Focus on Four

Pastors have a tremendous amount of responsibility.  We face an endless list of things that need our attention from our families, our churches, our communities and our own personal needs.  At times, I find myself looking for the phrase, "He gave some to be jugglers" in Ephesians 4...but it's not there.  Whether we are working 40 hours a week or on the road for 20, we must find a way to balance all those things.  For me, this reality hit home in 2012 when I entered back into bivocational ministry after 5 years and 4 months.  We had a unique situation of coming to a church that had went through a season of difficulty and experienced quite a bit of decline in attendance and the availability of workers was scarce.  Don't get me wrong, the people that were there were willing to help in whatever way necessary.  I was super cautious of not wanting to put too much on them and so I did what most pastors did...I did much of it myself.

I was in deep.  I feared asking people to help around the church mostly because I had a fear that it wouldn't be done my way. Stupid, I know.  As if I was the only one who could shovel the sidewalks, set up ProPresenter, do my own graphics, find a Sunday morning video illustration, Blah, Blah, Blah.  The issue exploded on January 4, 2013 when I was overwhelmed and found myself at the brink of wanting to throw in the towel.  Thank God for amazing Network leadership.  John Musgrave, OMN Director of Church development, gave me some great advice.  He asked me to focus on four things that were things only I could do at that point.  He assured me that anything I was doing that didn't get picked up by someone else wasn't all that important.  He was spot on.  I began coming up with the list of those things I was doing and met with others who I felt could do it.  I knew if I let them know where I was, they would step up.  If not, it would probably be okay and wasn't vital to reaching the community for Christ.

Here are the four things I began to FOCUS on.  Not that other things don't have my attention or I am not ware of them, it's just that I realized if those "other things" don't get accomplished,  life would go on at Velocity Church.

1. The business of the church.  Working with the treasurer/book keeper week in and week out to ensure everything was paid up, taxes were covered and we locked down some incredible systems so the business of the church wouldn't hinder the ministry of the church.   I talked more about the business of the church in the October post, Be About The Business.

2.  New visitor/absentee follow-up.  I knew it was important for me to cover this.  For us, we know that people coming in and who have missed a couple Sunday's, need to hear from the pastor.  Our process isn't extensive but it is important.  In a church our size, the people are expecting to have decent access to my wife and I.  I knew if I delegated this concept to someone else, it would backfire.

3.  Membership.  I still believe in the commitment that comes with church membership.  We use Growth Track to aid us in moving new people along in their process at Velocity Church.  Moving new people from consumer to contributor is vital in ANY church.  It's not just doing a class...it's connecting with new people on a level where we learn about one another and they find their niche at Velocity

4.  Sunday Morning Preaching.  For a VERY long time, I had to focus on just a Sunday morning message.  Not videos, not fill in the blank notes, not bulletins or the occasional stage design.  People at Velocity didn't NEED those things.  They neeed a message that would challenge them in their faith and connect them to their creator.

For you, perhaps your four will be similar or much different.  Every situation is unique.  Your church needs you healthy and on your A-Game.  If you are playing "juggler" with things not vital to church health, it's a C-Game at best.  Be sure to talk with your board and leadership about making the necessary changes for you to shrink your list because it won't happen overnight and won't be effective without their help.

Bivocational Pastor...Get Some Rest!

If you follow this blog, you are confused right now.  If you don't follow this blog, you likely saw the last title and are thinking I have a split personality.  Here's what is happening.  I shared in October about finding something to do outside of ministry that breathes life into you, brings you joy or occupies your mind from ministry.  I stand behind that to this day.  Suddenly, you find me telling you to Get Some Rest...and I have good reason to because a lack of rest is why I haven't posted in 2 months.  I have had a problem for far too long of not taking some time off/rest and it caught up with me in a nasty way.  I came to Velocity Church in 2011 and have only taken one vacation in nearly 6 years.   It's dumb and I certainly don't recommend it.  A day off sounded more like a unicorn or Sasquatch because they just didn't seem to exist on a regular basis in my world.  I couldn't ever tell anyone what my day off was because if I wasn't at the church, I was out trying to sell something. I always said I would work it in but you likely know how that goes because something unexpected happens and there went any hopes of time off because if we really have to "work it in", it isn't all that important to us.

As I have previously mentioned, all but approximately 18 months of my time at Velocity Church has been bivocational.  For 2 1/2 years, I was working a 40 hour work week while pastoring.  The last 20 months, I have been doing sales.  Trust me...there is a difference from those two scenarios.  When I would work the 40 hours, I was done with work and ready to set my mind on things at the church at the end of the day.  Yes, that has it's own challenges that many pastors realize and live through every week.  In sales, it is much different from the view that I am never really "clocked-out" except on Sunday's and oh yeah, I have to preach on those days.  For so long now, my mind has typically been in one of two places...Sales or Pastoring.  Unless of course I was at football as I shared in my previous post.  It seemed as if I never had a break from THINKING about "work."  Unfortunately, it caught up with me. 

There were several things that led up to this URGENT need for a Time Out.  Perhaps I can share how that went at another time.  It ranged from using a vision God gave for a building expansion to validate myself, trying to pastor the church I wanted rather than the church I have and focusing on planning a project rather than pastoring people.  I was in a BAD spot!!!  Sure, it all looked great on the outside but on the inside, I was a mess.  A close friend of mine asked me what my destructive behavior was. IT didn't take long to figure that out in that moment.   It wasn't cheating on my wife, doing drugs, hitting the bottle, gambling, ripping off the church, looking at pornography or whatever other destructive behavior I could of found myself in.  My destructive behavior was that I didn't care!  I didn't care about the needs of people in the church, how much office time I put in, how much I was putting into messages or Bible studies.  That same mentality trickled into my sales job as I found myself taking shortcuts, not making follow-up calls, not sending out letters, not engaging in sales meetings and dismissing possible leads.

On November 13, I announced to the church that I would be taking a 3 week sabbatical from ministry.  Leading up to that Sunday, I met with our church board and some key leaders to share with them what I was dealing with.  They were all in agreement that I needed the time off.  The first 2 weeks I didn't do anything ministry or church related but still ran sales calls.  The final week I was off from all things Velocity Church and Culligan Water.  A week of REAL REST and VALUABLE TIME OFF.  Just as I will share about the struggles and mindset I had leading up this need to take time off, I will also share about what I am planning to do in the future to make sure I don't travel down this road again.

If you are like me, you are thinking how could I possible afford to go somewhere.  I would challenge that and tell you that you can't afford NOT to.  Trust me, it is beneficial to get away geographically...that's why we spent our final week in Myrtle Beach.  I have a pdf of some incredibly affordable or FREE opportunities that range from cabins, Bed and Breakfast, retreat centers or campgrounds.

The link below is a list by Lifeway of some additional affordable retreats/vacation spots for pastors.

http://www.lifeway.com/pastors/retreats-and-getaways/

My wife and stayed at the Hampton Inn on this list in Myrtle Beach for our final week.  Our 4 nights cost us $266.  The first image is from our bed looking at the ocean.  The second image is us enjoying the view in the morning from the balcony. The only thing that separated the ocean from hotel was the hotel swimming pools and about 30 yards of sand. We are going back in April.

The reality is that in Exodus 20, it takes 4 verses to talk about the Sabbath Day or Rest. The other Commandments contain 1 verse on keeping God first, 3 verses on idolatry, 1 verse on misusing the Lord’s name, 1 verse on honoring your mother and father, 1 verse to not murder, 1 verse to not commit adultery, 1 verse to not steal,1 verse to not lie and 1 verse to not covet your neighbors stuff.  Here's my take.  The 4 verses on rest doesn't necessarily make it the most important BUT without the rest, we will struggle to keep the other 9.

Find time to rest. 

Control your calendar, don't let it control you.  

Don't let your diligence become disobedience.