MK Thomason, the author of this post, serves as a member of our Gathering Production Team. For more information about serving opportunities, visit our Serve page.
A Crazy Start
I started volunteering at the Gathering around three years ago simply because I didn’t know anybody in our church family. I tried out a couple different teams before I found my fit–and I’ve been with production ever since. I was involved in service planning at my church before I moved to Columbia, and in other organizations, so I think that I was always going to end up doing production. My first experience on the production team was, quite honestly, terrifying. I got a crash course in ProPresenter (that’s the program that puts the song lyrics and sermon slides on the screen), and then the person training me said “I have to go use the restroom…can you do the first song?”
A Community of its Own
Ever since, then it’s been one of the things I look forward to the most. I absolutely love Sundays when I get to volunteer. I typically run Pro in the 9:00am & 11:15am Gatherings, and it’s one of the only things I will cheerfully get up early to do. I get to sit through soundcheck with the band, so I can learn songs really well (which is actually an asset when you’re the one controlling the words on the screen).
I also get to know the people back in the booth when we work together. There’s usually a solid three or four of us working together on Sunday mornings, and we’ve become really close friends. That’s actually probably the best part of the production team–getting to know everyone.
It’s really cool to be around our pastors and leadership as they prepare because you can really see the heart and the intent behind the sermons and everything we do at our Gatherings. The intentionality and thought that goes into planning our Gatherings is something I really appreciated from the outside, and now get to appreciate from the inside.
Worshiping Through Serving
Helping with production has become such an integral part of my Sunday experience that I sometimes feel strange if I’m not doing it. It may seem weird, but I feel like I’m worshiping at my fullest when I’m back in the booth pressing a little button so everyone can see the lyrics.
If you’re looking for a way to serve and you’d be up for making some new friends, I’d definitely consider the production team. It’s something very cool to be a part of, whether it’s sound or lights or ProPresenter–the production team is just a fantastic thing to be a part of.
We're always looking for people to serve with our Production Team on Sundays. If you're interested in joining the team, you can sign up below.
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