The call to ministry is a noble one, but it's also a time-consuming role to play. However, our profession as vocational ministers should never take over our lives and we should never act as if we are the primary builders of God's church because we are not. Jesus is the primary builder of the church, and we are merely stewards of what He has built.
An informal Twitter poll by the LifeWay Research institute held in 2013 shows that 87 percent of pastors work from 40 to 59 hours a week. Most surprising is those work hours exclude sermon preparations.
It's crazy to think how little time vocational full-time pastors have left to spend with their families. So much of full-time ministry is focused on serving and meeting the needs of others, administrating church expenses, feeding flocks and strategizing church growth plans.
But the job template of the early church overseers were a whole lot different from today. Paul made sure in his letter to Titus that overseers were not just selected or retained based on their ability to work and hustle. Paul included other requirements and stressed heavily on other key relationships -- family relationships, friendships and relationships with non-churchgoers.
The pastoral calling is one of the very few professions on earth that call for success in marriage, parenthood and friendships to be successful in it. It doesn't matter how smart, eloquent or charismatic a leader is. If his or her relationships are sacrificed on the altar of ministerial success, there can be no thriving ministry.
That's not to say that other professions are excused from taking care of relationships, but the demand is much higher for overseers and pastors. Titus 1:6 says, " An elder must be blameless, faithful to his wife, a man whose children believe and are not open to the charge of being wild and disobedient."
So many ministers today are sacrificing their families to grow church numbers, improve services and strategies on discipleship and so on, but very little is done to cherish and invest in the primary relationships God blesses them with -- family.
Most of the time, this stems from a very high anxiety that is rooted in the belief that as heads of congregations, it is our job to secure the church from finance crashes, service glitches, discipleship loopholes and many other uncontrollable things. The sad thing is that all these problems will always be present because God allows them to happen.
And the reason God allows these problems to happen is to remind us that we are not in charge. He is. Paul reminds us in 1 Corinthians 3:6, "I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth." As we allow God to do the growing, reviving and transforming, we will find more time to spend on things that matter most -- our key relationships with our spouses, children and friends.
