A number of JRF affiliates do not have rabbis and thus have to face the challenge of leading services on a regular basis.

One thing I reflect on in connection with my former congregation, Congregation T'chiyah in Detroit, Michigan, is that they still use the service structure three of us on the religious services committee set up about 20 years ago. Its longevity suggests that it can be a useful structure for other affiliates in ensuring service leadership, but we also found it provided many more benefits.

We were at a very bad pass at the time. Services were led by volunteers, the service leaders usually being members of the same family. Only a few families volunteered and those families got progressively annoyed at being the only ones to shoulder the burden. It looked as if we would soon be unable to have services, and this young congregation would die.

What we came up with was the following plan.

1. The obligations of membership were the payment of dues and leading 2 services a year.
2. The obligations were individual (thus greatly enlarging our pool, pushing all members to get educated on this matter, and ensuring that a family obligation would not fall on just one person and let other members evade it.
3. Anyone over bar/bat mitzvah age was obligated to lead services.
4. We paired people up so that a more experienced service leader would teach a novice.
5. We also constructed a top secret list of members based on what we estimated their level of experience was.
6. We paired people up who were not in the same family so that members would get to know one another and help us be a stronger community.
7. We designated one RSC member to be responsible for ensuring services would function for a specific month, thus sharing the responsibility.

We also thought that over time we would get a more involved and engaged membership.

In fact, this happened. I recall one very secular family who wanted to join because their son wanted to be Jewish and wanted to go to the Sunday school. When told they had to lead services, they tried to find an escape clause. Finding there was none, they began to lead services and gradually moved into congregational leadership.