I've recently really been wrestling with a few thoughts about pastors and what causes them to leave ministry. This all came about a few months ago when I heard again of another buddy of mine that I went to college with (Southwestern Bible College) and that he left full time vocational ministry, he told me that he was done, and that he wasn't going to do it ever again. And that was hard to hear, especially because I felt the same way before, however I was very fortunate to have someone who I really respect (now my Pastor) walk with me though that time and encourage me. My heart aches for my buddy, and it made me think of how many more have has some kind of bad experience as well. So I started contacting several of my old buddy's and was a little surprised to find out that 12 out of 20 of them are not currently in a full time vocational ministry an longer. Now please hear me when I say that I don't have a problem with someone leaving full time vocational ministry and making a career doing something else. What I am saying is I want to know what happened to this person along the way that caused them to go from believing that God had called them to full time ministry, then to walk away from that all together, I have a hard time with this. Is it that they where not called to begin with, or a lack of obedience, or did God uncall some of them? I really don't know, but I'm excited to find out some more info. I'm getting a group of the guys together that I graduated with and we are going to have a round table discussion about this very topic of why they pulled out of ministry. I'm convinced that something has to be done, because great leadership does not squash leadership potential, it develops it.
As I process all of this I came back to my thoughts on Obedience....and my question is this, and please let me know your thoughts I'd love to hear them....
If someone feels "Called" to full time ministry, can they be "Uncalled" or is it just a lack of obedience?
5 comments:
Hi Daniel,
I am the crazy girl from PV that invited you and Violet over for dinner. So anyways, I checked out your blog this evening and I wanted to respond to your question. I graduated from Johnson Bible College, in TN, and have a quite alot of college friends in the ministry as well. It has been quite a discussion for those in the ministry to change what they do in their lives. It has been a question of "burn out" to me. I don't know if I will ever understand that term. But what I do think, it is a mix of being "uncalled" and disobedient.
The "uncalled" term is strange as well. The reason is because there is never a time that God calls us away from being commissioned to teach the Gospel and express Love to everyone. I do believe we have seasons in our life that causes extreme times of being on fire and quiet rest in these areas. But I don't think God wants us to get out and get away from the ministry ~ for good. That is our Purpose as His children. I just want to know if what drives you away from the Ministry is in your heart (problem/or no problem, obedience related) ~ or is it the people? That is my question to those who step away.
So, I really hope that you hear good things in your meeting and you feel uplifted from the things you hear. Whoa, sorry for the book- Congrats to you and Violet,
Brooke Spurling (sorry mistakenly deleted it)
What an important topic to discuss. I have seen way too many people in ministry dropping out lately. The people that I am thinking of said that they were just dropping out of "vocational ministry," but would still be in ministry on a volunteer basis. BUT I am not seeing any ministry come from these people except maybe on a very marginal level. I am curious if the group of guys you are trying to get together with would say that they were just leaving "vocational ministry" and if they would say that they are contributing more as volunteers than they were as paid church staff. I wouldn't be concerned with this trend if people were genuinely impacting people for God to the same level that they were when they were in vocational ministry. I just doubt that this is the case the majority of the time.
I agree with Brooke and Donnie in a lot of what they said.
I think that when God calls someone to ministry, that means He beckons their heart to a different way of thinking about others, and gives him or her a fire for constantly seeking an opportunity to minister to the people around him or her. That calling, like Brooke said, is never removed. In fact, the same calling he gives to you and me is the same calling he gives to even the newest Christian.
As far as being called to work full-time as a paid church staff member, I'm not sure God calls anyone to that specifically. What I mean is that we are all called to minister, we then choose to use our ministry in accordance with the gifts God has given us.
For some, that is a full-time position in a church, for others it may be volunteering to teach Preschoolers on weekends, for others it may involve showing Christ's love to their co-worker week in and week out.
I think it is common for people to believe that a calling to full-time ministry automatically means that we quit our job and spend our entire week at the nearest church. Sometimes that overeagerness can hider the calling, and that's why some feel out of place in full-time church work -- they made the simplicity of their calling into something far more complex than it needed to be.
I think that a lot of people mistake the calling for the career.
Sometimes I wonder...
I agree that you can be asked by God to step out of ministry for one reason or another. We each have seasons in our lives and have to trust that God will show us His perfect timing during those seasons.
I do agree that some people are being disobedient and not showing complete Faith in the Lord.
Just because you take a job outside of ministry doesn't mean you have to give up sharing your faith and leading others to Christ though!
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