Specifically anxiety and depression.
Another of my friends has written some great blog posts you can read here if you like. What's interesting about this is I was all set to write a blog post about this issue, but having written it I decided to delete it.
Coz trust me, you don't want me writing this on bad week.
In this post, I just want to deal with the sort of pressure we pastors deal with internally on a regular basis. I'd like to give you an insight in my thinking processes. I can't speak for everyone, but as I understand it I'm not alone in many of these feelings. So here goes...
Why be a pastor in the first place?
The short and simple answer (even though it isn't simple or short) is we want to see people know God and experience his love more and more through Jesus. This looks different for everyone. For people who are Christians we want to see them grow more. For people who don't know Jesus, we want them to get to know him and give their lives to him. Around that revolves all sorts of issues concerning church meetings, structures, people, personalities, budgets, etc, etc.
Things that cause pastors stress?
This is hard bit, it's kind of personal, but generally I'd say it all comes down to people. As a pastor, you do all your work with people. A good people day is great. A bad people day? Well, well get to that... Here are situations that cause me (and probably your pastor) serious stress.
Suffering
When you are going through something tough, likely as not your pastor is sharing your pain. The worse it gets, the more he carries of it. I remember waking several times every night for weeks when a friends child was dying of cancer. I'd wake, pray, toss and turn and go back to sleep. Another particularly awful day was going to the funeral of another child.
Attacks from the outside
It is terribly difficult to deal with public attacks. These days they often come via social media. There is often no good answer you could give to your accusers. There is also no real way of making them stop. We lived through one of these situations. Most of it is pure survival via prayer. We were very grateful to have the support of many people, but even still, it caused a lot of stress.
Attacks from within & difficult people
Attacks from difficult people within the church are pretty much the hardest things to deal with. This is for a few reasons. Firstly, the people involved are often people you've been friends with. Sometimes they were close friends. Secondly, they often involve an element of politicking behinds the scenes and slander. There are people I know who were just innocent bystanders but never really got over watching these sorts of issues. Pastors who've lived through these often struggle to trust people with the prospect of being hurt or betrayed again. I ended up at counselling after one of these situations.
Passengers
I want to be careful how I say this, but in many churches there are Christians who are just selfish and lazy. There are issues in their lives they won't deal with. They don't grow and they hardly help. Pastors often pour time and energy into these people in order to help them to grow in Jesus. Sometimes it works. When it doesn't, it sucks the life out of your pastor. Worse than that, these people often passively resist change that needs to happen and fail to welcome newcomers who want to grow as Christians. If a pastor has a whole church full of such people, it's a recipe for depression. If you're a passenger, stop being a passenger and start serving your church.
Whingers
In every place, there are whingers. Complainers. They also join churches. They negatively see things around them spend their lives telling everyone how things aren't good enough. Sometimes they mean well but can't communicate it. Other times, werl you see where I'm heading. These people similarly suck the life out of pastors. Nothing is every good enough and he can begin to think, "why bother". There is an antidote if you're a whinger. Philippians 2:14-16
The tyranny of Sunday
Every week has a Sunday in it. Every Sunday has church (unless you meet another day). Before every Sunday, your pastor has to do a bunch of different things; prep a talk, sort music, get a handout ready, look after any issues, welcome new people from last Sunday, organize the office, oversea kids activities, morning tea, the property, seating, welcoming, bible reading, prayers, etc. That's for just two hours on Sunday morning. And it comes around EVERY Sunday. If a week has a Sunday, he has to organize these things before it comes. If things are good, he'll have a large team of people to help him. However, for most of us, we're still doing a lot of that stuff... or our wife is. More than that, every week you (and we) want it to be better than last week.
Can you see where I'm heading here?
The point is, if we have a sick day, public holiday, conference (which are good) or a mishap, that time is stolen from preparing for Sunday morning. I used to love public holidays and sick days. Now I hate them. They steal time I can't get back.
At the same time we're also carrying a much bigger priority...
Mission & Outreach
We want people who don't know Jesus to get to know him. Mission. Yep, for most of us, that's why we went to bible college and became pastors. We have a burning desire to see people OUTSIDE the church know and trust Jesus. That is really where we want to spend time. It cuts us to the heart to see people at odds with God when they could have forgiveness and relationship with God through Jesus. We love them and want them to turn back to him.
We live in a state of permanent anxiety for the community that we live in.
It's a good anxiety to have, but none the less, it's rests heavily on my heart. It drives me from day to day. In fact there have been times at our church when we've not been succeeding at this and it drives me NUTS. Between Sundays and the desire to reach out, we then encounter another issue...
Overwork
Most pastors I know are at some level workaholics. They drive themselves hard and they are earnest in their care for others. The problem is, this can become very unhealthy. There have been times when I've felt guilty for taking time off. I've experienced the beginnings of panic attacks. I've been totally overwhelmed and burnt out. Last year I went to a pastors retreat thinking, "if this doesn't really help me, I may be at my witt's end". I'm thankful to God for that retreat. I now wonder what I'd have done without it.
Beyond this there are any number of other situations that add extra stress to your pastor's life. Things I can't mention here for reasons of complication and context. Daily, weekly, monthly and even annual events he is constantly dealing with.
So I understand when pastors become clinically depressed.
I'm hoping that by now you're wondering how you might help your pastor. Let me give you a couple of simple ways. They won't cost you much, but they will make a huge difference to him. I have people in my church who've done these things. They have picked us up and healed us a bunch of times.
1. Pray for him each day
Pray for; relationship with God; his time and resources; the church mission; his marriage, wife and kids. If you pray for him, tell him you are. It will mean a lot to him.
2. Get to church a little early
Seems little, but this will tell him you are there to work WITH him. He won't feel alone in the tasks at church. He will appreciate this enormously.
3. Look after his wife
His wife carries his struggles, but can't talk about them. Bring her favorite chocolates occasionally. Give her a hug and tell her you appreciate her. Offer to babysit for them so they can have a date night.
Summing up...
Pastoring is an immense joy, but it comes with significant stress. I hope this post has been helpful in putting you inside my head for a few minutes. Maybe there's something you can do straight away to lift some load off your pastor's shoulders?
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