Marq posted this on his site from theResurgence:
These numbers are astounding to me. Awe. Shock. Wonder.
- Fifteen hundred pastors leave the ministry each month due to moral failure, spiritual burnout, or contention in their churches. (Another way to look at this is 18,000 a year.)
- Fifty percent of pastors' marriages will end in divorce.
- Eighty percent of pastors and eighty-four percent of their spouses feel unqualified and discouraged in their role as pastors.
- Fifty percent of pastors are so discouraged that they would leave the ministry if they could, but have no other way of making a living.
- Eighty percent of seminary and Bible school graduates who enter the ministry will leave the ministry within the first five years.
- Seventy percent of pastors constantly fight depression.
- Almost forty percent polled said they have had an extra-marital affair since beginning their ministry.
- Seventy percent said the only time they spend studying the Word is when they are preparing their sermons.
- Eighty percent of pastors' spouses feel their spouse is overworked.
- Eighty percent of pastors' spouses wish their spouse would choose another profession.
- The majority of pastor's wives surveyed said that the most destructive event that has occurred in their marriage and family was the day they entered the ministry.
Don't laugh but I went to a seminary (of sorts) for a few months. Not once did I glance out knowingly to my classmates (wink) and believe that 80% would throw up their hands within 5 years. Of the ones that hang around and survive into their 6th, 7th or 8th years, 80% of their wives would wish they would work in another "field." Of the 20% that do remain, over 1/2 would quit if they could do something else. Who knew that of my class of 50, 20 would have affairs? Or that 35 would have Depression? Or 25 would get a divorce? Or with all the training 8/10 would still feel grossly inadequate to minister?
Yet, I sit here, reading my Bible only in preparation for my studies, struggling with endurance, not knowing the language, failing morally, battling contention and my family torn between ministry and secular work.
And I am not even a pastor.
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9 comments:
So there's a good 40% chance that you'll be involved in an extra-marital drinking binge at some point-- 'specially looking like Antonio B. But then, you're not a pastor. Maybe if you'd just go all the way for pastorhood, you'd just slide smoothly into the Max Lucado percentile, and you could do cartoon voice-overs and write children's books.
Or maybe secular work could be a ministry. Hmmm
i wish i knew more about what you do there. Very curious am i. Do you like it there?
You know me, Cody.
I'm just Joe Christian.
Work full-time. Kiss the wife sometimes. Raise the kids. Do a little sumpthin', sumpthin' on the side.
However, there comes a point when kingdom work could be a full-time job in itself. I'm getting there.
To answer your question, yep, I dig it here. I miss some American things, like National Forests, big English libraries and some good Tex-Mex or New Mexican-Mex food but otherwise its a pretty cool place to exist.
well that's good. you just sounded a li'l down there toward the end. Can't have you down. Just wouldn't do. No sir.
Down?
I guess I meet with the frustrations that are common to man. Honestly speaking, life is just hard. If you want to love right and live right, its work. And on top of that, I'm fleshly.
Romans 7 incarnate.
Well, that's what i meant: "fleshly;" not down. Fleshly. You seemed fleshly there toward the end. Stop it.
LOL!
That cheered my downright fleshy heart up.
:)
I recommend reading going and reading the entire mars hill post. In its original form it was not a “shock and awe” piece, although the facts are shocking. Their objective seems to be helping ministry leaders avoid the pitfall of falling and failing, which consequently seemed to be the very thing Paul warned Timothy about in his epistles. No doubt many should never have entered into full time ministry in the first place but what is more alarming is how devastating a miscalculation entering unprepared can (evidently) be. God spare any of us that fate. Not to resuscitate poor Jason from his “shock and awe” but for the sake of broken hearts, broken families, broken churches, and a broken witness in the world.
Amen there. Take me, for instance: i entered the ministry to "get in otta the rain," so to speak-- or as a form of spiritual flagellation for sins i'd committed earlier. And now look at the repercussions. i listen to country music and fellowship with my lawn when he gets long enough to do a sacremental cutting on. If only i hadn't fallen for the siren song of hundreds upon hundreds of people getting brushed & dressed up just to come hear what pearls of eternal wisdom i'd have to disseminate. Three times a week.
If only somebody'd said, "cody, go into the military instead. You won't have to pretend to like anybody there. In fact you can shoot at 'em," then there'd be no pauses in my own marriage for the sake of contemplating other folks' souls or marriages.
But then again, i didn't really ever go into ministry and am not a minister. i'm just channelling one of those parallel dimensions.
What the heck am i even talking about? crud.
So no one confuses the issue, my purpose in posting the statistics was simply to bring attention to them as they are reflected in my own life. I found myself classified in more than one of those categories. The "wonder" for me is in the fact that the so-called leadership is so rife with weakness. Me included.
For Anon,
I must have read that article 5-6 times. It was that incredible to me. However, I disagree that this piece was not meant for "shock and awe." It was. Hundreds of thousands of ministers and pastors have "entered the ministry" without counting the cost. Hundreds of thousands leave off building the house. These are staggering figures. The discerning reader will realize that "burnout" is not the lead cause either. As I am sure M.D. realizes.
However, the weight of the stastics may be metaphorically referred to as a "gaping wound." The article's final 9 Habits of a Highly Effective Pastor are little more than a Band-Aid. (I realize that he called these 'some solutions.') In light of the gaping wound, there were some glaring omissions in his prescription.
Nonetheless, the tips are good. I just don't think they really address the statistics head-on.
Cody,
Something about your last comment reminded me of Deep Thoughts by Jack Handy.
John,
Teeheehee. Yoga. :)
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