The SIAFU Guidebook

142 The SIAFU Network Guidebook

Developing Effective Service Project Groups Helping Your Chapter Organize around Burden-Driven Service Projects Rev. Dr. Don L. Davis

This paper is an adaptation of an article written for an inner-city church plant which organized its witness around burden-centered cell groups. I have adapted its language from those of cell groups to those of service project teams. By organizing your service projects around the shared burdens and visions of your members, you will be able to accomplish many exciting, practical projects which meet the real needs of others in your community. Each of these initiatives, whether they focus on providing service to others or on outreach to unsaved friends and neigh- bors, can be organized around particular teams of Chapter members who strive to represent the Chapter in their works of service. SIAFU Chapters can use service project groups to help their members identify, commit, and organize around specific problems they want to address or particular burdens they possess. As you plan out your service projects for your Chapter, you should consult this article to find out specifically how you can encourage your members to be sensitive to their own burdens for others, and how to turn those burdens into practical service projects that meet real needs where you live. As you organize your Chapter service projects, you may elect to host more than a single project at any given time. Based on the money, interest, and involvement of your members, you may plan several projects to run alongside each other simultaneously. Also, you might choose to divide different members into groups to work on separate projects at different times. This idea of planning multiple service pro- jects allows you to tap into the different interests your members may have. You can easily encourage your members to serve based on their burdens and opportunities and give those members the chance to work together based on their shared interest.