Is Ministry Where We Go to Lose Our Sense of True Calling?
I nearly lost my pastoral call somewhere between a rapidly growing congregation and the second-guessing of some difficult church members. How did I let it happen? How can we “self arrest” before we slip off the icy slope of administrivia into the tyranny of the urgent? A real analogy from my life helps me to describe the many stories we hear about in the ministry.
I joined the team because of kids like Bobbie
from the local church camp. When his eyes caught a glimpse of the 500-foot
waterfalls, his first words were, “Cool climbing wall!” Up, up, up, 50, 100,
250 feet the 12 year-old ascended. The rotten granite handhold tore loose.
Down, down, down he fell. He landed on ‘Blood Rock’ barely alive. As our team
rolled, we were met by his heart-shattered mom. “Please, please, help my little
boy.” When I joined the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Search and Rescue Team,
we were trained to do just that-Search and Rescue. We became medics, graduates
of the academy, took classes from the Border Patrol on tracking lost souls, and
rappelled out of hovering helos into remote canyons. We loved what we
did. Then it happened. I lost my calling, passion and zeal. Kids like Bobbie
moved to the background, partly from “my” own success. I became the Commander
of the team. I did not fly anymore. I sat at the command post mentally flying
over wilderness maps where my feet once explored. I did not medically assess
patients. Now I triaged jurisdictional conflicts between Fire Department and
Sheriff’s Rescue teams. I went to policy meetings, and risk-management
seminars. Somewhere along the line, I lost my calling-to Search and Rescue.
Someone has to do all the administrivia, yet is that the Senior
Rescuer/Minister’s role?
How Does It Happen? Johnny Cash’s last video Hurt will break your heart. He simply asks, “What have I become, my sweetest friend… and you could have it all, my empire of dirt”. I ask the same question: “What have I become? I nearly lost my calling because I was infected with:
The Please Disease: Ever heard this phrase, “At our LAST Church Pastor Bob did it THIS way?” Everyone has an agenda for ministers.
Margie came from a Presbyterian Church that had not grown in years. Her last pastor, functioning as a hospice/chaplain minister to a dying church always visited her in the hospital.
Mark came from a Church of God, where the elders were stuck in the 50’s, the 1950’s as a policy and policing board checking up on the Pastor, aka a parolee needing an “ankle bracelet.”
Tom on the other hand came from a Software Company. When he looked at the Senior Pastor, he expected clear vision statements, strategies and skillful management. Of course, they teach MBA courses in Bible College, don’t they?
Bob came from a Calvary Chapel, he expected his Pastor to spend no less than 20 hours a week in lesson preps for the Sunday and mid week soul feed. “Can’t steal well-fed sheep Pastor. That will close the back door.” Bob is troubled that his Pastor is spending too much time at the hospital with Margie, updating Mark as to where he is while reading yet another book from Tom on Church management.
I also nearly lost my calling because I had self-inflicted wounds called:
A.D.D. Success Syndrome: Our family
arrived at Seaside Christian Church to join in giving CPR to a dying
congregation in 1990. Thirty-four wonderful but tired people grew into a
congregation of nearly 400. How can we keep our focus when we suffer an
attention deficit disorder about spiritual things? We tackled marketing the old
property, buying 10 new acres, coming up with innovative designs for the new
building, applying for conditional use permits, seeking consent for ingress and
egress, meeting with the Department of Environmental Quality for sewage, the
State Fire Marshall for sprinklers, the church loan company for a draw,
marshalling crews to help build every Saturday for the next year, rain or rain
(we live in Oregon) and handling complaints on Sunday like, “Pastor your sermon
wasn’t like it used to be.” Ya’ think? Then hiring a company to lead us on a
campaign to reduce our debt so that we could hire an architect to design our
next building, so we could pull another conditional use permit, to start yet
another building project! And why not throw in pursuing a doctorate at the same
time with three kids in sports? I would read continually from Maxwell on
Leadership, Len Sweet on the Emerging Culture, Lucado on Jesus, and
occasionally even found time to work on sermons. Thank God for Rick Warren’s
completed sermons during “40 Days of Purpose for my well was running dry. The
church grew, my soul 
shrank. I had become the spiritual equivalent
of a Soccer Mom-A Senior Pastor.
Can we self-arrest before we have a cardiac arrest or “go postal” with the congregation? In the winter, high among the icy peaks, our rescue team had to know how to “self arrest” if we fell on the frozen slopes. With ice axe in hand we were positioned headfirst--downhill…toward the cliff on a steep snowfield. That is incentive to learn this art. The instructor noted: “If you don’t arrest within the first 50 feet, your speed will be too great to stop.” The slide began. We dropped the ice axe into the snow at our left hip as we were going headfirst on our back! Our body jerked around as the tip dug into the ice. Our face, with a sigh of relief, came uphill alongside the serrated piece of hopefully imbedded steel! We had all seen picture of mountaineers who slid down a 2000-foot slope at 80 mph.
“Lord what have I become? Arrest me, help me to self-arrest.” I re-read yet again Eugene Peterson’s The Contemplative Pastor where he says, “Busy is the symptom not of commitment but of betrayal, it is not devotion but defection. Busy to a pastor is like adulterous to characterize a wife or embezzling to describe a banker.”[i] He is so right as he asks how can we lead people to the still waters and green pastures of the Lord when we are continually in motion?
Here are some ways to self-arrest. Before the day’s slide begins, practice these spiritual disciplines. Hunger to hear from God before the siren voices of people’s agendas fill your day. Slow yourself and spiritually focus through-
F Prayer. Make a template. Pray for specific needs of your son, or ways to love your wife that you have noted and written down. Daily revisit in prayer those insights. A template is where our prayer-refined ministry goals are each morning prayed for. We intentionally keep our souls on target. (Internet article on Prayer-templating?)
F Bible Reading-I mean unrushed reveling in the Word that has no immediate work-related purpose besides filling the soul with joy and wonder. Treat the Word as that which first changes our being, before we apply it to our doing, our ministry.
F Daily, read a chapter from the great Spiritual Classics: A chapter from E.M. Bounds Power Through Prayer[ii] or find a good translation of Practicing the Presence of God.[iii] These time-tested trend resistant works will re-charge even the most care-worn soul.
F Encourage your pastor to build a study, not just have an office. A woodshop or a study is where you dream and build. An office is that sterile, sawdust-free place where you meet the customers and run your business. Some pastors are able to have an inner sanctum of quiet at the church building. I have built a study on my farm with internet & phone connected to work if there is an emergency, but protected from the tyranny of the urgent. To my left, a sign in the woods reads: National Park Boundary. In front is a mile of rolling forest, ribboned by a blue ocean. Make the study embryonic, a birthing center for God. A Pastor’s Study is synonymous with a “rendezvous” one-on-one with the Lord. Then having spent the morning in study,
F Spend the afternoons with the people. If you church is large-your first congregation is your staff, teaching them to be out with the people, saints and sinners alike. If you church is smaller-hit the road Jack! “The kiss of death can often be a minister in his office too much!” Look at Jesus-MBWA-Management By Walking About! It is a great job not in spite of the people, but precisely because of the people.
F Spiritual Job Descriptions: Learn to put up boundaries. Ask firmly that people respect them. Re-do your business card to read, “Husband, Dad, Pastor.” Never forget that order. Put a plaque on your Study Door: “Acts 6:4.” Then “Just do it!” As you begin to slow and reclaim your call, jettison the myths that you have to co-sign every church check; do every wedding, all the marriage counseling and every hospital calls. Ephesians 4:12 the congregation. Train, empower, release and then go fishing with your daughter!
F Finally, take another look at the Pastoral Letters of Paul. Using Microsoft Word, pull up I and II Timothy from a software program. Then, hitting Control-F, substitute Timothy’s name for you own and print it up. Now you have a heaven-sent job description that will allow you to hear the phrase: “Well done, Good and faithful Servant.”