“Pastors must receive professional help. I am not referring to the general help found at conferences and seminars. I'm referring to the personal kind, like that provided by the personal coach of a world-class athlete. Pastors need highly personalized help at three points in their ministries: when leaving a church (under good or bad circumstances), while serving a church, and prior to entering a new church.”
“Pastors are generally tough, resilient people who find it hard to face and accept their own needs. They function out of personal initiative, faith and prayer. When they do not periodically gain professional help, the church pays the price. They become blinded by the light of self-evaluation and cannot see their own needs. Behind every badly burned pastor will be found a long, slow burn that took place before they became engulfed in the final flame.”
“Unlike flesh wounds, heart wounds don't heal on their own. While God has built restorative powers into the body that perform without our awareness, the heart and mind demand conscious care to heal. And that is best done with a professionally trained person to assist the process.”
“While people must draw their inner strength from God alone, it is also within God's plan that people draw from one another. It is not infrequent that one will gain a divine perspective only through the assistance of another person. TRC [Alongside] counselors are trained to listen for the symptoms of burnout or other problems. They may take their cues from hearing pastors mention such symptoms as listlessness, lack of motivation, sleeplessness, tentativeness, loss of creativity, withdrawal from people, detachment, cynicism, and anger. They know that failing to get at the heart of these symptoms can lead to serious physical problems, as well as the destruction of ministries and homes. Their purpose is to help God’s servants restore strength for service.”
“Frankly, every person in ministry periodically needs to sort through the complexities to understand his or her inner motivations and responses. These areas are often worked out by talking with a loved one or a friend, as in iron sharpening iron (Prov. 27:17). Leaders who would reach greatness, however, must find someone trained…who can fulfill Proverbs 20:5; ‘The purposes of a man’s heart are deep waters, but a man of understanding draws them out.’”
“Churches have the right to expect good performance from their pastors. But that leads to responsibility of providing the assistance pastors need to keep their performance levels high…If you were hiring someone to head a billion-dollar-a-year corporation that yielded nothing more than temporal value, you would consider a thirty-day preparation time as money and time well invested. How dare we consider anything less for the people whom we call to lead the church in matters of eternal consequence? A thirty-day period is not always possible. But between pastorates, especially, and every three to five years within a pastorate, a thirty-day period is essential. At every point this is neglected, the church will suffer loss. On the other hand, your pastor’s gain will directly result in your church’s gain. Your church will pay one way or the other—either by equipping and enabling your pastor to be a bright beacon, or allowing him to merely exist on a low energy charge, resulting in a dim signal to the world.”
“If you are a pastor, you cannot wait on the church to provide for your needs. Whether churches awaken to this concept or not is beyond your control. Therefore, you must take immediate action to keep your own life in peak condition...”
Submitted by
Ron Susek on 01.19.07
