On this episode of the Dudes and Dads podcast, we talk about pastor appreciation.
You're listening to the Dudes and Dads podcast, a show dedicated to helping men be better dudes
and dads by building community through meaningful conversation and storytelling.
And now, here are your hosts Joel DeMott and Andy Lehman.
Andy, Joel.
How are you?
I'm excellent.
I'm a little tired.
It's been a long weekend, but I'm excellent.
I'm going to say I'm excellent.
You've had a lot of really amazing things actually happen here recently.
Yes.
One of them is that Hattie Mae, the really the star of the layman show, the whole layman
show, or as I'm concerned.
Yeah, I mean, she got her, she wouldn't got baptized.
She did.
So today, special day.
Yeah, it was.
So last time we have four children and the last of last of the show, the layman children
are the weas, the weas, the weas default of all the layman's was baptized today.
Yeah.
So, yeah, I will say I saw the video you posted, but I was in a situation where I was unable
to, I just, I was, it was a silent film for me.
Gotcha.
I should have put captions up.
Maybe, maybe you should have, because I don't know what I was doing something else.
And, but what I was really, what I was most concerned about was, were you able to get
through without, without just trying like that?
I was.
That's great.
Yeah, I did.
It was this time.
Did you feel like you had to like mentally prepare for that?
Like, or you just like, Hey, we're just going to do this and whatever happens happens.
Yeah, it was the latter of the two.
It was kind of like, whatever happens, like, I didn't know if I was going to be, I kind
of, I'm an emotional, like normally.
And so, well, it, when it's your, when it's your little and you're, it's such a, it's
such a powerful experience.
I to this day, if like my Achilles heel for the crying is anytime, anytime a kid, I was
baptized like anytime a child.
Oh my gosh.
It just like, Oh, it gets me.
So no, no difference with, no difference with Hattie though.
That's awesome.
Yeah.
Super, super great.
Next, next step in her, in her journey.
Let's see anything else interesting going on with you.
You did, you were kind of go, go, go this weekend.
Yeah.
This weekend kind of seemed go, go, go.
So it was kind of like, it's good to sit down and kind of take a few breaths and talk to
you gentlemen.
Absolutely.
Well, yeah, we had our, today was our last Matthew last outdoor soccer.
We managed to get without any bad weather, but of course today was like, today was the
final, it's like the final game.
We had to travel long distance and bear the rain in the wind, but we got through it and
yeah, Jackie and so I had two of the kiddos here with me this weekend.
He was out of town for a family birthday celebration out in the Cleveland, Ohio and she's on her
way back now as we speak.
And then we hit the ground running tomorrow as, as is always the case.
Monday's always got back at it Monday.
Yes.
Well, hey, as always, or not usually not as always, but usually we have a guest on and
tonight is no different.
A returning, I was trying to remember it's alumnus, right?
Because when you say alumni, that's like the plural.
Right.
And Tyler is only a single person.
He's not a multi person.
No, he's single.
So our good friend Tyler Hartford is here with us and the reason we have Tyler with
us is because Tyler brings with him the perspective of, because he works with pastors and we're
talking about pastor appreciation.
And for those of you, I think this will be an interesting thing.
Some of you, we know our audience is kind of all over the place in terms of backgrounds
and perspectives and all of that.
And so some of you are like, pastor appreciation, like what's this all about?
And some of you are our church going folk and some of you are pastors.
So we thought this is appropriate.
The whole mix.
So, but for those of you that aren't as familiar, I think, I think even as we talk about pastor
appreciation, it gives some insights into, into the challenge of leaders today, currently,
broadly speaking, it's a broad leadership challenge.
But just organizations, how they're, how they're functioning, how they take care of
their leaders, how they think about their leaders and thriving and all of that.
So hey, Tyler, hi, welcome.
Thanks for being with us.
Hey, great to be here with you guys.
Oh, it's a joy, an absolute joy.
Tyler was already on one of these episodes this season.
Yeah.
So he's, that's why he's an alumnus.
Right.
No, I mean, I recently, like he was on recently.
Yes.
So that's true.
It wasn't too long ago actually.
Right.
Yes.
Time flies.
Yeah.
So it is pastor appreciation month, the great month of October.
And for those of you listening, maybe your church right now has done something to acknowledge
the people that shepherd your congregation that lead.
There's all number of different, you know, different ways that various churches do this.
But I was just thinking, you know, when talking, when talking about our pastors, talking about
those that are kind of leading organizations and spiritually, you know, those sort of things.
When you think about your pastor, whoever that is, what comes to your mind?
How are the pastors that we know?
How are they doing?
You know, personally and professionally.
So when you, I think that is a question that it's a simple question.
Like, I think it's easy, but the whole point of like pastor appreciation is to like to
again, to like bring to our minds like, oh, pastors are pastors are people too.
You know, they have, they have challenges.
They have, they have, you know, families, they have all these sorts of, and so just the
first question is, is like, for any of us, when you think about your pastor, how do you
think they're doing?
Have you, have you asked?
Have you?
And the trickier thing is, have you asked, and do you think you got a serious, a serious
answer?
You did a safe environment for that real answer.
Yeah, yeah, right.
Yeah.
Some spaces, a pastor may not actually feel safe.
They, they feel.
I'm always anticipating, you know, I know I said it many times when I was in vocational
ministry, people ask me how you're doing, and I use the Christian F word.
Fine.
I'm fine.
And, and sometimes that was true.
And probably sometimes it wasn't, if I would have given a second, although knowing that
there were times where I didn't just give the Christian F word answer and, and sometimes
people were not prepared for what I would share with them.
Right?
Like it was a little bit of a, you know, it's like, be careful what happens when you ask
me to tell the truth.
So Tyler, in your role as someone who works with a, with a network of churches representing
over 50 congregations, kind of all across Midwest, out to the, out East Coast and then
into the kind of the central heartland, I guess we could say.
What is the farthest West?
I'm trying to, because you're out, you're out to the East Coast.
In Iowa, there's a gentleman we relate to out in California, but then I'm also part
of a, a online huddle once a month with, yeah, yeah, yeah.
A donation about 40 pastors.
Yeah.
Serving in larger context.
And this is why I think having Tyler conversation, Andy, like as you and I talked earlier.
Well, it gives us a bigger, broader scope of overall, what's happening in the church.
Right.
You know, then really just what we're seeing here.
So, so I guess Tyler, maybe in, in the, in the aggregate, as you think about these meetings
that you, for the last, you know, for last, well, I mean, while now between sitting with
executive pastors who are, you know, and, and leaders of various to not, you know, various
denominational backgrounds, all of that.
And then also your leadership role within the Avana network.
What, how do you feel like, like, apart from the studies, we're going to talk about some
study things that can't, that have been released.
But what has been your sense?
Like, how are people doing?
Well, let's, let's just first acknowledge that when you say pastor, are you working
with someone that's quarter time, half time, working a full time job, really doing two
full time jobs to the pastor who's basically doing everything with the office administrator
to multi staff to, you know, mega church with 30, 40 people on staff or more.
You know, so that let's just acknowledge that we're never going to cover all the dining
racks on this call.
And then what that minister is expected to cover can vary as well, right?
You can be very specialized as the teaching pastor or the youth pastor, or you may wind
up just basically having to do everything.
Yeah.
So, so what I'm going to try to know are a couple of key pieces that affect probably
all of them.
Great.
One is, let's face it, when we went to the pandemic, we trained people to find community
online.
And there's many who have learned that, you know, frankly, I don't miss being in the
gathered body.
And so, since churches are not businesses, they don't create products.
They specialize in relationships when you have meaningful relationships with people who then
just suddenly disappear.
That's, that's difficult.
Right.
Pastors are dealing in relationship regardless of the role they're in.
And it can be put together with you as you think they may be, you know, they may be just
stoic, but the reality is you're in the people business.
So we've gone through a very disorienting time.
Then those who have stayed engaged with the gathered body, there's been a lot of shifting.
There's been alignment along more political silos in congregate.
Yeah.
So you'll see whole groups leave and just show up at another church because of the political
landscape, the health landscape, et cetera.
And then what you're also seeing is just like the baby boomers, the baby boomer generation
is pulling out of large sections of the marketplace.
I'm seeing a large swath of baby boomer generation pastors stepping out.
So you have tremendous collective wisdom that have been at it for 20, 30, 40 years.
And they're actually taking retirement in many cases at an earlier age as opposed to
in the past, they would stay in the past for it and just kind of do the slow fade.
And so you're just seeing a lot of shifts in the landscape.
And one study I saw basically said that we have seen in the course of two to three years
the acceleration of leaving pastors leaving and congregational decline that you really
would have expected after about seven to 10 years.
So really it's a trajectory that was going to come in seven to 10 years.
It has already happened in two to three years.
So imagine being responsible for a business and your product is a certain kind of widget
and you've done the best you can.
And in most cases, the relationship return on what you're doing in the congregation is
far below what you ever thought it would be.
It's quite distressing.
So pastors are also at a place where I think they're looking at there's another election
cycle coming.
There is huge economic upheaval.
Some congregations are seeing more giving, but others are seeing a real decline in giving
because the disposable income is dropping.
And then of course now we have this disorientation that's happening with the Russian-Russian
war, the Israel-Imasz war.
We can only absorb so many conflicts before we really start seeing something hit the markets
and faith.
And so just like what anyone might be facing in the business world, pastors are sitting
here going, okay, we are in the business of talking about, let's just face it, everybody
says when you're together with the family, you're not supposed to talk about religion
and politics.
Pastors that's their bread and butter, not necessarily about political parties, but about
lived-out belief, which is expressed in a sort of political way.
I'm going to stop there and just say, I tried to paint a big picture and just simply say,
you know, that you're going to get a very different answer for each person, but just
be aware that every minister is kind of feeling these pressures.
Whether they know it or not, that's a key thing.
I do know some are just like, oh, it's fine.
And you know, I just think in the midst of all of that, in the midst of those pressures,
if you have a congregation, if you have people around you that you have a sense are in your
corner and that are supporting you, that are appreciating you, that are designating that
in some way, is it fair to say that your ability to sort of weather those storms increases?
Your bandwidth to a certain degree increases.
I mean, if you were to use a military analogy, I mean, if you're trying to go about a battle
and you're not getting shot by your own people, you have a better chance at one.
I was blessed to be in a congregation for 14 years where I really felt like I was not
necessarily a target of people's frustration.
I think, well, you have to ask them if they...
But I hear horror stories.
My wife is part of a group of several thousand pastors' wives on Facebook and all they do
is share how they can support each other when something terrible has been said.
Maybe I should say this.
I think that ministry is unique in the sense that some people wind up.
You may have a trauma in your life that came from the authority figure that was acted against
you.
And just my presence in your life speaking life into you and sometimes saying hard things
to help you be the better version of who you are.
I can put my finger in that wound and you can just deck me.
But I'm not the one that caused that.
And I find that pastors are often on the front line there.
They get sheep bites and it's not necessarily the fault of the pastor or the sheep.
We're dealing in the healing business.
I have to make it clear again too.
We see all the headlines of spiritual abuse where sheep pastors are stepped out of line.
We hear about the Catholic priests.
I'm a Protestant minister but what is said about Catholic priests also sticks to us.
But the reality, the average person on the ground that's a male, female pastor is really
just trying to do the right thing and do the good thing and really want to see people
thrive.
And when you do that, you're going to get bit.
It's like a vet.
They're working with an animal that ruined it.
The healing business is hard work.
And Andy, I wonder as maybe you and Julia have had this conversation at some point now
that you have a wife that's entered into vocational ministry later on in life.
Just having the conversation of what...
Because every individual, especially every spiritual leader, they receive affirmation
differently.
So, would you be able right now to have a sense of in what area...
Like how...
If somewhere to ask you, come to me and say, hey, how can we encourage your wife and the
work that she's doing?
Would you have an answer for that?
Would you have a sense of how to help that along?
Yeah, I think definitely words of affirmation are going to go a long way.
Everybody experiences love and affection in different ways.
I mean, that's why we have the different five different love languages.
So, I mean, obviously, people are going to...
Some people are going to get that same thing as if you were trying to woo your wife.
They're going to be different.
People are going to experience that in different ways.
But I think words of affirmation go a long way because it not only is just like, here's
a gift, but it allows them to see what they appreciate about the pastor.
So, it's saying, hey, good example would just be like, hey, I'm just going to use Julie
since she...
Yeah, absolutely.
Like, hey, Julie, I really appreciated the way that you've connected with our family,
you looked out for us when XYZ was happening.
And I really appreciated the way that you...
What you said really spoke to me on Sunday.
And it doesn't have to be during pastor appreciation month.
Yeah.
So, it's a good time to remember that because...
Yeah, I mean, I think...
Well, I've never been in ministry where I'm being paid, but I have been in the help desk
industry.
Yeah.
And so, the same similar type of things.
And so, I know from personally, for me, that when you're helping people all day, especially
that people are coming to me when things are wrong.
Yeah.
And that's a great...
I think that's a great insight just to say, usually the beginning of the conversation,
the interaction is because something is sideways.
Right.
And I get that that's not always the case in pastoral care, right?
I mean, that's not always the case.
But a lot of that is here.
Even no matter what type of pastor you are, whether you're the congregational care pastor
or either had lead pastor or a kid's pastor or whatever, you're going to have people coming
to you that are needing something.
Yeah.
I mean, because your job is to pastor the flock, right?
Right.
And so, that's your job.
But seldom is seldom...
I mean, to that point, though, like seldom is there a case where like someone's like,
hey, I'd love to sit down and talk with you about everything that's going really well
in our church right now.
Or I'd love to talk with you about just, man, the multiple great things.
I just want to spend some time counting the awesome things that are going on.
Now, by the way, if you did choose to do that, I would...
Man, like that's worth its weight in gold.
110%.
I was really, really fortunate.
The last congregation that I served, we had...
Man, it was...
There were two or three instances where folks in the congregation called the office and
said, would it be okay?
I know you guys have your staff meetings on Tuesday mornings.
I think that's...
The Tuesday morning church staff meeting is the...
That's the go-to.
That's the go-to, right?
Yeah.
I know you guys have your staff meetings on Tuesday mornings.
I would just love to come and share how the collective ministry of this church has positively
impacted and changed my life.
Let me just tell you, and I remember those.
I can remember those individuals.
I remember those conversations.
That...
Them coming in on a Tuesday morning set the course for our week as a whole team.
I really felt that.
These would be things that they're sharing that I think would be very easy to dismiss
as like, oh, we're just doing our thing.
We're just doing our jobs and whatever.
But it was huge.
And to have someone create space, carve out space to share that, I just incredibly powerful.
And I think, again, because we don't hear...
It's hard to hear affirmation.
I mean, Nick and we don't...
People don't naturally...
I'm in several different Facebook groups, right?
Technology stuff.
And one in particular, I'm thinking people are like...
People are always saying, there's newer versions of the software are terrible.
There's newer versions of the software are terrible.
But what you don't hear is the people coming in and saying, these newer versions of the
software work great for me because people are coming for the group for support.
And so, as a pastor, it's those type of things that you long and crave for because you want
to hear what you're doing right.
You want to hear when people appreciate what you're doing.
Well, for me, not a lot.
We just hope we're making a difference somewhere.
Like...
Well, again, I want to remind you that since you're dealing in relationships...
There is this sense that if I'm producing RVs here, I can tell you how many units come
off the line with it.
But when you're investing in a relationship, you really don't even know this side of heaven.
Like where that relationship is going and what it's going to be like in the end.
So, it's just really hard to get immediate feedback.
Let's just face it.
I know that we want to talk about some self-care pieces.
But if I could just at least know that there's a couple of suggestions I could give that
really actually just helpful for appreciation for not just pastors, but really anyone in
your life.
I mean, you're now an executive director of a nonprofit, Joel.
Like, I'm now a director in a church network.
It's fascinating because we're still kind of doing ministry, right?
But we're not necessarily on the radar of people now.
We're not in the trench having people say, I'm so glad your shoulder to shoulder with
me.
We're kind of top level.
So, I would just simply say it's really helpful to just think about the word of encouragement.
You're talking about love languages, right?
Or other ways of hearing it.
I have letters that I've kept for years that just so great to have just this tickle file
of places to go back and hear that somebody actually said something great to me.
Just of what you do for work.
If somebody shows healthy, appropriate love to your children, sometimes they can't say
that to your face.
But I had people who treated me really difficultly at times in church.
But the way they expressed their care for my children or gifted things to them, which
is just really special.
When people remembered them as well, that's a powerful experience.
Another piece would simply be like thinking about it, like giving sort of like experiential
things rather than material items, you know, taking them out to a meal.
It's astounding how many pastors don't get invited to go out just a regular meal where
we're not talking about church.
Everybody just assumes that pastors are so busy they can't do it.
What the reality is, is many of them are starving for this regular relationship where there
is no agenda and you're just going in your break and bread together having a nice meal.
And again, these are appropriate things for really any professor.
Right.
Well, and I think to one of the things that's hard about that I've seen, that's hard about
being in church ministry is for me and Joel, right?
We go to work Monday through Friday.
Sometimes we work in the evening, but we have this time of separation where on Sunday we
are going to church to worship.
Yeah.
I mean, granted, I'm not saying this is the only time.
Yeah.
Right.
Being a Christian is a whole life thing.
But there's this separation of work versus being worshipping, whereas for pastors that's
not necessarily the case because they're working still Sunday morning.
Yeah.
No matter what, it's a 24.
I mean, it is a 24-7 job in one way or the other, just in terms of when you might be
called upon, whatever might happen.
And a pastor never really sets that work aside.
It's incredibly difficult, too.
They teach you more and more to have healthy boundaries where maybe you should have clear
times when someone shouldn't call you.
But I think you should try to do that as a pastor, but the reality is death is never
convenient.
Yeah.
Right.
Death never happens when a crisis never happens on your schedule.
Yeah.
I cannot tell you how many thanksgivings I've missed in 14 years of ministry.
It just spelt like, in my context, so many people died on thanksgivings.
Yeah.
And I don't mean that as humorsing or anything.
Yeah.
It's just don't know what's happening.
Right.
Yeah.
The other thing is we work when people play.
I mean, the reality is most church events are when the average person is free.
So it's not unlike, I worked for Toledo Symphony for some time.
We would work on nine to five jobs, but then we'd have two to three concerts in a week
during the regular season.
It's not unlike some of those professions where you do your administrative work, but then
you're on when everyone else is off.
So it does take some work.
I think that's the piece that maybe if you want to talk a little bit about self care,
that's a great transition.
Yeah.
Well, and we want to, as we're talking about appreciation, as we're talking about, because
there's a piece of, we've talked about some parts here of practical things that any like
a congregational member can do, just very straightforward practical pieces of how they
can express appreciation.
What I'd also want to do, because my, you know, once a pastor, always a pastor, is if
I could give a seminar to church elders and deacons and anyone who's overseeing or supervising
or has an impact upon the work life of a pastor, there's a whole additional category
of like practically speaking how they can show appreciation for the pastor.
So we'll just, we'll say that first.
And I want to give, I want to give some context to one, why lay church leadership needs to
do this, because, because there's a new reality.
We've talked post COVID, there is a new reality about pastoral health that, that we're seeing.
So I took some, the Christian, the Christian post in a June of this year, they did, they
did an article, a lot of this came from a bar in a group with research they had been
doing with pastors.
They did a bunch of initial surveys and interviews in 2015 and then came back to that group seven
years later.
So over course, the time of 2015 to 2022.
And by 2022 pastors had, you know, there are full two years into, and this was in the 2022
they did it like towards the end of the year, if I remember, yeah, it was in September of
2022.
So just about a year ago, they completed this and really got an interesting snapshot of
what, of what's going on kind of, and this is within a Protestant, Protestant pastor
specifically just to, to be clear, but so here's what they, here's what they found.
In key measures of wellbeing, such as physical, mental, emotional and overall health pastors
have suffered significant declines over the last seven years, especially when it comes
to having true friends, which as Tyler has touched on, a new report from Barnard research
shows citing data collected again in this, they did this study was known as the resilient
pastor research from 2015 to 2022.
The evangelical polling organization showed that pastors suffered significant declines
in all areas of wellbeing when asked to rank how they felt as excellent, good average,
blow average, poor or don't know.
So in 2015 data was collected between April and December of that year and based on 900
interviews that they did with Protestant seat, and these are senior pastors specifically.
So I'm just here to tell you definitely challenges specific to senior pastors, but that doesn't,
it does not end.
The challenges do not end at the senior pastoral level for sure.
You know, and I'm saying that as someone who's doing, was doing youth ministry in 2020 during
all of it like had very, very similar experiences.
So they do these surveys.
So it says when it comes to having true friends, the data shows that 20% of pastors in 2022
ranked themselves as below average in the area compared with 10% who did so in 2015.
Another 7% ranked themselves as poor when it comes to having friends in 2022 compared
to just 2% in 2015.
While 34% of pastors ranked themselves as excellent when it comes to having true friends
in 2015, that share dropped to 17% in 2022 from 34 to 17% in 2022.
Many pastors also indicated that their physical health suffered significantly between 2015
and 2022.
In 2015, only 7% of pastors ranked their physical well-being as either below average or poor.
Seven years later, that number has more than tripled to 22%.
With some 18% reporting their condition as below average, only 9% of pastors reported
their physical health as excellent in 2022 compared to 24% seven years earlier.
And then again, the study goes on and talks about mental health.
The mental and emotional health in 2015, 39% of pastors surveyed said their mental and
emotional health was excellent by 2022 was down to 11%.
So we're seeing physical health.
We're seeing lack of friendships, meaningful friendships.
We're seeing a general overall decline in these groups, some significant numbers.
And I don't know how where the average lay leader is about this.
I feel it's like I want to advocate for it.
I want to make it known.
But I don't just want to drop kind of a frozen turd, so to speak.
Like, what do I do with this now?
I think what it circles back to.
I'd love to hear you guys' input on this.
I think number one, you all can do the difficult work.
It can be difficult working, can be tricky to navigate of being a friend to your pastor.
I have had pastors tell me your congregation members and your lay leaders don't want to
be your friend.
And there's a big discussion out there actually as whether or not pastors can have friends
within their congregation.
Call me naive.
I still want to believe it's possible.
I guess how does that work for you?
Again, I'm coming from the fact that I've never been a pastor, so I can't really speak
to that per se.
But for you, how does that work?
Because do you find that you need to necessarily guard yourself?
That's the question.
And in that case, then how do you become a true friend to serve a said person?
But at the same time, why can't you?
Right.
So there's a few dynamics without getting too deep into the weeds.
I would say number one, everybody wants to be your friend until you have a hard thing
to say to them.
Sure.
Right.
Tell it like it is, pastor.
Come on.
Tell it like it is.
They're like, oh, we're too close to home.
So that can turn things.
The other thing is it's like I have seen the absolute best of humanity in a pastoral role
and I have seen the absolute worst.
I mean things that are so dark and are so ugly that were perpetrated or endorsed or whatever
by quote unquote normal congregational members.
If someone asks me in the congregation, how are you doing?
Like what's up?
It's like, first of all, there's things that I just flat out can't share just like any
counselor or anybody, whatever.
And there's always a little bit of that dynamic of that person who is trying to get to know
me knowing that there are things that I can't disclose.
That's always between us to a certain degree.
That can be a challenge.
So that person is okay with that and comfortable with that.
Great.
But if they're uncomfortable with their being that like X factor of unknown, because it,
I mean like Andy with you and I shoot with any of us guys here, the hope would be that
we would be continually working in our relationships to be more and more transparent to the, to
even to the levels of like uncomfortability and pain for the well-being of each other.
Right?
Like that would be the sense.
It's very hard to go to that place with congregation members.
That is a challenge.
The other thing I would say is sometimes when you do share the things that are bugging you,
people don't know how to handle it.
They don't, you know, it's like, dog on it.
I put my pants on one leg at a time just like everybody else.
I got, you know, gosh, last year, last year around this time a little bit earlier, actually
into the summer, like there was, there was, you know, there was a thing with, with one
of my kiddos that was really bothering me and it was good.
It was getting to was affecting, it was affecting a lot of things in my life.
And I'll be honest with you.
When people asked me how that was going, I don't know if they, like, I don't, I don't
know if they knew how to receive that.
I don't know if, because I was like trying to be honest, you know, what the, what the
thing was that was in my life that was the most, it was the most challenging.
And so it's kind of like, you know, there's, yeah, there are some, you know, there's,
there are some, there are some landmines there at the same time.
I want to believe that I can be, I can have meaningful friendships with the people in
my, in my congregation.
So, so how, how as people in your congregation, how can they support you do this?
I mean, we've talked about, we've talked about cards and words of encouragement and
even, even gifts.
Yeah.
Like what's that look like for, for the two of you, you know, even, even now Tyler, you're
not necessarily in, in day to day pastoral ministry, but you're still in it.
Yeah.
Right.
So what's, what do those things look like for you?
So here's what I think.
So I'll say this and then, and then I definitely want to hear what Tyler would say, but, um,
okay.
The way you can show appreciation to your senior pastor at a bigger congregation level.
So by the way, this is like, if you are someone that's part of a church and just even as a
voting church member, this is an awareness you can have.
If you're a deacon or an elder, you have some sort of, some sort of role.
This is what I would, I would say you need to lovingly the way you, you can appreciate
your pastor is to lovingly mandate certain rhythms of self care into their life.
Um,
So you're saying advocate for them.
Yeah.
Like, like as, as, as just church members, you advocate for them to the, to the board
and then stay at your hand at the, at the church meeting and go, Hey, when does pastor
so-and-so get their, when, when, when, when is there sabbatical happening?
Um, what are we, what are we doing?
What are we doing about that?
Um, have we budgeted, have we budgeted that?
You know, if you're on the finance, are we budgeting for sabbatical?
Are we budgeting for someone to do pulp, pulp it supply or whatever is needed while
they're gone?
Um, are, uh, so, so those be a hand, you can be a hand razor and razor hand and ask those,
ask those questions.
Um, as an advocate for, for your, for your pastor, that's, that's, and that's one way
to show appreciation.
The other thing I would say is if you're on a board where you are, you setting the expectations
for what, what, how the pastor dedicates their time or whatever.
Uh, yes, mandate sabbaticals.
Um, there's a lot of discussion around how frequently that should be done.
I, the net, the network with which I, I'm, I still hold my ordination, but as I was
serving in, it's every, you know, a lot of, it's every fourth year they look at, they
look at doing a sabbatical.
I don't know if that's changed much Tyler.
It's usually between four to seven years, but if it's seven years, it's three months.
Yeah.
Um, you know, but it's like they're, they're really serious.
They're really serious.
The network is really serious about that.
And there, there's, I know there's been some pretty intentional conversations around it.
The other thing is, uh, and I did this executive pastor, uh, you need to have a circle of, of
people that are praying for you outside of your immediate ministry context.
And I, I, as an executive pastor, I mandated that for my staff.
I said, you need to have three to five people that do not have a dog in the hunt in this
local congregate and this local congregation.
So this is a little bit out, this is a little bit outside of local congregation, but, um,
who you can, you can share your prayer needs with and they, and they will, and they will
do that.
Well, and I think that that's probably a better thing to have on the out, like outside of
your local church.
Cause again, like, yes, you can, you can be friends with the people in your church, but
like you said earlier, Joel, like you have this confidentiality that you can't necessarily,
and again, not saying, well, if it's like, Hey, I'm pissed off at my senior pastor right
now and I need you to pray for me.
It's like, maybe shit.
Yeah.
Um, no, but I mean, as if you have your prayer circle, your prayer shield outside of your
local congregation, then you, you can not necessarily giving details of it.
Cause you still want to be confidential to who you're talking about, but you can open
up a little bit more and say what you're struggling with and how people compare in particular.
So if you're an elder and you're responsible for assigning, you know, assigning job description,
whatever to your, your senior pastor, your youth pastor, whatever it is as an elder,
what I would say is, Hey, a part of your job, part of your job requirement is having a group
of people outside of this congregation that are actively praying for you that you're,
that you're sharing with regularly.
And like we're going to require that.
So there, there's that, uh, there's the sabbatical thing.
And then I would say a regular rhythm of a day of like a silence and solitude, like on
a monthly basis kind of thing.
Some pastors that get, and again, as I'm saying this, I know that someone is hearing
going, you don't live my ministry life.
Where's the time to, you know, to do these sort of things where I can't afford it.
Here's the deal.
I want, please hear me in all love and respect.
You cannot afford not to do these things.
The studies, the studies are in what I just read here is the result of unhealthy rhythms
and that have just been, you know, um, have just been, the volume has just been turned
up on them over the last few years and we're looking at it.
So, uh, the way you can appreciate your pastor is to sort of impose upon them healthy opportunities
for healthy rhythms, whether or not they follow through on it, that's going to be on them.
But communicating to them, this is a value for us.
We want to appreciate you in the, in these ways.
Uh, and we want to give you space and we want to give you an expectation.
Well, and I think another good way to do that is to mandate and mandate and provide finances
for counseling.
Yeah.
Because I think a lot of times pastors in general aren't necessarily going to do that
if they're not, I don't want to say forced to, but they're taking a lot on their shoulders
and need to be able to get that off.
And so they're with counseling that's in their relationship where they can have a confidentiality,
but it'd be able to work out some of the things that are going on in their lives.
Like, yeah, I think that would be a good thing.
You could do a preemptive as well of, of not counseling, but rather spiritual direction
so that you're heading it off at the past before it.
There's counseling needed.
I know my church provided for me to meet with a spiritual director every month for,
I mean, nine to 10 years and that made a really big difference in being able to pivot and
spend some really difficult time.
Can you explain for our listeners what the difference between counseling and spiritual
direction would be?
In a nutshell, counseling is kind of like, what's the joke?
God was the first counselor.
He said, where are you and what have you done to Adam?
I give credit to a federal computer for that one.
But a counselor is kind of digging at kind of like places that need like real healing.
A spiritual director is helping you kind of look at where God is working in your life,
helping you discern what next steps might look like.
I used to say with my spiritual director that my theme was chasing God's glory.
And so my spiritual director was constantly helping me open my eyes, seeing how God is
at work, even in difficult situations.
He was not there to counsel me.
He was there to ask questions that opened and unveiled and directed.
He's like a listening partner, helping you hear.
Yeah, kind of thing.
That's the same line.
It really is because a spiritual director can lead you into an area where you definitely
need, you discover that you really do need some counseling.
A couple of things I would just note.
One would be that in an environment where an open position used to generate 20, 30 or
more applications, we're now seeing one, two, or three applications.
So there just simply aren't a lot of people going into ministry for various reasons, the
time and the pay.
I mean, it's not a high paying job for many people and it's a lot of work and it costs
you, it costs your family.
And so right off the bat, we're giving advice for pastors and for congregation.
Just know that pastors are in high demand and congregations need to be careful to not
assume that there's just someone else going to come in and pick up the ball if this pastor
burns out and leaves.
It's really putting the weight on congregation to take care of the people that they have.
And for pastors to take care of themselves.
So I just wanted to note that's a key point.
As far as like hair, I think that if you're a pastor and you're listening to me, I was
guilty of it.
We all have blind spots where we just kind of think that we're functioning really well
but we're not.
We're functioning out of tiredness or the last dregs at the bottom of the barrel.
And it's helpful to remember what my mentor told me, 83-year-old Dan Slavaugh.
He said, listen, the Holy Spirit was at work before you showed up.
You're going to keep working when you die or when you leave.
Don't think you're the Holy Spirit.
It's kind of in line with Joel saying that you can't not afford to take that time off
or to reorient.
If you're pouring into other people, you must take breaks.
My congregation gave me a weekend away every quarter and you have to learn to step out
of it because it will be removed from you if you don't learn to step out of it.
When we're seeing that roll out all around, a dear friend just had that happen a couple
weeks ago, burned out, tired, said things that they never intended to say in meetings
and wound up having to step out.
Everything is fine until it's not.
And that's how it goes.
I just, yeah, I think for anybody listening, wherever you are, if, again, congregation
member, church leader, pastor, whomever, there's all this work that all of us can do together
that is just, there's good preventative work that can be done.
There's agreements that we can come to where we say, hey, all of us together are going
to promote the longevity and the health of the ministry that we're engaging in.
And that means appreciating each other in very practical, specific ways.
Having built in rhythms in which we do that, there's a month dedicated to it, but man-o-man,
a card of appreciation.
When I served here at Clinton Frame, there are a few individuals here.
Their ministry is card writing.
Tyler, I have the same deal.
I have those saved.
There's a box that I keep them in.
I just opened them up.
Oh, gosh, it was last month.
I was like, there's this whole, I've got this whole crate of cards, even it was my last
sermon that I preached here a few years ago.
Just cards upon cards.
Oh, man, really, really powerful, meaningful stuff.
So there's the practical things.
There's also the structural, you know, what do you want to call it, job description sort
of things, things like that that we can do to show that we appreciate the pastoral role
in our churches and that we understand that while this person has a unique gifting and
a unique call, they are human just like the rest of us and that they have needs just like
the rest of us.
So, you know, friends, I hope that's what you hear.
I hope that's what you've encountered.
If maybe you're in a situation where that is not the reality right now, then the effect
change.
Raise your hand.
Ask some questions.
Ask how pastors are really doing.
Do what you can do to make a positive impact in that area.
Yeah, kind of in closing, I know you're beginning to wrap up.
I'd just like to know, make this offer that if someone's listening to this that's in ministry
or someone is a ministry leader working with a pastor and they'd like to talk to somebody
outside of their context, feel free to reach out to dad and they can pass that information
to me.
I have met with a number of pastors outside of my context and I'd love to make those
connections and walk with them or leaders.
I just want to give one last little pointer.
Evaluation.
Just consider that if you're working with your pastor and you want to make it a great
experience, consider using something like an appreciative inquiry method.
Ask what's going well.
What are the strengths?
What are the places that you dream about for this ministry?
Where are your challenges?
Well, I tell you, it's a lonely place when you're the only pastor and suddenly it's
review time and all the questions are about ways that maybe you're not picking up the
ball, especially if they do a survey of the whole congregation.
It's just basically inviting a shooting gallery.
Just consider even just the way your structure is set up to work with something like an appreciative
inquiry process.
It's just a game changer.
It really is for the congregation and the leader.
Thanks for having me on.
Yeah, thanks for joining us.
It always flies.
It's always great.
And so glad that each and every one of you were able to join us this time around.
As always, you can head over to dudesandadspodcast.com.
Well the show notes there, again, will connect you with Tyler.
We're always available to have a conversation.
Always love that.
So, dudes and dads podcast at gmail.com for all your emails five seven four two one three
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Well, hey friends, thanks for joining us and until next time we wish you grace and peace.
Bye.
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