Another Pastor Down

June 9, 2009

The news has sadly been circulating the internet over the last couple days regarding the confession of Pastor Gary Lamb at his blog of an affair with his assistant. There’s already enough opinion flying around about who is for who, who hasn’t said what and what ought to have been said, and more. I don’t have anything to add to that. Don’t really want to even be a part of all that.

I will only mention that probably the healthiest two places I have read response to Gary’s situation have been from Geoff Surratt and Ron Edmonson. They are certainly not the only two who are speaking painfully well of the circumstance, but they’re at the top.

Since the launch of Pastor For Life last Summer, I have endeavored to keep any commentary or review of stories like Gary’s to a minimum, just trying to bring about anything factual and pointing out what we can learn to keep such stories from becoming mine or yours. Frankly, sometimes you can and sometimes you can’t.

I’ll never forget being at Mountain Learning Center in June Lake, CA in May of 2001. I was 3-1/2 years into a Senior Pastorate at a church I had served for 12 years before being appointed as the Sernior Pastor. In those first 12 years, I had worked with the three previous Senior Pastors. All three pastoral transitions were painful for the previous Pastor’s family and the congregation. The last two had pains of immorality and both Pastor’s marriages ended in divorce.

When I became the Senior Pastor, I was sure of two things:

1. I was nothing like my predecessors (watch out for that pride, folks!)
2. The one thing that would never happen to me was “burnout”.

Yet there I was, deep in burnout, wondering how in the world I got there. My wife was with me, there had been no immorality or “sinful” mess that had been made of my marriage or ministry. But my foundation of inner life was in shambles and I was depressed and spent.

What I will never forget is my counselor at MLC, Dr. Russ Veenker, having no idea of my two certainties above, hearing my story and saying to me:

“Paul, you are just like your predecessors. I can guarantee you that before they messed up their marriage and ministry, they were in burnout. The only difference between you and them is that you sought help before doing something stupid.”

The advice to Pastors that I’ve scanned today on all the blogs in response to Gary’s situation has been good stuff for the most part.

• “Don’t counsel alone with the opposite sex.”
• “Have an accountability structure in place.”
• “Don’t spend time at the church office with staff of the opposite sex.”

All of it is good advice. It’s good stuff to have in place. Bottom line, however, is that most people close to me were able to see my slow descent into burnout way before I ever saw it coming. And they were saying things. And I was giving blank stares. And before I knew it, when the pressure became too much, my inner life crumbled.

Thing is, at some point, we ALL crumble. Um, yes, ALL of us. I’ve seen it happen time after time, and so have you. If you can’t say that, you haven’t been around ministry long enough. Just wait.

So, what does it take to last? My belief …. do whatever it takes to monitor your heart regularly and keep it at Jesus’ feet. This requires that you adjust your pace to your current life and ministry circumstance, and “ruthlessly eliminate hurry” (from John Ortberg’s “The Life You’ve Always Wanted”).

Most of us Pastors, I find, are unwilling to do that. I was. That’s how I ended up where I was. I am convinced I was headed for a major life adjustment no matter what, even because of age. But it could have been experienced much differently had I been less “Superman” and more hu-man.

I realize, too, that for many Pastors, you serve in a system (church body) that doesn’t allow for much adjustment in these areas for you. That’s a whole other story of change and transformation that must take place for real health to occur, both for you and your congregation.

How about you? Your thoughts?

Ted Haggard, etc. ….

January 25, 2009

Having been through some pretty rough pastoral transitions over the years, I am saddened by this week’s news of further allegations of sexual misconduct in the situation surrounding Ted Haggard and New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

I commend Pastor Brady Boyd for his forthright and pastoral handling of the situation. His is NO easy task. He deserves our support and prayers as he and the New Life leaders navigate what is sure to be a difficult week.

Along with the news of further misconduct, HBO is airing a documentary on Ted’s fall and the consequences. It airs Thursday night.

May God grace Pastor Boyd and New Life Church with His overwhelming presence this week as they continue to endure a glaring spotlight!

Strange Things We Do When God Moves

December 16, 2008

I was initially going to title this post “Lakeland Revival Learnings”, based on the recent revival/renewal/spiritual stirring that took place earlier this year in Lakeland, Florida. The meetings took place under the leadership of evangelist Todd Bentley. They ended when Bentley (who was the primary speaker at the revival meetings) left back in August and the meetings have since fizzled.

Just this week comes further revelation about why the revival meetings ended and what was happening behind the scenes. You can read the story here.

Sadly, stories like this are not limited to Lakeland’s Outpouring. All too often, sticky issues such as pride, arrogance, and self-aggrandization come into play for those leading such a move of God.

I write about this not for sensational purposes, but for educational reasons. As Pastors and Church Leaders, we have got to figure out how to set ourselves up for long term effectiveness even when the Spirit of God is moving in His power and force.

For some reason, when the supernatural occurs, we think it makes US supernatural too. In truth, the supernatural is ALWAYS about Jesus, not us. We do not all of a sudden have a life that is without its limits.

Bob Pierce, founder of World Vision, had a famous phrase that as he traveled the world while his family was at home, he believed God would answer his prayer. That prayer was, “God, I’ll take care of your little ones around the world if You’ll take care of my little ones at home.”  Somewhere, Bob got his roles mixed up. He wasn’t God, and his kids needed him at home.

You can say all you want about the massive and great work that World Vision does today and I wouldn’t slight you one bit. But Bob’s kids missed their father, and one of his daughters ended up committing suicide.

If God used you for such a move of the supernatural, what would you do to make sure that self-care was a high standard for your life?

Leadership In Its Right Place

December 13, 2008

With this post, I want to introduce you to Dr. Russ Veenker and his wife, Kandy. You can read more below the article on the stuff they do. Essentially, this is one of the the guys that God used to save my hide when I was in the depths of burnout and depression. We will feature one of his articles here on a regular basis. I think you’ll get as much out of Russ’ wisdom as I do.

For the past 25-30 years our culture has been engaging in a crisis of leadership. Whether in government, business, or church, the topic of leadership has been the mainstay of reading, study, seminars, and academia. It is a multi-billion dollar industry. One doesn’t have to look very far to grasp this: my internet search engine listed over 35 million items/topics/references/books/seminars when I typed “leadership into the little search engine box – lots of good stuff for sale. My library bookshelf is filled with books on the topic of leadership. A recent issue of Leadership Journal had sixteen new books on te topic of leadership advertised; five of the furteen Bible Colleges and Seminaries who advertised had something to say about preparing church leaders. We are consumed and obsessed with leadership theories, models and practices.

In the not-so-distant past when I was an “Operations Leader” in Search and Rescue, I had a baseball cap with two bills sewed on to each side of the hat. For comic relief I would wear the cap to the monthly team meetings that I presided over as president. On the front of the cap it said, “I’m their leader…which way did they go?”

The humor releases a certain underlying anxiety that comes with the role of being a leader. And all the talk about “leadership” does reveal certain anxiety – particularly in the church. Sometimes I get the feeling there’s a mythical ghost in the shadows of our churches whispering weird messages when it comes to all this leadership stuff. It goes something like this: if we get our leadership RIGHT (whatever THAT means), the church will be “right” …. or “OK” …. or “fixed” …. or “on track” …. or __________________ (you fill in the blank). Leadership is often touted (or blamed) as the answer to what lacks in the church today. And yes, leaders have been and are the easy targets – they’re easily spotted on our radars!

I believe the anxiety with regard to leadership issues runs very deep into the fabric of our souls. The church (along with government and family) for many centuries in western civilization was a central pillar to our modern society (1500-2000 A.D.). However, we are leaving modernity and its philosophical presuppositions behind, and as a consequence, the church has been displaced and marginalized. Simply put, for most of the populace in our culture, nobody cares about who the church is and what it does. For those of us in the church, particularly those of us in leadership, that experience of being marginalized by culture at large creates a lot of anxiety. Why? Because we are no longer significant (as a central or important and valued part of culture). So perhaps all the hub-bub about leadership is really about us attempting to move back into the mainstream of culture – to have value and significance, to re-capture our special place we’ve had in the past. And we all know that repeating the past usually doesn’t work too well in living out the future.

Now I realize I’ve made some sweeping generalizations with the above assertions. However, if you are, or have been in a leadership role in the last twenty years of the church, what I’ve written will make a great deal amount of sense. And that prompts an old, modern question: So what do we do now? Well, because I’m a romantic, modern, “old-fashioned” kind of guy, I think the ancient writings of God are a great place for wisdom. And a great verse to deal with anxiety is Philippians 4:6-7:

“Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, shall guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”

Maybe leadership in the Church is more about praying for healthy anxiety management than technique. Perhaps it’s more about humility before God than knowing the right direction to take. May prayer be the central hallmark of leadership in Jesus’ Church.

© 2008 Dr. Russ Veenker

Dr. Russ Veenker has over thirty years of formal ministry experience having served as a youth minister, interim pastor, church-planting pastor, chaplain, church and para-church consultant, and conference speaker. Some of these ministry positions have been concurrent with his work at the Mountain Learning Center.

I Am Second, Are You?

December 8, 2008

Have you seen the new website creeping up – iamsecond.com? It’s quite insightful.

Anyway, Pete Briscoe, Pastor of Bent Tree Fellowship in Texas, shares a bit of his testimony that I think is great for Pastors to hear. It’s only a few minutes, but may shake you deep inside.

Click here to see it.

Churched … Matthew Paul Turner

November 28, 2008

I just finished reading Churched by Matthew Paul Turner. The cover was what initially intrigued me. A close-up shot of a kid putting a tie on. The subtitle grabbed me next: “one kid’s journey toward God despite a holy mess”. THAT resonated with me.

Having grown up in a mix of Assembly of God and Baptist churches (don’t ask, I have no idea), thriving in my relationship with God through High School in a Foursquare Youth Group, and attending Bible College right out of High School, I’ve served on staff at a church in one role or another ever since. The last 11 years, I’ve been the Senior Pastor (after serving 8 years as Youth Pastor and 4 as Associate Pastor) of a Foursquare Church that is pushing 60 years old and doing my best to revive it, only to find myself exhausted and literally burned out on 2001.

My journey out of burnout is being chronicled at here. In the meantime, I am always looking for resources to help those like me who have found themselves drowning in the mire of this thing called ministry.

I am finding that way too many of us got into ministry with a good heart, but not necessarily a healthy one. Us Pastors are a funny sort that way.

I found Turner’s story quirky at first, in the sense that he seemed a bit cynical. I’m a little quicker (not much, but some) these days at figuring out that most things I read or hear that seem cynical are because of my own defensiveness, rather than what’s really true about the author or speaker’s point of view.

It actually didn’t take long at all to equate the resonating sound of Turner’s experience of having been “raised in the church” with my own. I try to stay positive about it all, but truth be told, a lot of my own experience as a kid in church seems now to be just plain weird. And that, my friends, is what resonated so deeply within me as I kept reading.

If you can get past what sounds cynical and relegate yourself to identifying with Turner more than defending your own history, this entire book is actually a riot, in hilarious kind of terms. This guy is funny! It kept me going, wondering what was going to crack me up next as I could feel the creaky wooden steps and smell the musty old pews of my childhood Baptist Church.

I could go on, but one of the funniest parts is his story about hearing Phil Donahue host his talk show one day on the topic of narcolepsy. Turner becomes almost convinced that he has narcolepsy, and the only time it shows up for him is when he’s in church. He tries oh-so-hard to stay awake by drawing in the air with his finger until the air is so discombobulated by his writing that he has to stop. It took me back to the night time meetings of my Vacation Bible Schools at the Baptist Church, doing the exact same thing!

Then, I have to share what I think is the most poignant part of his whole story. He freaked out after seeing A Thief In The Night, and wrote about some of the storyline that scared him most. Well, I got saved watching that movie at a Fellowship of Christian Athletes meeting sometime in 1978! The way I tell my story is that the movie “scared the hell out of me”!

The one thing I loved about Churched most was how freeing it can be to actually live in the grace of God. It’s one thing to know that God’s grace is sufficient for you. It is something altogether different to actually believe it and live it.

When you start to actually believe it and live it, you realize how far behind yourself you actually are. When you recognize that, it’s the very grace God gives us all that allows you to accept where you are and grow from there, even when you feel like it’s a rhythm of two steps forward and one step back.

This is a great book! Go get it here.

Dispelling Some Myths About Depression

November 21, 2008

Anne Jackson, author of the soon-to-be-released Mad Church Disease: Overcoming the Burnout Epidemic, and blogger-extraordinaire at Flowerdust.net, wrote about depression in words that are more than adequate.

I REALLY encourage you to go there and read it.

When Courage Falls Short of the Demands of Reality

November 20, 2008

I love “The Purpose-Driven Life”. I dig the “Wagner-Houts Modified Spiritual Gifts Inventory”. There’s not a much more clear tool than the DISC Profile. And when it comes to bare-bones personality information, nothing beats the MMPI for depth of definition.

As good as all of that is, there is no better tool than the Bible to define who we are. I think most reading this blog would agree. When our faith in who we are in God’s eyes meets the reality of daily life, if we’re honest, we know we often fall way short.

Let me drive this painfully home. I want to be the best husband I can be in all practical ways possible. I want to be Colleen’s knight in shining armor who sweeps her off her feet to save the day. She struggles with a 12 year diagnosis of Lupus and Rheumatoid Arthritis. You’d never know it if you met her becasue she does her best (and then some) to not let it stop her.

Last weekend, her shoulder froze for no apparent reason. That’s just life for her. Jump to tonight, when she gets home from her job teaching Certified Nurse’s Assistants at our local Adult School. She has planned a Jafra party for our house tomorrow night. The tile floor (lots of it) needs to be mopped.

Can you see it? The knight in shining armor? Mr. Clean with broom and mop in hand to save the day? Not in the least! In my dreams! Instead, here was my selfishness rearing its ugly head. (Hear the whine….) “I hate mopping this floor!”

What does that have to do with figuring out who you are? Well, beyond all the education and self-discovery comes the hard work of discipleship. And it’s deeper than just applying a few Scripture, although that’s helpful. It is coming to terms with who I really am and having the integrity to have courage that meets the demands of my reality. (That’s classic Henry Cloud & John Towsend, in case you’re wondering.)

The path of discipleship, becoming like Christ, Whose image we were created in from the beginning, is hard work, friends. Inherent in it is getting to know you. The REAL you. That includes your motivations (WHY you do what you do), your intentions (WHERE you desire to go with what you do), and your actions (HOW you do what you do to get where you’re going). And those are deep issues.

For me, tonight, it was “will I steer clear of the thing I don’t want, or even HATE, to do for the sake of my own comfort, or will I serve my wife, my kids, and our family by putting me aside?

When’s the last time you had to face this dilemma? At home OR at work/ministry?

Leading On Empty

November 12, 2008

If you’re following Pastor For Life, you know we’ve been somewhat chronicling the story of Pastor Wayne Cordeiro through his recent heart surgery and his return to the pulpit following this encounter. I am a regular reader of his blog …. MentoringLeaders.com.

I was quite surprised and blessed when my original article here was used in its entirety to report Wayne’s surgery to the MentoringLeaders.com family. In the process, I’ve been able to contact Wayne, and he has agreed to do an interview with PastorForLife.org regarding his recent crisis and return to ministry.

However, I am very excited to also lead you to a couple of recent posts at MentoringLeaders.com that give a sneak peek of his soon-to-be-released book titled, “Leading On Empty”. He writes it out of his personal experience with burnout a few years ago.

Having survived burnout myself as a Pastor, it’s not often that we who go through this crisis end up with the privilege of continuing to serve the same congregation. Often, that’s because the burnout ended up leading to a moral failure of some sort that disqualified a Pastor’s ministry.

I have come to learn that there are MANY of us whose burnout does not lead to any kind of moral failure. Yet still, church leaders often assume that if the Pastor is experiencing burnout, there must be SOMEthing that’s not right that would damage the trust of the leaders or congregation in that Pastor to regain health and lead again. Most often, nothing could be further from the truth.

Wayne is one of the few who is opening his life and his story so that other Pastors might find help and wholeness on the road to healing. I encourage you to check out the Sneak Peek 1 and Sneak Peek 2 of “Leading On Empty”.

AND, stay tuned here at PastorForLife.org for our upcoming interview to learn more from Wayne’s story.

“Healer” Author Confesses His Real Need For Healing

August 29, 2008

In no way do I mean for this post to be a judgment or condemnation, nor a condoning, of the sorrowful circumstances that surround the story of Michael Guglielmucci.

He is the author of a song very recently released on the latest Hillsong Worship DVD album, “Hillsong Live: This Is Our God”. There is apparently a documentary on the DVD of how Michael wrote this song right after a diagnosis of aggressive cancer. A popular video on YouTube has now been removed that showed him telling the story at a worship concert just before he would lead the song with an oxygen tank by his side and the tube on his face.

Turns out that he confessed just a couple weeks ago that he was never diagnosed with cancer. He was able to deceive his wife and family as he was apparently suffering physical manifestations of his inner battle with pornography. His father is a Pastor in Australia. You can read his initial statement here.

I do not pretend to know Michael’s torment or make claims of superiority. While my heart is very sad for him and his family, and for the Church at large, I do not pretend to know his torment or make any claims of superiority. But for the grace of God, his story is ours … ALL of ours.

This is another in a long line of stories of lives torn apart by the temptation to live one life in private and another in public. This is not the first and it will not be the last.

There are a couple of keys here about what it takes to be a Pastor For Life.

One is the deep need for safe places to be able to be truly who you are, including the inner battles and struggles we all face. The sooner we get out into the light, the less the damage and the stronger the ability to resist temptation.

Another is the need for us to live in brokenness and vulnerability. The foundation of this relies on us. We must allow for the transparency and consistency in how we live.

Many we lead cannot handle an ounce of weakness we may show as leaders. That’s part of what keeps us from vulnerability. But somewhere, somehow, those who cannot handle our weakness will have to find their strength in Jesus. They may find it in our transparency, but our fear is that they may not. We must become OK with that.

I commit myself, and encourage you, to pray for Michael. While his confession shocks many, it’s actually the first painful step of real freedom for him, and for his family. While the road to recovery will be long and grinding, he is in the best place he can be, or maybe even has ever been.

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