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When Is It Time To Leave?
- Incompatibility. Good church, good pastor, but a bad fit. The congregation needs a form of pastoral leadership that the sitting pastor does not possess.
- Immobility. The congregation has become trapped in an ecclesiastical whirlpool-lots of motion but little sense of direction. By subtle control, some dominant church members stymie every pastoral initiative. Fresh leadership is shrewdly neutralized. There is an inescapable sense that the congregation is a closed community that plays church.
- Organizational transition. Healthy organizations inevitably reach growth points where a new kind of leadership becomes necessary. Not every pastor can adapt.
- Stagnancy. Sometimes pastors conclude they can no longer personally develop in giftedness or leadership effectiveness in their present situation. When a congregation prevents its pastor's personal growth, the result will be boredom and mediocrity for everyone.
- Fatigue. The ministry lacks a "renewing" component, and the pastor concludes that he or she is on continual spiritual-psychological-physical discharge.
- Family morale. Occasionally a time comes when it's impossible to ignore the fact that one's spouse or children are being more harmed than helped by the present situation.
- Closings and openings. Sometimes one senses ministry in a particular church has reached a point of conclusion. Word comes another congregation is seeking a pastoral leader that fits your sense of call and giftedness. There is a curious ambivalence: the grief of saying goodbye to people who are loved and yet the excitement of a new challenge. Creative juices begin to flow. The mind is caught up with the anticipation of a new beginning. A spouse, a bishop, or trusted advisors concur. Most of all, you feel God is in the decision.
- Age. An aging pastor faces the terrible temptation to hold on to the job too long. The love he has for the people and the love they have for him is life-giving. To surrender the task to someone else is almost unthinkable because the person and the job have become indistinguishable. Yet not to leave is almost risks unintentionally damaging much of the good previously done.
A pastor is probably wise to wrestle with the leave-decision on an annual basis-a few days budgeted for self-examination, for seeking the insight of reliable counselors, for candid evaluation based on previously set goals and intentions. If this discipline is pursued, it is likely that when the time to leave does come, it will be done in a moment of confidence that God has spoken, that a good work has been completed, and that there are new opportunities just ahead.
Adapted from a similarly titled Gordon MacDonald article in Leadership Journal 7/1/02
