Twenty Ways (15 wasn’t enough) To Solve Our Pastor Shortage, Conclusion

Over the past three weeks I’ve shared fourteen ways in which we might move towards solving our pastor shortage in the evangelical world.

While I’ve done some bemoaning of our situation, your responses have been encouraging.  I have not felt like a “voice crying in the wilderness.” I’ve found that many of you share my concern, many of you are praying about it and many of you are thinking (deeply) about it and are willing to consider some innovative ways of meeting this challenge.

Just yesterday a former youth pastor told me that we need to return to the days when youth workers were praying for ten in ten: ten young people going into Christian ministry in ten years of the youth pastor’s tenure.  Awesome!

In today’s post I’m not going to reiterate the fourteen ways I’ve shared so far.  Instead, I’ll give you links to the first three posts in case you’d like to check them out for the first time or review where we’ve been:

Fifteen Ways To Solve Our Pastor Shortage, Part One

Fifteen Ways To Solve Our Pastor Shortage, Part Two

Twenty Ways (15 wasn’t enough) To Solve Our Pastor Shortage, Part Three

Now it’s time to finish this up and then get to work at solving our pastor shortage.

15. Tired pastors can share pastorates.

I have seen this done.  Issues surrounding who does what and, especially, who leads the church, must be worked out of course, but this is not impossible. (If you’re tired enough, you’re willing to let someone else call the shots.)

This is not an unreasonable solution at all when we face the simple fact that in the churches of the first century, solo leadership of a church was clearly not the norm.  If your Bible college, seminary, or denomination has not allowed you to face this truth, see it for yourself by examining Acts 11:30, 14:23, 15:1-22, 20:7-38, I Timothy 5:17-22, Titus 1:5-16, James 5:14 and I Peter 5:1-4.

Many a pastor has worn himself out trying to do all the tasks which God’s Word assigns to a team of elders but his congregation has assigned to him alone. Instead of leaving the ministry altogether, perhaps an increasing number of wise and weary shepherds can move from exhausting, more-than-full-time pastorates to less demanding, shared pastorates.

16. Longer, healthier pastorates will lessen the need.

This is a big subject so I’m going to refer you to an excellent and thought-provoking book, Extended Stays, by Rich Brown. Brown wants pastors to make a concerted effort to do everything they can to make their current pastorate a long one by making it good and long.  While acknowledging that not all long pastorates are good pastorates, good ones tend to be longer, more productive and more fruitful for the Kingdom of God.

Good, long pastorates are clearly the ideal to work towards and will help alleviate the pastor shortage by decreasing the pastoral dropout rate, improving overall church health (see #2 in the first post of this series) and encouraging more young men to follow the example of their beloved pastors and seek long pastoral ministries for themselves.

17. We can treat pastors better.

A couple of beleaguered pastor friends wanted to make sure that I didn’t forget this one. Here’s the bottom line:  A few churches treat their pastors exceptionally well.  Quite a few churches treat their pastors reasonably well.  More than a few churches treat their pastors very poorly.

This should not be the case of course, and one of these days I’ll write about this.  For now, we’ll just say that too many congregations pay their pastors too little, expect far too much work from them, speak to them and about them disrespectfully, despise their sincere efforts at leadership, make unreasonable demands on their families, expect them to have all the gifts which God gives to entire teams of elders, etc.

If you have any concern that you’re not treating your pastor well, ask him.  If you don’t trust his judgment (or mental health), allow an objective third party to assess the situation and tell you what he observes. God is not likely to bless your church until you stop abusing your pastor.

18. We can consider mergers, fostering and adoptions.

Mergers – Too many towns have multiple tiny congregations with underpaid pastors – or no pastors at all. Mergers are not easy. They present all the challenges of the blended family. But there are some “Brady Bunch” churches out there which have made this work well with much help from God.

“Fostering” means that a dying or pastor-less congregation temporarily hands itself over to a thriving congregation. The foster parent congregation – for a year or so – provides funds, leadership, preaching and help with Sunday worship until the hurting church is ready to stand on its own again, in some cases, with pastoral leadership from a candidate trained by the healthier congregation.

“Adoption” occurs when a pastor-less, hurting congregation joins in and becomes a part of a larger, healthier church. The struggling congregation loses its unique identity and name, but the congregants gain the privilege of becoming part of a healthy church family with a healthy pastor.

19. We can rethink our theology of calling.

Again, this is a big subject.  All I’m asking here is that you join me in seeking the truth of the Scriptures on this subject.

Here’s my concern: The theology that says that every congregational pastor, part-time or full-time, must be someone who received, at some point in time, a clear, dramatic and unmistakable call from heaven to enter the pastorate, is questionable Biblically and a hindrance to finding the gifted leaders (Ephesians 4:11- 13) whom God has provided for our churches.

While servants of God such as Moses, Isaiah and Paul received clear messages from God about His will for their lives, the New Testament model for church leadership from elders (see #15 above) includes no mention of such calls. Rather, the candidate for eldership is seen as needing the required character (I Timothy 3:1-7, Titus 1:5-9), acquired respect (I Timothy 3:2, 5:21-22), a spiritual gift or gifts appropriate for church leadership (Acts 20:28-32, Romans 12:3-8) and a God-given desire to do the ministry (I Timothy 3:1, I Peter 5:2).

Many of us who have served as full-time pastors for decades “found our calling” by way of trial and error, the discovery of our spiritual gifts, the observations of others and the God-given desires of our hearts. We believe that God called us to our work in eternity and we discerned that call over a period of time. There’s no reason why people in their 40’s, 50’s, or 60’s can’t find their way into the ministry the same way we found our way into it in our teens, 20’s or 30’s.

20. Churches can become more willing to call pastors who don’t quite fit their wish list.

Too many churches are remaining pastor-less year after year because their pastor profiles (their dream descriptions of their ideal pastoral candidate) are too long, too narrow or too detailed.

Putting it as succinctly as possible, some churches want to pay too little, expect too many hours of work, expect too many gifts or competencies, have too narrowly defined their ideal age range, want too much experience, expect perfect agreement with their congregation’s denominational or theological position, etc. I have a highly gifted and godly pastor friend who sent his resume to hundreds – not dozen but hundreds – of congregations before finding one which was willing to seriously consider him.

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION:

1. Is the pastor or are the pastors in the room right now tired? Tell the group why you’re so tired. Give him or them the gift of listening.
2. Can anyone in the room describe a long, healthy pastorate which resulted – among other things – in young people pursuing vocational ministry?
3. Is our church a candidate for a merger, foster care or adoption? Could we further God’s Kingdom work by being the healthy church involved in one of these arrangements?
4. What is our congregation’s theology of the “pastoral call”? Is it keeping people out of the pastorate?
5. If your church is seeking a pastor, do you have a good balance between wanting a good “fit” and being open to someone with whom God might want to surprise your church?