Talking with Discouraged Pastors

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I once talked to a Pastor, and he asked me, “You know the passage where the Apostle writes about finishing the race?”

“Yes,” I said, and he replied, “Let me read it to you: ‘I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.’” Then the pastor continued, “I’m going to finish the fight, but the last few years, I’m not sure it’s been a good fight for me. I’m going to cross the finish line, not in a victorious sprint, but crawling, battered and bruised.”

Since I retired from Fellowship Church, I’ve been sought out by pastors, ministers, missionaries, and church leaders. Many of them are isolated, criticized, lonely, and feel as if their gifts and skills, taking years to hone, are no longer respected or needed.

While not using the exact words as the pastor above, a lot of older church leaders, while believing in their younger years that ministry would be from glory to glory, now cross the finish line with bloody knees and weary demeanor.

Another pastor said, “I worked at this church for 39 years, and I thought that when I retired, the church would take care of me. But they thought (even with my low wages) that I should be responsible. My wife and I are now living on a very low Social Security paycheck and getting by each month. I should have had an agreement in writing.”

I have learned from many experiences of budget versus faith skirmishes in local churches that when it comes to future finances, a pastor should obtain it in writing beforehand.  

As one pastor recently told me, “I thought that I could trust them.”

TV programs and movies often present pastors as egotistic and fleecing the flock. Though most of the pastors that I know serve with humility, they live “on call” 24 hours a day, balance family and ministry time commitments (taking the full blame if the too-busy schedule ruins their children), all the while producing a powerful enough weekly sermon to keep attendees from visiting another church.

A leader said, “I was fired by an email.” Another, “I feel so dishonored. I’ve worked for years in study, learning organizational church dynamics, and almost everyone, especially when offerings are low or there’s friction in the church, wants to tell me how to do my job.”

Sitting with one pastor, he read to me a passage from the Apostle Paul …

Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure (2 Corinthians 11:24-27, ESV).

After reading about Paul’s trials, the pastor said, “I feel guilty. I see other pastors endure far more than I do without complaint. I guess I’m weaker than others, but I’m not giving up.”

That’s the point of this Interruption: not to make church members feel guilty or give flippant encouragement to church leaders “to follow the example of Christ” (through we all should), but to pastors, ministers, church leaders, and to all of us — we run a difficult race, there is finish line, and afterwards we receive a crown. 

I confess my identity with crawling, rather than a first-place gold medal.