lead a huddle, or run with a ministry-specific initiative that the Lord has put on their heart. Check out this episode from the Craig Groeschel Leadership Podcast to learn more about empowering your team. 

5. Make Every Volunteer Feel Seen

One of the most important things you need to do with your volunteers is have a system of care where you are strategically checking up on them to make sure they’re doing well. 

Side note: this isn’t to just make sure they are OK so they can serve next week; this is to build a relationship with them as they’re continuing to take steps to become more like Jesus. A system of care could look something like this: 

• Create a list of your volunteers and group them up evenly into “Span of Care” groups.
• Commit to reaching out to the volunteers that are in that group to do a “care check” on them. This is as simple as sending a text, calling them on the phone, or sending an email.
• In this communication, ask about their wellbeing and how you can pray for them and their families, and see how you can support them. 
• The next week, reach out to the next “Span of Care” group and do the same thing.
• Integrate this rotation into your weekly rhythms, and continue caring for your team.

When your volunteer team knows deep down that you truly care about their wellbeing, that connection strengthens the entire team. Who knows what God can do when you and your team become a family that cares about each other and serves the Lord together. 

If you do these five things, you will have a strong volunteer team that is ready to rob the gates of hell, and repopulate Heaven. 

Looking for more? Find more volunteer training at Life.Church Open Network.