The health of the minister

It is curious to some church members when their clergy get tired, sick, depressed, discouraged or burned out. Somehow, there is a small group of folks who believe their ministers aught to be above it all: the sordid money, greed, anger, frustration, weariness, and impatience.

Sadly, there are some ministry students who believe they, themselves aught to be above it all. My job as a field work supervisor with the local seminary is to help them see why they won't ever be above it all.Not only that, but if they don't change their thinking, they will be "under" it all. So, they get sent to me.

As a field work supervisor, I believe in the beauty of the ministry and the meaningfulness of the ministry when viewed through the proper lens. My lens have never been rose colored lens because I grew up in a service station in West Texas right down the street from one of the bigger Baptist churches. I won't say that I have seen it all from religious people, but what I haven't seen, I had just soon pass by on the other side.

For better or worse, churches are composed of people. And therein is the problem. Some of the people are the embodiment of Jesus Christ. They are the people you aspire to be at some point in one's life. They have the right amount of love, grace, forgiveness, and toughness for life. They inspire and encourage. If every church could be full of these people, well, ministers would give their salaries back to pastor these kind of folks.

However, my experience is that such people are like salt sprinkled over the church to make the others endurable. There is probably a parable there about how God feels about us all, but on we move. The rest of the lot can be a pretty dodgy group. Depending on the church, they may be family inbred, they may be theologically inbred, they may be historically inbred, or they just may be inbred.

Family inbred may be the worst. These are the folks that throw hymnals at each other both inside and outside the church. They are all family, you see, and all the family issues are always right in the presence of the gathering whenever the gathering gathers. Snubs at weddings, arguments over land, divorces and remarriages, they live on in the family church.

One of my personal favorites is the theologically inbred. You know you are in this church if when one enters the building, everyone is clutching their King James Version of the Bible. Tradition, theology, culture, and "the way we've always done it" get mixed up into this crazy mix of theological goo. One does not not even know where to begin to unravel the mess or more appropriately, mop up the goo.

Then there is the historically inbred. These tend only to be an issue at "First Churches." Their history is deep in the community and there are certain standards expected of the church. They have nothing to do with the Gospel or the Bible or Jesus Christ, they are just a part of being the "First Church" in town. I pastored one of those. (The leaning brick church sign should have given me a clue everything was not up to plumb!) And if God is gracious, I shall never, never, have to put on the top hat and whistle and try to bring sense out of such a circus again. Perhaps what gives me a little joy in my life is knowing that everyone was laughing at them behind their backs. All the while, they were busy playing at being church.

Finally, there is just the inbred. They are a mix of age, family, theology, history, and all those things that don't count for anything. In some ways they all become an excuse for doing nothing but keeping the organization going. What that includes is changing nothing. No leadership is ever changed. No worship style is ever changed. No seat is ever changed(unless by chance some erstwhile guest sits in the wrong seat--which won't happen again). On a tour of the building, they will tell you they have have the same red carpet in their auditorium for the last 50 years. It smells like 50 year old carpet and toward the front you can definitely smell where thousands of sermons have died painfully slow deaths.

Yes, it is the work of the field work supervisor to help his student see the world of ministry into which he or she goes. You may think it sounds cruel, but cruel is letting them believe the church is one step below glory. To do so will crush their health and perhaps cut short their ministry. Frankly, ministers cannot be above it all; they will not survive if they end up buried under it all; they need to learn how to survive in it all!