Great Expectations

GREAT EXPECTATIONS
Avoid the misconceptions that can discourage those who serve.
by Derek Perkins and Rodolpho Carrasco
September, 1999 in Discipleship Journal
[Derek Perkins and Rodolpho Carrasco co-direct Harambee Christian Family Center in Pasadena, Calif. Check out more articles by Rodolpho Carrasco here.)

Though the call to community involvement is clear, its clarity does not make fulfilling the call easy. Some ministries -- those dealing with the urgent and complex needs of fatherless youths, pregnant teens, recovery addicts, and the homeless, for example - are fraught with difficulty given the chaotic lives of the people they seek to serve. Even outside these critical needs, the next-door neighbor in the suburb can be a handful once you get to know him or her. Whatever the apparent difficulty of the mission, volunteers can be unaware of potential pitfalls that set them up for discouragement.

Expectations have the power to make or break a volunteer's experience in community ministry. That is our conclusion after a combined 29 years of ministry, that relies heavily on volunteer. At Harambee Christian Family Center we are trying to raise Christian leaders from this community. To accomplish this, we spend almost as much time with volunteers as we do with the people we serve. Volunteers of all types - community residents and commuters, one-day or one-week work groups, people from all ethnic groups and economic backgrounds - are our coworkers who will help us accomplish our mission. They help make Harambee what it is.

We are glad to share these reflections on expectations because it is in our self-interest to do so! The vignettes and suggestions that follow, we pray, will help you adopt reasonable expectations as you serve the people in your community.

FAITHFUL NOT FRUSTRATED
Twice a week, Beth Burns volunteers in our neighborhood outreach program in Pasadena, Calif. For four years she has come, pulled The Phonics Game down from a high shelf, and taught small groups of children to read. A retired public school teacher, Mrs. Burns is a hero to us. Two years ago we selected her as our volunteer of the year.

But some days have gone against Mrs. Burns' expectations. We have seen her face personal rejection as the children who most need help with reading refuse to join her class - calling it "dumb" or saying they don't like her.

Some days contain other frustrations. Once she was locked out of the room where The Phonics Game was kept, and no one on campus at the time had a key. On days when our center, a polling site, hosts an election, Mrs. Burns is forced to reach in a cramped, noisy room - not the most conducive environment to learning.

Many volunteers turn frustrations like these into a one-way ticket out of the ghetto or barrio. But Mrs. Burns has remained. She sees clearly the big picture - the difficult circumstances illiterate children face - and she does not expect overnight miracles. Her expectations are tempered by her desire to do something about the great needs around her. She has chosen to be faithful rather than frustrated.

WHAT DO THEY EXPECT?
Recently, we turned the tables on ourselves and became the volunteers. A group of 12 adults and 21 young people journeyed from Harambee to Mississippi for a spring-break service trip. We hoped to serve a little and learn a lot about God's work in that southern state.

We expected to do light work in the mornings and have afternoons and evenings free for Bible study and history lessons, touring the countryside, and as much fun as we could squeeze in. Our hosts, however, expected us to focus almost exclusively on a string of work projects that would have taken our entire group more than a week to finish.

From the beginning there was tension.

One of the hosts, himself a long-term volunteer, felt we were not working hard enough. Our group grew increasingly annoyed about the intensity of the work. Then we clashed over the living arrangement. Our group expected a camp-style setting where some messiness was the order. But we found ourselves in a large building with residents who wanted the place kept thoroughly neat at all times.

It seemed impossible to reconcile their expectations of devoted work group keeping a spotless home with our group's expectations of service, learing and fun in a laissez faire environment. But with a little effort, both sides modified their expectations.

Our group, the young people in particular, gave up their dream of an away-from-home teen paradise and began cleaning up. We also accepted that the host organization needed more from us than we first expected, and that we would need to be more flexible about our touring and teaching agenda.

Our hosts mellowed out once they understood our group's initial expectations. One of them even made the 32-hour drive back to Los Angeles with us.

Few of us function without expectations, as we learned on this trip. But with the right spirit and honest communication, most of us can work through the tangle of conflicting expectations to accomplish the higher objective of loving and serving.

THE DREAM TEAM
In military conflicts of the past century, occupying troops and the cavalry worked together. The occupying troops hunkered down in hostile territory. The cavalry brought in reinforcements, supplies, news, and fresh energy. The outside resources of the cavalry and the front-line wisdom, experience and commitment of the occupying troops were often the recipe for victory.

Volunteers function as cavalry to the long-term ministry staff. This means, in part, that volunteers function best when they are willing to serve in a way that does not create more work for the local people.

We both fondly remember a work group from the Wesley Foundation chapters at Texas Tech and Louisiana Tech. This group was truly self-sufficient. Group members understood the projects we needed them to complete, and every day they accomplished their tasks with little or no intervention on our parts. They didn't have an overly ambitious group schedule but flexed around ours so that we could talk with them at our convenience.

Most importantly, they made the quality of their work - painting fences, landscaping, interior cleaning, repairing walls - match the work they would do at home. As a result, we felt empowered by them and were also able to get much needed rest during their stay. We were refreshed when they left, not in need of recovery.

So far, we've seen the positive way that adjusted expectations help volunteers cope with the demands of serving. Unrealistic expectations are not the only snare on the path of community ministry. Subtle misconceptions also trap many Christians getting involved in loving their communities. Let's look at a few.

GIVE AND TAKE
The first dangerous misconception is this: I'm going to help these people. Some call it a Messiah complex; others, patronizing. Any approach that sees only a need in others and fails to recognize our own neediness is flawed.

Yes, we are the light of the world, as Jesus says. But some volunteers seem to think they only they are the light of the world and that they are not in need of receiving light. It's a subtle snare, but at Harambee we observe it all the time.

Often the snare materializes in friction-causing expectations. "Why don't these people get to work on time, quit having babies, do their homework?" we hear. Such comments project a sense of superiority to many fallen people, who are more likely to avoid the speaker rather than heed that person's call to excellence. The speaker will soon be preaching without an audience, having alienated the very wounded souls he or she intended to serve.

Our own approach involves allowing ourselves to be served just as we serve others. It's healthy for everyone, even the poorest of the poor, to give, and it's healthy for everyone to receive. For that reason, we live in the community we serve so that we have shared needs and can build trust with people who may not initially trust us.

When we need practical help, we try to ask adults in the community. Rudy recently asked one mother for a ride to the airport. She readily agreed and gushed the whole way, "You all have done so much for me; I'll do whatever you need." Taking her at her word, Rudy asked her for a few dollars for the trip, because he realized he didn't have any cash on him!

By all means look for ways to give to your community. But don't forget to let the people in your community give back to you as well. Such an attitude communicates mutuality rather than superiority.

NO LONE RANGERS
Volunteers also run into trouble when they enter into community service with this misconception: I'm the only one doing anything to help.

We sat in a meeting one day as a new guy in town berated churches as being lukewarm and unwilling to serve the community. He then accused the local government of the same. In the room with us were pastors of churches who had toiled for decades to reach the community and Christians who went into government service specifically to use our taxes to serve the community.

To say this guy blew it is to understate the gravity of his disrespect. In our community, as in many others, numerous people are hard at work. To walk in and act as if no one has ever done anything to help is to risk alienating the people who could be your greatest champions. With the first misconception, you may alienate the people you want to serve. With this one, you may alienate your closest allies.

THE GIFT GLITCH
Another snare lurks behind the third misconception: My gifts will be utilized to the fullest. We share the desire of our volunteers to use our gifts in service to others. It's a joy when our God-given gifts match a human need and bring about transformation.

But there will be times when your gifts will not be used. That's the nature of community involvement and especially the nature of ministries that reach the neediest of the needy. You may be a musician, expecting to use your music in your ministry. But at the agency where you volunteer, they may need you to push a broom or serve. If you are a computer whiz like one of our current volunteers, you may spend an entire year doing seemingly mundane jobs before you ever get your hands on a computer.

REDEFINING SUCCESS
Expectations arise, in part at least, from our desire to succeed. The problem is with our definition of success.

Our call is not to expect success or fixes. Our call is to the faithfulness described in Matthew 25: "I was hungry...thirsty...a stranger...naked...sick...in prison." The text doesn't say, "I was hungry and you gave me a fish, taught me to fish, helped me buy the pond, and helped me rezone the pond." It says, "I was hungry and you gave me something to eat." Simple obedience. Direct love. Relationship that flows from meeting needs. Christ takes it all personally -- every blanket, every cup of soup, every letter written, every visit: "Whatever you did for one of the least of these...you did for me." Our sole expectation as we reach out in love to people around us should be that, as we are obedient to Christ's mandates to serve, He will be faithful to those who seek Him.

The copyright for these materials are owned by Rudy Carrasco.  These materials were used with permission by TechMission.