Rita nervously sat down in my office. Because counseling is not my ministry, I had tried to steer her to one of our staff counselors or her small group leader. But she insisted on seeing me and promised that her appointment would not take long. Prior to her visit, I had had just a few superficial conversations with Rita; conversations that I considered friendly, and in no way confrontational.
“So, what can I do for you?” I asked as she shifted in her chair.
“Well, I knew I would be nervous,” Rita replied, “so I decided to write all my thoughts down in a letter.”
Her letter turned out to be an epistle—about six pages, single-spaced, consisting of a dozen charges detailing how I was just like her ex-husband. I was accused of not wanting Rita to have a career; not believing she was very smart; being critical of her ministry ambitions and so on.
After reading the letter, which took about ten minutes to speed-read, I put it down on the coffee table that was between us, sat back in my chair, and said—nothing. After a couple of awkward minutes, Rita finally broke the silence asking, “Well, what do you think about what I wrote?”
I answered as gently as I could, “Rita, I believe you have never forgiven your ex-husband.” My first thought, though, which I didn’t say was: “Poor woman, if only you knew the truth. In a church of 2500 members, I not only do not have negative thoughts about you, I never think about you at all!”
In any case, by the grace of God, my statement about her not forgiving her ex-husband hit Rita like a ton of bricks and she burst into tears. We, then, had a wonderful opportunity to talk about some of the things she had suffered at the hands of various significant men in her past. We prayed together and Rita left.
The situation with Rita illustrates one of the prices that almost every leader will pay: the price of people’s projections. Because pastors and leaders are in positions of authority, many people will project onto them the negative feelings that they have had from dealing with other authority figures in the past. One of my friends calls it, “being presented with another person’s bill.” Thus, as a male leader, I have often been asked to pay the bills of fathers, ex-boyfriends, ex-husbands, and former pastors.
Of course, the opposite is also true: I have been the recipient of positive experiences that people have had with authority and relationships with men as well. But, as I consider the various prices of leadership, I am going to restrict myself to the negative.
On another occasion, I was joking with a woman in an evening small group that I was leading. We wise-cracked back and forth, all in good-natured fun, or at least that is what I thought. After the meeting my wife, Marlene, who has much better discernment in these things than I do, suggested to me that I had hurt this woman’s feelings. I immediately assured my wife that she was being overly sensitive. She said, “No, you need to give her a call. You hurt her feelings!”
Having learned over time that ministry goes much better when I listen to my wife, I called the woman the next day, but was only able to reach her answering machine. I told her that I wanted to chat with her and to give me a call. I wasn’t able to reach her until about 5:00 p.m. that afternoon. By that time, she seemed quite nervous and asked, “What do you want to talk with me about?”
I said to her, “Well, when we were joking last evening, Marlene felt that I may have hurt your feelings. I was calling to apologize.” At that, she began crying into the phone. I thought, “Now what? What did I say? What did I do?”
She said, “I thought you were calling to yell at me because I had joked with you last night.”
I said, “Why in the world would I do that?”
She said, “Because at my last church every time the pastor called me, it was because I had done something wrong. In fact, I was so certain that you were calling to rebuke me that I insisted that my husband come home for lunch to pray with me in anticipation of your rebuke.”
I said to her, “I don’t know why your former pastor treated you the way he did. But I make you this promise, I will never, ever call you and yell at you on the phone. If we ever have a problem, I promise to speak to you face-to-face and to treat you with courtesy and respect.” Can you imagine what this poor woman had gone through all day anticipating her new pastor’s angry rebuke?
In order to remain sane, leaders need to realize that they are often asked to pay bills that are not theirs. Not every offense in the mind of an offended person is necessarily something that the leader has done. Therefore, leaders must learn to separate themselves from their roles. Leaders must remind themselves regularly that an offended person may be relating to them a certain way because of their roles and not because of anything they had done.
One helpful thought to keep in mind is that not every time someone says, “We have an issue between us” is it really a we issue. I have occasionally said to people, “No. We do not have a problem. I have no problem with you. Now tell me, what is the issue you have with me?”
The price of being a lightening rod. Bill was a faithful member of one of our worship teams. When a position for a new worship leader opened up, Bill thought that he would naturally get the nod. But for a number of reasons, the position was given to Gina. Though I had absolutely nothing to do with this decision, Bill seethed inside and, in particular, became angry with me for being passed over.
As leaders, we will often get credit for successes in our ministry. But we will, at other times, become the lightening rods of people’s upset and pain when things, either personally or in ministry, do not go well for them. Thus, many problems in church often become personalized as a problem with the pastor, the pastor’s spirituality, or the pastor’s decision-making.
There are several ways to lower the likelihood of being a lightening rod for every difficult decision in a church. One thing that I do is teach the church the difference between godly ambition and selfish ambition. Selfish ambition is focused upon a role—Sunday School Coordinator, Worship Leader, paid ministry position, etc. Godly ambition is focused upon a need—the need for children to be taught the Bible, the need for people to gather together and pray, or the need for lost people to come to know the Savior.
I tell our people that no one else can ever prevent you from meeting a need. If your heart is set on meeting a need, then it doesn’t matter what the pastor, the head usher, or the women’s mission coordinator decides. God will lead you to meet that need in another way. I have often said to folks: “Are you telling me that if you are denied a position as a youth pastor, you can’t find another way to minister to teens? And if you don’t get to be the prayer coordinator of our evangelism program that you still can’t pray with a group of people? If your heart is set on meeting needs, and not on a role, then you are secure.”
Another way to lessen the “lightening rod syndrome” is to minister with a team. The senior leader must not allow himself/herself to always be the point person for every difficult decision. The senior leader must also insist that the responsibility for hard decisions not always get pushed up line. Most people look for ways to dodge the heat for tough decisions or uncomfortable situations, and the easiest way to escape the heat is to blame the person above us for the decision. “Well, I am sorry to have to tell you this, but we are going to have to make a change. Pastor Joe is really not pleased with your performance and I am here to report that to you.”
This kind of cowardice ought never to be allowed on any team. I regularly tell my staff that when they deliver the “bad news,” my name better not be mentioned unless it is mentioned in positive terms. You are a pastor. You take the heat for your decisions. If you don’t agree with this call, then tell me in the privacy of my office. But don’t go out there and make me look bad because of the tough calls in your area of responsibility. If you don’t want the responsibility of being a pastor, fine! But leadership comes with a price tag.”
The price of displeasing people. It is inescapable that we, as leaders, must make unpleasant decisions for the ultimate good of our churches and the kingdom of God. It is impossible to pastor people without occasionally challenging mistakes or confronting sins. Many leaders have trouble at this point because they desperately want to please both God and the people they are serving. There are occasions, however, when the righteousness of God is on the line and a leader is forced to choose between pleasing God and pleasing people.
We lost our largest donor, who gave the church over $100,000 a year (apart from his building fund contributions), because someone confronted him about his speech patterns. After I got over the initial shock of his withdrawal from the church, God spoke to me in a still, small voice asking: “Are you really upset? Don’t you want a church filled with people whose desire is to please me? Shouldn’t he have been confronted about his speech?” Of course, my answer was, “Absolutely yes, Lord (but could you bring someone else who will give what he gave?).”
There are other reasons besides our desire to please God why leaders should not be afraid to displease others. One reason is that you don’t really know if you have real genuine support for your leadership if all you have ever said to someone is “yes.” I have a dear friend who often says, “You know if you are someone’s pastor or leader if you say ‘no’ to one of their demands and they still stick around and follow you.”
So long as the only response that people get from a leader is love, acceptance, affirmation and forgiveness, it is impossible to tell who our sheep are. It is those who hang around after our hard sayings that have, in fact, submitted to our leadership (John 6:60-69).
Moreover, if we live to please people, we often discover that we hate what we have created. We become slaves of our people. Leaders who live to please their people, are no better than hirelings. Instead of one master (Jesus, whose yoke is easy), we substitute numerous Pharaohs who are never satisfied with our performance no matter how much we do. I have found that being willing to displease people has actually gained me respect in the church. People of good character do not want to be flattered or lied to. Quite the opposite! People of good character want to hear the truth so long as they feel loved and pastored in the process.
We have had staff problems during evaluation time when supervisors gave subordinates entirely positive evaluations. I have had staff members come to me and tell me that they feel like they are being pandered to and are not getting honest feedback and proper supervision because every thing they do is just fine with their bosses. They were actually upset because they got overly positive evaluations! Leaders must be willing to pay the price of displeasing people.
The price of unrealistic expectations. Bill and Janette had repeatedly invited my wife and me for dinner over the course of several months. My wife, Marlene, not wanting to say, “No, absolutely not,” kept putting them off. She said things like, “We’ll have to check our schedules,” “Rich is going to be out of town that week,” “We have a conference that weekend,” etc. Of course, Bill and Janette’s frustration level grew because there never seemed to be a time when we could get together for dinner.
The fact is, in a large church, it is unrealistic to expect the senior pastor to have dinner with even a small percentage of church members. Likewise, it is an unrealistic to expect that pastors or leaders be close friends with any more than a small handful of people in the church that they are serving.
Unrealistic expectations can become real problems because they are not only generated by others; some are self-imposed. There is a task master within every Christian leader’s heart that is never satisfied with any action no matter how diligently it is done. “After all,” I sometimes say to myself, “you are not meeting with enough people! You need to be mentoring more young leaders! You need to be praying more! Things would be going better if you spent more time studying the Word!”
When I feel overwhelmed by my short-comings, one of the most encouraging verses to me is James 5:17, “Elijah was a man just like us. He prayed earnestly that it would not rain and it did not rain on the land for 3.5 years. Again he prayed and the heavens gave rain and the earth produced its crops.” Yes, he prayed and it didn’t rain for 3½ years. But 1 Kings 18:4 also says that “Elijah came to a broom tree and sat down under it and prayed that he might die.” There is no one on earth who is always up. That kind of person doesn’t exist. Everyone of us has his or her ups and downs. Everyone of us can identify with the great prayers of Elijah as well as the secret desire to pack it all in.
One of the reasons we sit under the broom tree is the unrealistic expectation that we should function at one of three speeds: fast, faster and supersonic. Many of us have no slow-down speed. One of the things that occurred in Elijah’s life was the physical drain and tiredness after tremendous victory. He was totally exhausted. He spent tremendous amounts of emotional and spiritual energy on the top of Mt. Carmel where he challenged the false prophets. He poured himself into praying and, then, by the power of the Lord, ran 20 miles. Here is a man who gave every thing that he had physically, emotionally and spiritually and he was spent.
A number years ago I returned from doing two weeks of conferencing in England, in which I taught 22 times over the course of 12 days. I then immediately went back to work and actually wondered why I was feeling exhausted and depressed. (I am slower than many people when it comes to understanding my emotions.) Archibald Hart, who is a professor of Psychology and Dean of the Graduate School of Psychology at Fuller Seminary has helpfully written on the issue of pastoral addiction to adrenaline. According to Hart, we can actually get high and live out of a continual addiction to excitement. He explains that very often leaders experience post-adrenaline depression after having some unusually heavy demand placed on them relationally or ministry wise. Thus, for example, pastors will often experience some measure of depression on Monday after preaching two or three times on Sunday. This same type of drain happens to athletes, to salespersons, to politicians, and to doctors after they charge themselves up for a big event. The depressed feelings are simply the result of being too revved up biologically. After being revved up, your body simply crashes.
For many of us there is a need to embrace the emotional rhythms of our lives. Over the years, I have come to accept the fact that following a weekend in which a number of people make decisions for Christ, or following a wonderful conference, I will be subjected to spiritual attack and feelings of depression. So I try to give myself a little more time to be away from people, to take walks with my wife, or to just veg out in front of a video. I no longer feel like I have to burn the fumes of my empty gas tank by engaging in more ministry.
On this point, the church growth consultants are exactly right. As churches grow, pastors must learn the art of moving from being shepherds to becoming ranchers. Otherwise, they will die under the broom tree. Every transitional step in our church’s growth has required me to let go (and to some degree to die inside) of hands-on responsibility, of being fully informed, and of receiving the emotional strokes of ministry areas that I dearly love.
One practical thing that I did several years ago was to sit down with a blank sheet of paper alone with God and say, “Lord, I really need to get in touch with myself regarding my emotional energy level. What are the things that fuel my engine? And what are the things that drain it?” I then wrote down my true feelings in these two columns: “Fuels My Engine” or “Drains Me Emotionally.”
Just to give you some examples from my life, I am particularly fueled by evangelism, so, for many years, I used to take the opportunity each fall and spring to do open air preaching at The Ohio State University here in my city. When I get out there and do some street preaching with totally unchurched people. I find myself going off like a bottle rocket. I may even see a few people come to Christ. But I have to admit that a large part of my motivation is just the sheer pleasure of doing evangelism. On the other hand, if I feel trapped in my office pushing paper, or if I have been spending a lot of time in areas that I lack gifting, particularly long-term counseling), my battery gets drained.
What fuels your emotional battery? Perhaps it is being around peers in conference settings where you are not responsible for delivering the talks. Perhaps it is motivational for you to catch new vision by attending a leadership seminar. Perhaps it is non-focused learning—reading books on history or politics, going to museums, or traveling. One thing that is a must for me is getting together with good friends who I don’t have to minister to over dinner.
Why pay the price? I could go into all the wonderful blessings of being in pastoral ministry—the blessing of knowing that your life is spent for the gospel, the blessing of using your gifts, the blessing of meeting wonderful people, the blessing of people’s encouragement, the blessing of seeing changed lives. You probably have your own list of blessings regarding what you receive in this life from doing ministry.
The fact is nothing of any significance is ever achieved without paying a price. You can’t be a great athlete without going through a rigorous program of training and deprivation, things like running in the rain and being battered in practice. You can’t be a great pianist if all of your time is spent having fun with your friends. You can’t be a great physician without going through years of schooling and a long internship where you have to stay up day and night. You can’t achieve anything in this world without some trade-off, without paying a price. And the gospel can’t be extended without paying a price. Some people must be willing to say, “I will pay for this! I am willing to have people present me with bills that are not mine. I am willing to make tough calls in ministry. I am willing to be poorly thought of by some people. I am willing to give up my house, my relationships to go across the world to bring this message. I will pay!”
This, by the way, is the “Law of the Harvest” that Jesus taught us in John 12. In John 12, Jesus said, “Unless a grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it stands alone. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. The man who loves his life will lose it, but the man who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Whoever serves me, must follow me. And where I am, my servant will be also. My Father will honor the one who serves me.”
The “Law of the Harvest” is simply this: In order to have many seeds, one must die. If we want many seeds in our church, someone must die. If we want many seeds in our community, someone must die. To put it simply, if we want to bear fruit for Jesus, there is a price to pay.