Building a volunteer church security team is about much more than finding people who own firearms or are willing to help protect the congregation. The people you choose matter. A volunteer may have a Texas License to Carry, military experience, law enforcement experience, or years of firearms training and still be the wrong person to serve on your church security team.
Why?
Because church security requires more than tactical skill. Security volunteers may have to deal with angry visitors, custody disputes in the middle of a children’s service, medical emergencies, or emotionally charged disagreements between members. In all of those moments, the ability to remain calm and make wise decisions on behalf of the church matters more than the ability to use a firearm. All of this illustrates that Texas church leaders need a real and repeatable process for selecting volunteers.
Background checks matter. Training matters. Experience matters.
But character, temperament, emotional control, and judgment matter too.
Choosing the wrong person can create more risk for the church than having no security volunteer in that position at all.
Across Texas, churches of every size are creating volunteer security teams to improve safety and protect their congregations.
Whether you attend a small church in rural East Texas or are part of a large congregation in Dallas-Fort Worth, church leaders need to be prepared for all kinds of disruptions to their normal operations. Protecting people is a great start, but a church safety team should have so many more responsibilities than just neutralizing threats. One of the biggest risks to the church’s reputation may not be the stranger walking through the front door. It may be a volunteer who does not have the right temperament or judgment required to be a productive member of the church’s safety team.
A volunteer who has a reputation for anger, confrontation, poor judgment, or an inability to control emotions can quickly become more of a problem than a help. This is why the most important thing that church leaders can do in creating an environment of safety is to develop a standard and repeatable process for vetting volunteers for the church security team. It is not about one person’s opinion of another, it is about slotting the correct people into positions of trust without risking the congregation’s safety and the church’s reputation. Texas law gives churches flexibility when creating volunteer security programs. That flexibility does not remove the church's responsibility to use good judgment when selecting the people who will serve.
Temperament matters because security volunteers often have to make good decisions in stressful situations where emotions are already running high. The wrong personality can turn a manageable problem into a dangerous one.
A volunteer who is quick to anger, eager to confront people, or unable to accept direction may react too aggressively when patience would have solved the problem. On the other hand, someone with good judgment and emotional control can recognize when to step in, when to slow things down, and when to let law enforcement handle the situation.
That kind of restraint matters because most church security incidents never require a firearm. The best team members are not looking for a confrontation. They are focused on keeping people safe and preventing a tense situation from becoming something worse.
For a church safety team volunteer, character and self-control are not secondary qualifications. They are part of the job.
Most Texas churches understand the importance of background checks. A background check may reveal criminal history, prior arrests, or other warning signs. It should be an important part of the church's process for evaluating volunteer security personnel. But a clean background check does not automatically make someone a good fit.
Texas church leaders need to spend the time required to vet members of their volunteer church security team. You need to develop a repeatable process that is standardized and used to assess a person’s reputation. More than just asking people’s opinions about someone else, there needs to be a standard form that ministry leaders, staff members, and volunteers can use to objectively evaluate someone’s temperament.
Here are some examples of questions to ask:
Additionally, social media can provide an insight into someone’s personality. Part of the process should include assessing whether someone is known for hostile arguments, aggressive behavior or poor judgment in online forums.
One of the biggest mistakes churches can make is focusing on firearms training while ignoring the rest of security training. Even though your security team members may carry a Texas license to carry a firearm, this does not automatically qualify them to serve as a volunteer church safety team member. Strong volunteer security programs require ongoing education and training.
That training may include:
This is where our partnerships with various organizations come in handy. At Insurance for Texans, we partner with organizations that offer church safety team training.
Former law enforcement officers and military veterans can bring valuable experience to a church safety team. But churches are not police departments. Volunteer security members do not have the same authority or responsibilities as law enforcement officers. Their purpose is not to enforce the law, it is to protect the congregation. That difference matters.
Texas law provides certain protections to churches and qualifying volunteer security teams through laws like SB 694, but churches may still face liability if a volunteer acts recklessly or operates outside the church's established procedures. This is why written policies, documented training, clear incident procedures, and proper supervision are an important part of your overall church safety plan.
Texas church leaders should know exactly who serves on the security team, what training they have completed, and what authority the church has given them. You also need to make sure that your church’s insurance agency is aware of your safety team, training and whether or not volunteers carry weapons as part of their duties.
Selecting the right people is only the beginning. Church leaders also need to create clear expectations for how the security team operates.
Every volunteer should understand their role, who they report to, when they have authority to act, and when they need to step back and involve law enforcement. The church should document training, review team performance, and address problems when a volunteer no longer meets the standards required for the position.
A strong security ministry is not something you build once and forget about. It needs regular oversight from the church’s leaders. The goal is to create a team that is dependable, disciplined, and accountable so that the church knows exactly who is protecting the congregation and how they are expected to respond when something goes wrong.
Building a church safety team starts with choosing the right people. Background checks are important, but they are only one part of the process. Church leaders also need a consistent way to evaluate temperament, judgment, and how each volunteer handles conflict before giving them responsibility for protecting the congregation.
That process should not be informal. It should be documented, repeatable, and supported by clear standards that church leaders can apply to every volunteer.
Insurance matters too. Depending on the policy, your church’s general liability insurance may not fully cover every activity of an armed security team.
At Insurance For Texans, our True Texas Church Insurance program helps churches build stronger security ministries from the ground up. We help leaders evaluate how volunteers are selected, screened and trained. Additionally, we work with you to make sure your Texas church is properly protected from the liability associated with armed volunteers.
Click the button below to schedule a review of your current policy or church safety plan with one of our church insurance specialists.