How to Prevent Pastoral Burnout and Promote Healthy Church Culture

so Mike you and I both know that pastors often struggle more than we would like and there are signs that pastors are going to start struggling and I notic things like uh sleeplessness yeah on one side on the other side hyper workor that causes it right and others that get burned out and they you find they're coming to meetings or preaching sermons unprepared so they can't manage their time they can't decide whether they should work really hard or that they're exhausted that's one thing I notice

yeah um sometimes things like red eyes and gaining weight yep and being short with people those are some signs that things aren't going well for a pastor what do you see uh small and you know you wrote a book about pastures that go far off the rails yeah one thing I'll start with is just the realization that you know most pastors start off you know with visions of what they want to be as a pastor and and and by God's grace making our best effort to be those people but then some pastors as years

tick by and the wear and tear happens they find themselves turning into people they didn't expect yes um and part of it is the reasons you pointed out it could be the exhaustion the stress the anxiety the pressure um one of the reasons I wrote my book Bly Pulpit was that sometimes and no one sets out to be this um pastors can begin to find that they're holding on so tightly to uh their Ministry their leadership that they begin to use Tech techniques and tactics that just really go beyond the bou

nds of what scripture calls us to and um I think you things can can get dangerous there people can can turn into some times pastoral bullies as a result and there's a level of compassion we can have on that because there's a level in which sometimes that's happening because they're they're feeling so much pressure like most people kind of lash out you know and so you can understand that but at the same time we want to help obviously the church be a place where that happens less um so that God's

people are protected yeah so right I mean we notice one of my friends said it this way politicians and pastors are frighteningly similar they are they start off trying to change the world and they end up being part of the problem not part of the solution so you know politicians want to be um honest and just and bipartisan and then they start worrying about get elected right and pastors can um hold on to their office they can also get weary of having every last person in the church being their bo

ss or at least everybody in the leadership team everybody has an opinion and they do start to get angry and shout and uh they do start to bully small small B not a big b bully but uh little acts maybe telling half truth telling people what they want to hear so we recognize we both recognize small things we just spend a minute would you tell us just a couple things about what to do if you have a big b bully and how a church can handle it if they have someone who's not not having ordinary pastoral

problems or ordinary failures real failures but ordinary failures of scientification yeah well I mean one of the things I think you pointed out there which is really key is that it's a gradation right it's you know when we talk about people with with with with problems in the pastor it it's not you know all or nothing and people have a range of different things and like you said some people struggle with things that are what you call ordinary problems but then sadly things advance to these bigg

er problems and and and we've seen that over the last 5 or 10 years maybe more than we had used to we don't know um where it seems like there's more capital B bullies out there than than maybe uh prior Generations had seen um and there's there's there's ways to spot that um it's important to say that it's not mathematical boy if it were wouldn't that be nice if it was just like you know crunch a few numbers check a few boxes and now you know there's a level of sub subjectivity to it we have to b

e very careful and cautious but I'll mention one thing that to keep an eye out for and that is uh you know what what what folks have called the relational debris Field behind uh certain leaders that they lead for a while and there's sort of this trail of bodies behind their leadership um and we're not talking about the normal conflict that happens in Ministry because that look you do ministry with sinful people and we're Sinners there's going to be conf disagree absolutely and people get hurt ye

p and and feelings get hurt and those can be tough things it can be painful things but the kind of debris field we're talking about is sort of destroyed lives um a wreckage of of lives usually people leaving usually broken relationships usually unrepaired relationships can be one of the telltale signs that you might have a leader on your hands who's who's heading down unhealthy path um and it's it's causing problems in the church yeah you know one of the things about pastors is they're put on a

ped they're very you're the most awesome ever and then knock down to I mean the man's just incompetent I don't know whys we ever hired him at the top there is this sort of we are special mythology and we're we're special because I'm special and you're with me yes and when that starts to happen I know you wrote about this but a lot of people see it you start surrounding yourself with people who will protect you and the people around think you're special who think you're special you know the truth

matter is maybe they are special yeah I me you know professional athletes think they're special cuz they are yeah they're distinctively gifted talented right and so sometimes even have a pastor is distinctively talented but then they surround themselves with people who want to protect them because they are attacked Y and they do suffer and we want to make sure he can be at his best but the difficulty is then when they start to go off in an unhelpful Direction the board or the elders whoever it

is that would correct them is unwilling to hear anything negative because they're so they're so intent on defending the leader I'm now I'm not back to I'm not talking about Big B bully yeah I'm talking about a person who slowly goes in a destructive Direction yes yeah no this this is what I call the franchise model of pastoral Ministry um and the fact they used a sports analy is totally fitting CU I think the world has an idea of of how you you lead an organization the way you lead an organizati

on is you you find your Superstar and then you build the organization around your Superstar and that's true for sports that's true for CEOs of companies lawyers and lawyers and well why not for the church um and you build your entire Ministry around the identity of this individual but we all know that the track record of that is not healthy and we know that that model is not necessarily uh one we find in it's unbiblical tot unbiblical of gifts not and what we don't realize is that not only are w

e hurting the church and we do that we're actually actually hurting the pastor too because you set him up for failure because nobody can live live up to that no one can maintain that level of expectation on them and so what happens is when things start to go bad you end up having Church splits and destructions and different things and and I I wrote my book certainly about uh bully pastors but I also wrote it within that trying to positively recover what does humble leadership look like right wha

t is what does gracious kind leadership like Christ look like what does gentle leadership look like and truthfully I think maybe the church has listened to um secular models of leadership a little too much not that we can't learn anything from those but they have a certain vision for leaders that I I don't know it works very well in the body of Christ yeah and you know what's funny is we're talking about this topic neither of us is really an expert in this we're both kind of exites and church hi

storians we're biblical Scholars and pastors and doing our best to think about how to how to solve this one of the things that I've noticed uh you know when you study the Reformation is that every last leader you can or po Reformation post-reformation all deeply flawed men of course yeah and you know Wesley could be almost almost um relationally clueless violent proud not violent physically but relationally violent Whitfield of course great as he is not only was against slavery and Chang his min

d he actually advocated for the laws to be changed to allow slavery to be reintroduced for the sake of his projects y um Luther became pretty violent his language are actually very violent yeah um and a number of his views of certain groups were very concerning yes deeply concerning but there are also positive stories of people who turned it around like Calvin who you know was fired and given basically 48 hours to get out of town in his late 20s and he said hey I don't need 48 hours I'll be I'll

be gone before he blinked twice right and then he came back and when he came back he was a changed man for having been under Martin botser yeah who taught him humility and Grace and he was a different man yeah not completely different he still sinned but he was different he knew how to compromise you know how to listen to people um how do we so that's that's a fact uh how can we encourage people today to um to have those flaws cut away as much as possible and also to grow as much as possible be

cause it does it is a path of decline often people start well and they slowly slip away but people do also turn around and become better men than they were 10 or 20 years ago those historical lessons have so many things we can learn from them I mean one of the things it reminds us of is that we're all flawed yes men and and women and who are sinners that that God still by a Sovereign Grace uses and so even the the the the stories of real serious failings throughout um the church we can always so

rt of acknowledge this is why we believe in the sovereignty of God God can take broken Fallen leaders and still do his purposes with them at the same time another lesson we learn though is that when we do come across those uh Fallen traits that that we we we don't ignore them we don't pretend they're not there we don't we don't slide them under the carpet and we don't we don't call them good when they're not and I think there's a common of acknowledging we're all in this boat together and God ca

n still use sinful people at the same time honesty uh and and forthrightness about these flaws in our past leaders and in ourselves um and then I would add to that there's also a point where everybody has flaws in Ministry you and I and anyone else who would have this conversation but there's also a point where the flaws lead to what we would call disqualification yes is right and there there is a point where you where you cross a line do you always know where that line is no you don't um and yo

u know bodies have to figure that out and so there's sort of what you use the term earlier normal failings can we say it that way orary faing uh and then the failings that do cross over into the not that you're not a Christian not that Jesus doesn't love you but that being a minister is something that you may have disqualified yourself yeah let's pick up on that so um I'll stick with Calvin for a second yeah uh you know he and frell actually were a team that led to uh led the church and the whol

e city of Geneva into great conflict right and they had a long investigation of it and I mean it was it was pretty disastrous but they decided they were both good and educated men and Godly men but they brought out the worst in each other at least at that period of time and they said we Calvin wrote a letter phell saying we are forbidden to colleague together so they're you're bad for each other that's the judgment and so you you can be friends you can write you can visit each other but you can'

t work together yeah um and so that was a really helpful corrective and they both received it which reminds me that the number one mark in my experience of someone who's disqualified is that they won't receive criticism that's right and you know you get somebody who's caught in a lie let's say a pastor I mean and and they deny that they're lying they'll look you right in the eye and say they're not lying and they are lying and you know they're lying and you have to say to them you can't possibly

think I believe what you're saying and oh yeah it's sincere it's like you we both know it's a lie and these are the people that end up in shipwreck yes when they won't receive Godly loving but firm correction no one of the things I I wrote about in in my book on this is there there's a level of defensiveness yes that we all have but there's a level of defensiveness for for for people that you're describing that that it's like a trigger point when you criticize them or bring up something that ne

eds to change it there's a switch that flips and they can go on the attack and so one of the things that that that that marks some of these problematic leaders is not only are they uh unable to receive criticism but they also often Dole it out there's there's a funny combination there it's like the very people who can't receive it are highly critical of their staff highly critical of those under them in a way that we all know there's times to correct there's times to Shepherd and and show where

things need to change but almost leading by um fault finding yes um and you know that that combination you know almost clinically is the definition of narcissism where you can't receive criticism and then dle it out all the time and you know those can be really dangerous in ministries I don't I you know I don't know that that was true of any of these historical figures we're talking about certainly but um I think you know there's certainly been cases where it seems to be be true yeah another way

to say it is the better the person the quicker they are to repent yeah and sadly the farther from God a person is and I'll even say a Believer who's just strayed somehow the slower they are to admit their sin and if anything goes wrong of course it's your fault right not mine and you shouldn't even bringing this up anyway so yeah there's an amazing ability to turn the tables there is it's like you come into the room thinking I'm trying to confront you with and you leave feeling like you're the

problem and you're like yeah you're like how'd that happen how how did I leave now that I'm the you know I'm the problem and you're like how does a person have the ability to do that it's like is there a class they take where they learn how to turn the tables um but it is it is a skill yeah so there's always this give and take and this is the comp complexity of these these um uh Ministry scenarios and this this really leads to one of the things that you and I were discussing before we got starte

d today is what kind of things can churches do um what kind of structures can we put in place and and watch out for to help minimize this from happening because I think we we're just acknowledging that even people who start off good have the potential to end up in in in unhealthy places and some that that start off good can can even get more Godly yes and and and and part of what makes the difference is whether there's things around them that can make that decision you have any I have a couple r

eally things and I know you age because I've read your book um number one is genuine annual reviews in a presbyterian system yes Elders would seriously review the pastor every year and ask not just how's your wife doing how are your kids doing what's your schedule but probe into some of the areas that they've detected for example somebody's working too hard right or if maybe they noticed that there's some issue in their family you know what's how's it going with you and your wife or kids whateve

r the case may maybe they see some un healthy habits even physical habits and they press That's one but I also believe in in talking to staff yeah oh absolutely you know whether you call it a 360 or whatever terminology you use you should definitely if especially if there's a staff of size obviously there's lots of solo churches and there's you know one part-time Administrative Assistant but if it's a church of size which is where things you know where pastors go wrong more I think you should in

terview multiple staff think that's EXA informally yep how's it going but also if there's any hint that things are going poorly a formal interview you know once a year and follow up on it no and and one of the things that that I've seen about those interviews is the staff have to also when they're asked how it's going be assured that they can safely and honestly answer because I've seen time and time again doing 360 reviews where the lower staff are very hesitant to say anything because the pers

on interviewing them they have the impression is the best friend of the senior pastor and they're like wait a second how how safe is this how how neutral is this that's why you have to have Elders who aren't the Buddies of the lead Pastor which we're not asking for hostility between them of course not we're asking for good faith oversight and this is one of the reasons I I mentioned in my book that you know is there a way we could rethink the way we pick our elders um and you know consciously tr

ying to not just create a band of my favorite people um around the senior pastor and obviously like you said you're not looking people to be antagonistic that's a whole another problem and I know that a lot of pastors probably listening to this thing are you kidding my my elders are my biggest Thorn on the side right and they're not protecting me they're they're they're sort of after me and I and I totally get that yes but there but there is a sense in which uh independent voices yes if I could

say it that way on the on the session or on the Elder board are so critical here so that they can listen to the staff genuinely not um beholden to one man or one person um and then the staff knows that they're not they can see it played out that oh this is a place where I and really be honest about what what I what concerns me I know that I'm not going to get fired a week later after bringing it up you know and I think that's a really important thing yeah and of course the best way to have a ses

sion formed is by watching the leaders God's already raising up in the youth ministry children's ministry adult discipleship and the elders are not selected by the pastor they're recognized correct by the whole church made Elders in one sense they're already functioning like that we're we're recognizing what's already happening one more thing on the on the anual reviews want to throw in there and that is um and this is a I know this sounds like a micro step but I just want to encourage the liste

ners to to think about this so many churches do the annual review process in a subgroup of the elders usually called the Personnel committee and usually three or four people are the ones that review the pastor and in the whole Elder board never sees the reviews on an annual basis and it's sort of hidden in a committee to some extent well why that's a concern is is that is typical that when things finally blow up in churches sometimes the large group of the session goes I don't I'm shocked I'm sh

ocked where did this come from and you realize it's been going on for 10 years but it's been sort of hidden away over in a personel committee so one one piece of advice I would give I think is wise is that when the when the annual reviews come in they should be shared with the entire session um so that the session can can see them and can say okay I understand our pastor's not a perfect guy he's got he's got challenges like all of us but we know what they are we can pray for him we can help him

and it wouldn't be a shock later down the road that might also be implicitly an argument for or sessions that aren't too large I think you could say that sure to you know there's sessions of I mean I had a session of 36 at one point and it's it's uh it's almost impossible to really dig into things so U it may be at least an executive committee that hears everything correct yeah good point thanks for that yeah I would say positive things include um just basic decency and following ordinary rules

you know if you visit somebody in the hospital you you say to the family okay are you sleeping and eating and not and not wearing yourself out right so I think I think it really starts with the most basic things like are you reading the Bible and praying and meditating apart from your sermon preparation um what are you reading are you are you only reading to prepare are you reading for your soul y assuming the pastor is married most are not all um tell me about your relationship with your wife w

hat's the quality of your time together you know encourage I I encourage all Pastors make sure you're with your wife one way to say it is um if you don't have sweet time with your wife and dates you'll have she'll point it out and you you'll give the same amount of time and it'll be sad worrying about your problem so so get ahead of the curve and have a good time with your wife you know if you have children in the home still you know have little dates do special things with your kids um just the

most basic practices reading the Bible praying meditating confessing yeah celebrating yeah can I just push that for a second yeah I I think I'll just say one word um I find not only um pastors are beaten down by their elders but Elders are weary Elders need to be praised and thanked for the work they do they do and if you if you have a staff and not everybody has a staff but if you have a staff um children's work Youth Work administrative work um if some if you have a finance director it's a lo

t of it's very thankless and the pastor gets the credit or pastors if there's multiple pastors get the credit and pastors have a unique capacity to take the time to label the excellencies of the people who work with them and to some degree under them and and to assure them their gifts are absolutely essential in the church and that I think has a pervasive influence it helps us so we're not becoming critics no and you know we bless our wives our children and we Bless the people who work for us an

d with us yeah I mean one one of the things I mentioned a minute ago about about unhealthy pastoral Trends is is is over criticism yep and you mentioned a a a swing towards a more healthy Trend which is look for ways to praise and affirm those you work that you work with and that are under you and I think this is just such a a forgotten thing and I understand why it is because we're so busy we're so so swamped and so exhausted the idea of you know we feel unthanked and so we're not when you feel

unthanked you're not going to go thank other people and this is one of the challenges of the weight of pastoral Ministry I get it we're we're in it together but it's amazing how much a word of thanks and affirmation to the staff really encourages them they feel seen by the pastor it's a gentle warm way to lead positively um I would also encourage pastors to to to to look to thank their their their female staff yes um you know one of the things that we're seeing more and more churches which is g

reat is is female paid staff doing variety of jobs and sometimes they feel perhaps not always seen by the senior pastor CU he's he's he's dealing with the elders and the other pastors that just a word of affirmation to your female staff can make a huge difference it really doesn't take long to observe just watch what they do well that you couldn't do correct or maybe you could maybe you could but you probably can't right and and they do it well and the body of Christ needs what they do I mean ju

st something like um taking care of newborns to 5-year-olds yeah you don't get a ton of praise for that no but it's so important I mean healthy church has to have good care of the little ones thank those who take care the little ones you know one thing in all of this and and and this may be a good a good way to land the plane on this conversation is you know wrapped up in in discussions of healthy Ministry unhealthy Ministry that you we could talk about structures and 360 reviews and how to form

a session and all those things matter and I wrote about a lot of those as you know one of the nebulous things here that I'd love to get your thoughts on Dan is is is the effect that church culture has on this whole thing yes so it's not so much a church structure although that's part of it it's not even really so much a church theology although that's certainly really important but isn't it true churches have Vibes and ethoses and cultures and some feel freeing and warm and inviting and some fe

el heavy and and and and maybe even at times oppressive I I wonder your thoughts on do Pastors think enough about that you know and and how to form and shape that because I wonder if if we're missing a piece of the puzzle here because i' I've heard people say it that Church culture trumps just about everything when you try to get stuff done um if it's a bad unhealthy culture versus if it's a good one that's right so let me just say this is maybe a little bit too particular I just finished a a fa

ntastic 2-year interim part-time while still being a professor at a church that had um and has a terrific Vibe and it lost it for a while Co and some things you know there's some Strife that occurred um and so they lost their true nature but there were um there were several people on the staff who were just I'll say by God's grace and gifting extremely positive people and what you have to do is let them flourish and tell them that they positive spirit I'll interrupt myself most pastors are intro

verts especially large churches you have to be willing to sit for 18 hours and working a sermon that means you're an introvert so you're probably not going to convey it's not a criticism just a real a real realistic fact of life you're probably not going to convey warm and enthusiasm but churches need warmth and joy do and so you find your joyful people which this church has an abundance and you label it and you tell them you bring a positive spirit you bring the joy of the Lord you bring the gi

ft of encouragement and affirmation and we're I'm thankful for that you keep it up you make us who we are yeah and you probably have some Elders who are maybe minded to be uh Watchmen or critical but you also have others who are enthusiastic and positive and they see the good and support protect and encourage them yeah so you may not have personally most pastors actually I don't think have a great personal Vibe via people I'm not saying they're bad but they're not great you have people around yo

u who do have a great Vibe no that's right so when you when you think about creating a church culture as a leader you're not even really thinking about who you are although that matters a lot um no one's no one's diminishing that but what is the team I'm to build and what type of people do I want to hire and bring into this team that can create that environment for me and I think one of the things I would encourage the listeners to ponder is that it's not as simple as saying do you affirm these

11 doctrinal things um because there's these intangibles that go with with healthy Godly leadership you know the spirit of things the ethos ethos of things the the way that is manifested is so important I know there's a level of subjectivity to this right you're like well what do you mean exactly and and I think that's exactly why why it matters so much because sometimes if it's subjective we dismiss it as a factor we're not going to consider and I think when we when you walk into the doors of a

healthy Church there is something there that sometimes you can't quite put your finger on and it's not just do you affirm the westmin conf confession of Faith or not there's something else going on there and those are the things I think we need to consider As Leaders yeah and it even includes things like picking your greeters very care it's exactly right I tell people the first face you see on suay morning you better pick that person very carefully cuz that's the impression of the church they'r

e going to have yeah and welcome your visitors every week and say how glad we are to have you and so forth yeah that's good I always enjoyed talking to you Mike great time Dan thanks for the conversation all right thanks