Appreciation Week 

Refreshments 

Invite the women to bring their best cookie or snack recipes to be gift bagged and shared with volunteers as an appreciation gift.  

Decoration 

This event will celebrate the people who help give our ministry physical hands and feet. Make it festive with a decorated archway of balloons and streamers to welcome volunteers to the parking lot.  

Drive Through Volunteer Parade 

Invite the volunteers to drive through the corps parking lot between certain times so you can cheer them for their working hands that help your community. 

Preparation 

• Send out invitations to all the volunteers who have helped with everything the corps does to impact the community.  
• Decide what type of memento you’d like to give to the volunteers. 
• Put together posters and signs that express your gratitude for the hard work of community volunteers who contribute to the corps ministry. 
• Consider a backup plan in the case of inclement weather. This can be an indoor event. Have volunteers walk down a hall of signs and posters thanking them and leading them to the meeting hall. 

Day of The Event 

• Mark a path with an arch of balloons, banners, and chairs, so that the volunteers arriving have a clear idea of where to go. 
• Play music and hang posters around the parking lot sharing your messages of thanks.  
• Establish an outdoor lounge/picnic area for those volunteers who want to park and share in fellowship. Refreshments and gifts could be available in this area.  

Let Us Not Grow Weary 

As a wife, mother, daughter, promise–keeper, teacher, Salvation Army Officer, my life’s motto has often become a weary “it’s always something.” There is always something vying for my attention, and I often grow weary as I feel that I can never reach the mark set either by myself or someone else. There are times when I feel like the enemy has me backed against a wall of weariness with no escape in sight. It is then that I am reminded of Galatians 6:9 (NIV): “Let us not grow weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” God does not just give us a command; He always backs it up with His grace. Paul reminds us that we will reap what we sow. We have to step back and ask ourselves, where is my energy being spent and is it for God’s glory? 

As women, it is not hard for us to fill a page of things that should get done. However, let us measure these activities against God’s standard and make sure that what we are doing is indeed good. Paul told the Philippians, “Finally, my brothers and sisters, always think about what is true. Think about what is noble, right and pure. Think about what is lovely and worthy of respect. If anything is excellent or worthy of praise, think about those kinds of things” (Phil. 4:8). 

As the character Willy Wonka would say, “We have to strike that, reverse it!” If we think about our deeds and actions in this light, the irony is that our “joy buckets” will fill and we will not dwell so heavily on our never ending ‘to-do’ list. It is all about perspective.  

What do you choose to focus on? This perspective shift epitomizes what it means to be like Jesus. He never hesitated to stand in the gap and offer His expertise in any and all situations. Even when the religious leaders and government officials pressed in against Him and tried to stop His ministry, Jesus knew the path God had set Him on. Jesus knew the face of weariness, too. But because He did not stay weary in bringing glory to His Father, Jesus now sits at God’s right hand as our High Priest offering the key to eternal unity with God.  

Volunteer Week is our opportunity, not just as an organization but as Christ–filled people, to take time to celebrate those who step up and help in so many ways. Those who see a gap and choose to stand in it without any real benefit for themselves. Ecclesiastes3:12,13 (NIV) says, “I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God.” Doing good should result in edifying those who choose to live that way. In a world quick with condemnation and blame–seeking, we need to be a respite as the body of believers for weary souls to slow down and see how they were Jesus’ hands and feet to others. Slow down and take a glimpse of what we have to look forward to in Heaven.  

Do not stand for the whispered reminders by the enemy of how short we fall. Remember that God has commissioned us for this path we walk. Do not grow weary. Keep sowing love and goodness and your reward will be eternal.