Dear Pastor…

An open letter to a weary soul

Dear Pastor,

I understand that the last couple of years have been difficult. Ok, they’ve been really difficult. The community you’ve been charged to care for is fraying and splitting and fighting and warring in your midst. You have encountered more tension and division in just a few years than a minister would normally see in a generation.

I have heard your stories. I have sat and listened to too many pastors like you tell me stories about the church dividing. You have been told to “speak up” by some and to “pipe down” by others. You’ve been given the impossible task of carrying the individual expectations of hundreds or even thousands of human hearts. You were not created to carry that burden and, yet, here you are.

I know the pressure is a lot at times. As if you didn’t have enough to consider in caring for the lost and broken, in counseling the hurting and carefully crafting weekly sermons to inspire a distracted and disengaged people, the last few years have added tasks to your plate for which you are profoundly unqualified. How long did you spend talking about the efficacy (or morality) of masks? How did you manage to parse the wildly complex racial history of our nation in creating an acceptable sound bite for your people in response to heartbreaking violence? How did you engage the political swings and factions of recent years without alienating everyone along the way?

Friend, you are not an epidemiologist. You are not a historian. You are not a political scientist. You are a pastor.

And too many pastors like you are bailing out on the profound and beautiful calling we share because of the unrelenting pressure on you to be everything you are not. Pastors just like you are walking away from ministry. Or being invited to “seek a new place of calling.” Over politics and pandemics. Over the demands that were never part of the job description.

You, pastor, have somehow managed to maintain your role serving the local church in this season. Still, you are probably weary and discouraged. You are likely jaded and a little bit more cynical than you were a few years ago. You might be thinking about detaching from some of the madness that’s overtaken your world or even, sadly, considering joining the wave of people deconstructing faith and walking away entirely.

Pastor, please hang on a little longer.

Let me remind you that you are valuable. Your ministry is often quiet, unseen in the midst of salacious headlines and breathless news cycles. And that’s ok. Let me remind you that being a pastor is not about making a worldwide impact but about walking with individuals through the valleys of life.

Let me remind you that pastors are not made through viral social media posts or superstar sermons from a stage. Instead, with the lights off and the microphone put away, your greatest contributions will be made in counsel and prayer, in hospital rooms and home visits.

Friend, I know that you’ve found a new level of exhaustion over the last few years, a profound, new, soul-level weariness that you can’t explain to others but which lingers nonetheless. If you are to persist, to make it through this season, it will be because you return to focusing on individual hearts.

You must start with your own.

After you’ve spent years filling the broken cups of others, it is time to ask the Lord to fill you again. And that starts with asking God to remind you of one simple fact which is as humbling as it is beautiful: you are not the savior and you cannot carry the weight that was designed for Him. Instead, the true savior is inviting you to lean in, to find hope, and to know true rest.

“Are you tired? Worn out? Burned out on religion? Come to me. Get away with me and you’ll recover your life. I’ll show you how to take a real rest. Walk with me and work with me—watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won’t lay anything heavy or ill-fitting on you. Keep company with me and you’ll learn to live freely and lightly.” - Matthew 11:28-30 MSG

I am praying for you. I am praying that you know that you are not alone. I am praying that you recognize that your role is smaller and simpler and more profoundly wonderful  than you ever considered. I am praying that you slow down long enough to fill up. Most importantly, I am praying that you find yourself with Jesus in these days, rediscovering the unforced rhythms of grace as you walk the ancient paths in a modern world.

Yours,

Kyle Burkholder

Pastor, Covenant Church, Bowling Green, OH

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PS - Need to talk? Need a lifeline? I’m here. Email me: kyleburkholder1981@icloud.com