Pastoral Longevity Through the Local Church
Let’s consider three questions together in this article:
Is pastoral longevity even an issue?
What are the causes of pastoral attrition?
How is the local church a means of bolstering pastoral longevity and combating attrition?
FIRST, IS PASTORAL LONGEVITY EVEN AN ISSUE?
There are three ways to answer this question: statistically, experientially, and personally.
Statistically, Barna states:
70 percent of pastors consistently fight depression
70 percent have a lower self-image than when they started
70 percent do not have someone they consider a close friend
50 percent would leave ministry if they could but they don’t have another way to make a living
Half of those starting in ministry will not last 5 years
Only 1 out of 10 ministers will actually retire as a minister in some form
Numbers tell us something, but they tend to best be used to provide a foundation for something we think might be true rather than to pull at our heart strings to care about any issue. After all, stats are used all of the time and many times we don’t know where they came from or if we can trust them.
But our experience tends to validate the stats.
Experientially, I’m 20 years into vocational ministry—16 years having pastored in the same church. In a generation before mine, young pastors tended to go to seminary and take residential classes and develop deep relationships with their peers. I was just on the cusp of the transition to non-residential training so my relationships with other pastors come from various contexts—some school, some geography, some random connections through the years, some just by watching their avatar on social media.
I don’t know numbers, but my experience suggests that many of those who set out on the path toward pastoral ministry are no longer engaged in the work, at least not in the vocational sense. There’s a big group that are doing something else—realtors, health consultants, wealth managers, leading nonprofits. Some are disqualified. I’ll leave the question of when and how or if someone should be reinstated to pastoral work after sexual sin or domineering behavior or financial misdeeds, but the fact is that some made decisions that undermined their ability to continue in the work. Some got super frustrated. They took a church job in their 20s and quickly learned that churches can hurt. The difficulty caused some to give up. Then there are those who liberalized, some of whom no longer claim to be Christians. Apparently it’s like walking up Everest and seeing the bodies strewn along the path—their lives a testimony to the peril of the work.
Personally, this work has not been easy — not in the “woe is me,” martyr complex banter that tends to take place. Some say “weighty” - the work is heavy. I say “exposing” - the work exposes all sorts of insecurities and difficulties and complexities that make you, you. It presses you to your limits of humanness and requires a unique dependance on God that’s unlike other spheres of life. For one, I underestimated how long the marathon of ministry actually is. While 2 decades may not seem like a long time beside the likes of those laboring 50 or 60 years, I do feel a long way from the wet-behind-the ears, frothing at the mouth, youngin’ I once knew.
And, I simply did not give sufficient attention to how much the Enemy and this world can deflate even the most helium-filled balloon of zeal. My last three years have been tough. It’s a petri dish of circumstances that easily grows into apathy. By my estimation, statistically, experientially, and personally, this is a matter worth our attention.
SECOND, WHAT ARE THE CAUSES OF PASTORAL ATTRITION?
There are long-formed answers to this question, books and podcasts that provide space for extended focus. Time doesn’t allow that today, so I’ll merely mention the issues that I see in my own heart and in the lives of many of my peers.
Negligence - Pastors fail to attend to their souls. They preach spiritual disciplines without themselves being men of prayer, deep devotion to the word, fasting, solitude, and silence. Anemic personal worship reveals itself over time.
Pride - These issues run in tandem – a lack of spiritual discipline is a statement of pride. We erroneously believe that apart from God we can do whatever we want, including preaching sermons and leading churches.
Success - It works, at least for a while. We seemingly succeed in doing good and, as Jared Wilson warns, “It is devilishly easy for us as pastors to believe our own hype.”
Sin - Repentance doesn’t come easy for most. The vague, “of course I’m a sinner,” but not matched by honest ownership of sin, a turning from it, and a renewed trust and reliance on the Lord. We coddle sin in the dark, like making a pet of a poisonous snake, and then seem surprised when it destroys us.
Pressure - Perhaps the most common is the insipid church growth pressure that we all feel. I matter because of how many people show up, how many disciples I make, how many churches we start, how well my sermons are received. People are not built to sustain that pressure.
Marriage - Unequally yoked applies to far more than just marrying an unbeliever. Many times the man either drags the woman into a ministry she resents or crushes her by serving everyone else but her. It’s hard to keep moving forward with a bad marriage blowing category 5 hurricane winds in the opposite direction.
Envy - There’s temptation to look around us and see people our age seemingly making more money, living a more comfortable life, or presumably having more impact in the world. We size ourselves up by the impression we have of others from a distance and believe that we’ve made a mistake.
Hypocrisy - By this I don’t mean overt sin. I mean hypocrisy in the truest sense of the word. Trying to be someone you aren’t. Rather than being the best version of the personalities, gifts, and abilities God has uniquely given us, we try to mimic supposedly successful pastors who are wired differently. Nobody can continue in the work of decades living a lie.
Depression - Whether it’s emotional volatility or a major malady, many pastors suffer in silence for fear of what others might think if they know that their pastor felt sad some, or much, of the time. We think that if we just found something else to do, perhaps the melancholy would lift.
Temporal Focus - I like cutting grass. Cut a row, turn around, and see what you’ve accomplished. Ministry doesn’t work this way. You can’t often look back and see if you’ve made any progress. Far too often we look around rather than look forward and lose sight of the promises of heavenly glorification that awaits.
That’s quite the list. In my younger years I ran a half marathon. I mainly ran it so that years later I could stand at events and say that I’d run a half marathon. The first 3 miles were fine. We ran on pavement and I had a ton of adrenaline because I’d never run a race before. But at the 3 mile mark we veered off onto a path. It was uneven, with rocks and roots along the way. Most of my training had been spent indoors, running at a steady place on an ever-consistent treadmill. By mile 8, I wanted to quit. By mile 12, I wanted to die.
I think pastoral ministry works this way. The safe treadmills of the church of our upbringing, campus ministries, seminary churches teach us to serve in a safe, somewhat easy, and predictable way. If things get complex, there’s always someone further up the ladder to blame. But then we affix pastor to our name and the path veers onto the rocks and roots of these 10 issues, among many others, and we wonder why so many men don’t make it.
Which leads us to question three.
THIRD, HOW IS THE LOCAL CHURCH A MEANS OF BOLSTERING PASTORAL LONGEVITY AND COMBATING ATTRITION?
Here’s where I’m really pleased with my topic, because of the help it provides. None of us, at least not if we should be pastors, would suggest that the normative Christian life isn’t also difficult. The roots and the rocks are there too. And what do we tell our people to do? Well, we argue that they need the church, right? The race of sanctification is too complex to run along, but when people run alongside other faithful saints in the local church they are far more apt to run well and experience God’s persevering grace.
But what do we do with pastors? While they serve the church, they often don’t depend on the church. The church becomes the ends for their work and not the means by which they do the work. They press people into the body of Christ, but themselves stand at a distance from God’s grace through the people of God. They lose sight of the fact that before they were church pastors, they were church members. And it’s this church membership that empowers them to persevere as church pastors.
Let’s see how the church combats the factors we just listed:
1. NEGLIGENCE - The church compels us to fight negligence through a steady diet of gospel truth.
Paul exhorts the local church this way: “Let the word of Christ dwell richly among you, in all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another through psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts” (Colossians 3:15-16). If the word is richly dwelling among the people, then that word ministers to the minister. He hears truth, both as he prepares his sermons and as he delivers them. He hears his people speak truth to one another and allows them to speak truth to him. The word is sung and prayed.
It’s common to hear pastors lament the consumerism in the church: people who merely approach the church like they do the supermarket, the CVS, or the local gym. But friends, we who are in ministry can do the same. We merely hand out the religious goods and services and fail to appropriate those truths to our own lives. Let’s not be models for spiritual consumers, but examples of faithful worship.
2. HUMILITY - The church compels us to pursue humility as we receive from others what we don’t have to give.
Paul writes, “Carry one another’s burdens; in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ…Let the one who is taught the word share all good things with the teacher” (Galatians 6:2, 6). What are those good things? Certainly there’s financial provision and hospitality, but it seems in context that at least one of the manifestations of the “good things” that people share with the teacher is they carry his burdens. Granted, this is tough. It’s hard to know who you can trust. Friendship can be challenging for a pastor. But we have a chance to press through the awkwardness to find a few people who can know you and support you through the various difficulties in life. Far too often the few pastors who do find this, do so outside of the local church. They find people in other places who know them and care for them, but they have no one close. No one who sees them daily. No one who sees when things aren’t right and can engage with care. This requires humility. It shows you that you are not strong all of the time. You need others to get under the weight with you and lend strength.
3. SUCCESS - The church reminds us that things are not always as bad or as good as they seem.
Success can easily go to your head, but if you are honest, one of the realities in the local church is that you know the difficulty and complexity in even the best local churches. While you might be tempted to get puffed up in pride, the church has a way of reminding you that church life is always a mixed bag.
This point is often made of teams after a big win. I read about a player from the Eagles after this year’s (2025) Super Bowl who said, basically, it’s a good win but what really gets me out of bed is the challenge, the drive to get better, so I’ll enjoy this tonight but then it’s back to work. Justin Anderson, pastor, quoted in Jared Wilson’s The Pastor’s Justification:
“For the last couple years, I have been living the dream. Our church has seen explosive growth, people being saved, baptized, and joining groups all of the time. We have four campuses, thousands of people, and a great staff. Finally, all the toil of church planting has paid off and the prospect of megachurch stardom was a reality. Most of us want some version of this ministry. I finally reached the promised land, and I can report that it’s just OK! Don’t get me wrong; there were parts that I loved, but at the end of the day there is always more to do, always another idea, hill to climb or battle to fight—it never ends.”
This reality can either crush us, or it can remind us that our success or that of our church isn’t the main goal. Even if we get to whatever level we think of as successful, there will always be another hill to climb. The church keeps us grounded in the simple contentment of the normal.
4. SIN – The local church calls us to repent and believe.
The pastoral qualifications are embedded in the local church. We know the list:
“2 An overseer, therefore, must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, self-controlled, sensible, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, 3 not an excessive drinker, not a bully but gentle, not quarrelsome, not greedy. 4 He must manage his own household competently and have his children under control with all dignity. 5 (If anyone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he take care of God’s church?) 6 He must not be a new convert, or he might become conceited and incur the same condemnation as the devil. 7 Furthermore, he must have a good reputation among outsiders, so that he does not fall into disgrace and the devil’s trap.”
1 Timothy 3:2-7
These qualities are only observed in proximity to others in the church. Only those who know you, those among whom you are serving, can lovingly reprove you in the face of sin and call you to repentance. The local church serves as sandpaper for your soul. It exposes the rough edges of your sin and your need for repentance. It is there that you can set the pace as the lead repenter among a church that will also need to turn from sin and turn to Jesus consistently. In the church, we watch our life and our doctrine closely.
5. PRESSURE - The local church gives you fellow elders who can shoulder the weight of ministry.
A team will not make up for a shaky identity, but a team of interdependent leaders can round out the gifts you lack and supply care to a growing congregation.
“I exhort the elders among you as a fellow elder and witness to the sufferings of Christ, as well as one who shares in the glory about to be revealed: Shepherd God’s flock among you, not overseeing out of compulsion but willingly, as God would have you; not out of greed for money but eagerly; 3 not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. 4 And when the chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory.”
1 Peter 5:1-4
Elders (plural) attend to the flock (plural). The weight and pressure of ministry is real, whether it be a flock of 25 sheep or 250. There’s always more to do—more sermons, more people, more ministry. You’ll need a team to serve as pressure valves for you. If you try to go at it alone, the pressure will build and, given enough time, you will implode.
6. MARRIAGE - The church provides your wife with trusted friends and a safe space to thrive.
It’s hard to be the wife of a pastor, or so I’m told. She’s a vital part of the work, but often in the shadows in ways that are not as validating as some of the ways pastors may be able to serve. The way you help her not resent the work is to embed your shared life in the local church where she can have friends, serve in areas of giftedness, and see firsthand the grace of God on display through changed lives. As a husband, you have a vital role to play. In large measure what it means to be head of your home is to put the others around you in places to thrive. It is on you to create the best context for your wife to win and then celebrate her a ton as she does.
7. ENVY - The church gives us meaningful ways to channel our energy in service to others.
The opposite of envy is contentment through service. As we pour ourselves out in love we have less time and energy to spend gazing upon the supposedly fertile pastures of our peers. There’s a rough equivalent to lust here. We can dissipate our energy through unhealthy sources like pornography or worse or we can expend that energy pursuing our spouse or loving others in the church if we are not married. The same is true for envy. You can either sit and scroll social media or watch the public ministries of others wishing you were like them, or you can open your home to show hospitality, meet tangible needs, go on mission trips, use your resources to provide for the less fortunate. The church gives you a way to direct your energy in real service to real people. This is the way Paul speaks of his ministry among the church in Thessalonica.
Working night and day so that we would not burden any of you, we preached God’s gospel to you. 10 You are witnesses, and so is God, of how devoutly, righteously, and blamelessly we conducted ourselves with you believers. 11 As you know, like a father with his own children, 12 we encouraged, comforted, and implored each one of you to walk worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory. -- 1 Thessalonians 2:9-12 (CSB)
8. HYPOCRISY - The church allows you space to grow comfortable in your skin.
It takes time to settle into the adult version of you. It’s common to mimic others and try on various roles in our 20s and 30s. Much like a young boy going through puberty, you’ll have a season for squeaky voices and ill-fitting clothes. And if you change churches over and over again through those years, you’ll often have to relive those stages of growing into your skin. But if you stay put in a church among people who know you, will forgive you and give you grace to mature, you’ll have a fertile context to develop into a fruit bearing tree in your 40s and beyond, like the seed that must fall to the ground and die in order to produce a harvest.
9. DEPRESSION - The church provides margin to find hope and help in dark days.
We don’t always know how to give thanks in all circumstances or count it as joy when we encounter trials of many kinds. So God gives us dozens or even hundreds of family members who are walking through their own share of difficulty. On Sundays we gather with fellow strugglers, we sing songs of hope with the downtrodden, and we receive grace for the Lord freely given to all of God’s people. These steady, common means of grace will minister to your heart, especially in places of great difficulty. And you have to root your life there ahead of time. Like Jesus’ famous story, we are building a house on a rock so that when the storms of depression and discouragement come, we are fixed on the rock (both the rock of the Lord Jesus, and the strong rock of His church).
10. TEMPORAL FOCUS - The church presses us toward heaven.
An often mentioned observation is that the church in America used to sing far more songs about heaven than it does now. It’s likely because we tend to be pragmatists who focus on the temporal at the expense of the eternal. The church is meant to be a picture of heaven, a gathering of the redeemed saints who are walking in sanctification along the path to glorification. On that day, we see our Lord Jesus fully and hear, Well done, good servant. You need this more than you think. You don’t need to go to a conference in another city with a bunch of strangers to have a picture of heaven. You get it week in and week out in your local church as you worship with the people of God.
Truly:
1 On Jordan’s stormy banks I stand,
and cast a wishful eye
to Canaan’s fair and happy land,
where my possessions lie.
Refrain:
I am bound for the promised land,
I am bound for the promised land;
oh, who will come and go with me?
I am bound for the promised land.
2 O’r all those wide extended plains
shines one eternal day;
there God the Son forever reigns,
and scatters night away. [Refrain]
3 No chilling winds or poisonous breath
can reach that healthful shore;
sickness and sorrow, pain and death,
are felt and feared no more. [Refrain]
4 When I shall reach that happy place,
I’ll be forever blest,
for I shall see my Father’s face,
and in his bosom rest. [Refrain]
Writing in the context of exhorting pastors in the church, Peter says: “God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble” (1 Peter 5:5). One wonders if the main means of grace God gives to humble shepherds is the ability to persevere. Since he ends by saying: “The God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, establish, strengthen, and support you after you have suffered a little while” (1 Peter 5:10). Let’s continue to labor “for a little while” more brothers.
