Entries from Off the Agenda tagged with: burnout
July 29, 2009
3 Questions for Bruce Miller
Find the right rhythm, not balance, in your ministry life.
Bruce Miller is the author of Your Life in Rhythm (Tyndale, 2009) and the founder and senior pastor of McKinney Fellowship in McKinney, Texas. Years ago while speaking at a leadership conference, Miller had a flash of insight: instead...
Tags used in this post:
3 questions, burnout, busyness,
A couple weeks ago, we talked here about reasons you'll want to leave a ministry position but shouldn't. Today we're publishing a condensed version of an article, excerpted from When It's Time to Leave, that takes the opposite approach:...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, change, decision making, leadership, pastors,
Do you feel isolated in your ministry? Ken Fong, pastor and a member of our Ask the Experts panel, reflects on his blog about how easy it is for pastors to feel alone, or just dazed by the position's...
Tags used in this post:
blogspotting, burnout, church leaders, encouragement, pastors, relationships,
April 24, 2009
5 Reasons You'll Want to Leave But Shouldn't
Is it really time for a ministry change?
Should I stay or should I go? At some point, every ministry leader asks the question, sometimes at weekly intervals. The answer isn't always clear. But whether you're asking it because of the Monday-morning blahs, the post-conference buzz, or...
Tags used in this post:
5 things, burnout, change, decision making, leadership,
October 16, 2008
A Mid-Life Shift Gives Meaning
Listen to God’s quiet voice when opportunities arise.
Talk about a timely book! In light of the current economic crisis The Shortest Investment Book Ever: Wall Street Secrets for Making Every Dollar Count by James O'Donnell is the perfect thing to be reading. But amid the savvy saving...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, busyness, discipleship, lay leaders, ministry, servanthood, stewardship,
September 25, 2008
Working Behind the Curtain
How to respond when ministry leaves you spiritually dry.
I recently spoke with a colleague who took a special behind-the-scenes tour of Disney World. As you can imagine, the tour is quite different from the regular Disney experience. Instead of the frills and fa?ade of the park, you see...
August 14, 2008
Great is Thy Effectiveness?
There’s danger in rooting our identity in ministry rather than in Christ.
Something's wrong. We pastors are the stewards, the spokespeople, the advocates of a message of hope, life, and peace. And yet so few of us seem to be experiencing these qualities in our own lives. Something's wrong. In a world...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, church growth, identity, measurable outcome, pressure, rest,
About four years ago, I bought a little flowering vine and planted it in my yard. The first year it sprouted a few flowers, then it appeared to have died, but then it sprouted again. And every year since it...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, pop culture, quiet time, technology, time management,
I'm going to attempt to paraphrase a story I heard at a small-groups conference a little over a year ago, so please bear with me. The speaker was Randy Frazee. The story centered on Frazee's first attempt at small-group ministry...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, small groups, time management,
I have this cartoon strip coming together in my mind. It has three frames: Frame 1: A well-dressed man - your stereotypical church leader - is taking in a worship service. His wife is sitting next to him. The congregation...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, pastors, volunteers,
March 5, 2008
Cutting the Competition
If you want small groups to succeed in your church, make sure your leaders have enough time to do them right.
Any church attempting to run a small-groups ministry will inevitably encounter a stiff obstacle to growth: the need for more leaders. This is actually a turning point in many respects - find a way to surmount this barrier, and there's...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, recruiting, small groups, time management,
January 28, 2008
Should You Stop Asking for Volunteers?
Perhaps it's time church staff and leaders re-think how they recruit help
I've attended - and volunteered in - several churches. And in some of them, I've made the mistake of volunteering for too much. By now, I've learned to draw reasonable boundaries based on my gifts and my limitations. And I...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, recruiting, staff, team, volunteers,
When our small staff (of two) met for a long-term planning and goals review, my colleague was visibly stressed. She said, "My whole life is church. I'm drained, rather than energized, by ministry. I want to be able to go...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, staff, time management,
January 10, 2008
Remembering the Pastor’s Spouse
Leaders can ease the burden by asking the right questions
The number one reason that pastors leave their ministries is "wives issues," according to a 2007 Time magazine article. I would take some comfort in that statistic - that the number one reason they leave isn't sexual sin or burnout...
On Friday, Amy Simpson wrote a post on our sister blog, www.giftedforleadership.com, about a leader's responsibility to those they lead. Her insights were too good not to share on Off the Agenda: As a leader, it's easy to understand and...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, pastors, recruiting, staff, team, volunteers,
November 27, 2007
Christ as Our Great Leader
Rick Allnutt, the pastor of Faith Evangelical Covenant Church, where I attend, preached Sunday on Colossians 1:15-20. While the message focused on the supremacy of Christ in our lives, I was struck by this passage on a somewhat different level....
Tags used in this post:
burnout, compromise, mediation, staff, team,
November 15, 2007
How Leaders Can Survive Information Overload
What must you know—and what can you safely ignore?
Let me begin with a simple, wonderfully freeing premise: You do not need to know everything. A few short generations ago, it could rightly be said, Information Is Power. That was true when there wasn't enough of it. Today, the...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, time management,
In the book Compassion, Henri Nouwen and his co-authors make an interesting observation about our society's impatience. The authors allege that we live in a world structured around impatience; entire economies are built on that principle; the one-hour time slot...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, pop culture, time management,
November 5, 2007
Stop Oiling Your Church's Squeaky Wheels
Learn to honor those who minister, not those who demand it
A ministering laity doesn't happen naturally. Many people still expect the pastor to do the ministry while they watch - and criticize. Changing that image requires shaking up time priorities. Pastors who develop strong lay leaders have learned to honor...
Tags used in this post:
administration, boards, burnout, difficult people, mediation, pastors, recruiting, training,
October 23, 2007
Before Ministry Life Burns You Out
Time alone with God--not better time management--is the key to healthier leadership
As I prepared to leave for a recent speaking engagement, I realized how tired I was, how desperate I was for my own experience of intimacy with God, and how much I needed the very things I would be guiding...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, devotions, meditation, prayer, quiet time,
October 18, 2007
The Looks in Our Eyes
The look of bewilderment and hurt in my friend's eyes caught me off guard as we ate lunch together last April. It was just after Easter, yet that look still remains vivid in my memory five months later. And our...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, community, difficult people, pastors, staff, stewardship, team, vision,
Off The Agenda: Conversations for Building Church Leaders is a blog where people in church leadership positions — pastors, staff members, and volunteers, among others — gather for discussion, where they encourage, equip, and prepare each other for the joys and challenges...
Tags used in this post:
administration, Bible study, boards, budget, buildings, burnout, children's ministry, community, compromise, current events, devotions, difficult people, elections, evangelism, failure, family, fund-raising, giving, hiring, legal, liability, mediation, meditation, men's ministry, missional, missions, money, multimedia, outreach, pastors, politics, pop culture, prayer, quiet time, recruiting, risk, sample forms, seniors, small groups, spiritual gifts, staff, stewardship, study, team, technology, time management, tithing, training, vision, volunteers, women's ministry, worship,
October 15, 2007
Flip the Switch Between Work and Home
"Make a mental switch on the way home. If that's not possible, give your family a signal when you've shaken off the day and are home at last. Take a shower, change your clothes, or even wait to drop the...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, family, time management,
October 15, 2007
Rev. Lynne M. Baab
Lynne M. Baab served in pastoral roles in two Presbyterian congregations in Seattle and is currently lecturer in pastoral theology at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand. She is the author of several books, including Fasting: Spiritual Freedom...
Tags used in this post:
burnout, community, devotions, meditation, pastors, prayer, quiet time, staff, team, training, volunteers,
October 15, 2007
Kevin Miller
Kevin A. Miller is editor-at-large of Leadership journal and executive vice president at Christianity Today International. Kevin writes for Leadership journal and PreachingToday.com, and he is a featured speaker for Preaching Today Audio. Kevin is also the author of several...
Tags used in this post:
boards, burnout, community, elections, evangelism, hiring, multimedia, outreach, pastors, politics, staff, stewardship, study, team, technology, time management, training, vision, volunteers,
October 15, 2007
Marshall Shelley
Marshall Shelley is editorial vice-president of Christianity Today International, and editor in chief of the Leadership Media Group, which includes Leadership journal, PreachingToday.com, BuildingChurchLeaders.com, FaithVisuals.com, SmallGroups.com, and ChristianBibleStudies.com. He served as general editor of The Quest Study Bible, a best-selling...
Tags used in this post:
boards, burnout, compromise, difficult people, evangelism, family, outreach, pastors, staff, stewardship, team, time management, training, vision,
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