volunteer

Volunteer. I use this word a lot but more and more am becoming unsure if I like the definition of this word, or what images it communicates within the community where I work.

There are several things that have been stirring all these thoughts within my brain...enough that I'm not really sure if this will even be a post that makes sense or if it is just a personal way to try and organize the shuffle of thoughts that I can't seem to articulate. First there was the Mennonite youth retreat and some awkward encounters about being a volunteer...there have been some more personal experiences of my own, here in Nueva Suyapa, and the experiences of other MCCers in Honduras...and I've recently been doing a lot of reading about the good/bad/ugly of volunteerism, thanks to some fellow SALTers in other parts of the world.

So I guess the first thing is thinking about why I'm a volunteer and what that means to me.
Then looking at reasons why I try and detach myself from preconceptions of "volunteers" and what that communicates to those in my community
And in the end, why ultimately I feel criticized by all these outside voices for being a volunteer...and from my experience why I think its really not the way they think it is...or something like that.

1) My definition of being a volunteer is easily summed up by "I work and I don't get paid." But, most days, that is not sufficient. There are many layers to this definition...I am an un-paid worker in an organization, but I have also made that decision out of a desire to work with others in a way of serving...this is not just serving the community (though on good days, I hope to do that) but also about exploring the tangible ways I live a life of serving Jesus, the one who should be the foundation and inspiration for all of this.