The Monday Morning Debrief: One and done

This past week I stumbled upon Paul Grein’s music blog “Chart Watch” list of the all-time great 1 hit wonders.  It was actually kind of scary to see all the songs that I recognized and at one time listened to on that list.  Songs like “Lovefool” by the Cardigans, “How Do You Talk To An Angel” by the Heights and “How Bizarre” by OMC bring back so many memories. One of my 1st Middle School videos with my late freind Pete Hill was done to “How Bizarre”.

So besides being background music to one of my 1st middle school videos,  how does this apply to ministry?

Don’t be a 1 hit wonder.  Don’t be one and done in your ministry.  There are a few ways you can do this:

1. Avoid Burnout.  Burnout in ministry is pretty common.  Not only that but being burned by your ministry is pretty common too.  Being burned out or burned usually leads to leaving full-time vocational ministry.  I have talked about different ways to stay healthy and 3 ways to fill up your tank.  Staying healthy in your personal and spiritual life will go a LONG way in staying healthy in your ministry.  It’s impossible to lead students to Christ if you are not in a right place yourself.
2. Work on having a healthy working relationship with your Supervisor.  Whether it is the lead pastor or an associate pastor who oversees you, make sure you are on the same page and that there is good communication between the two of you.  The more your supervisor knows about what is going on in your program that more he can help and support you throughout – especially if there are some pretty critical comments coming your way for one reason or another.  Keep the lines of communication open and make sure that you
3. Don’t lose sight of why you entered into ministry.  When you enter any job, getting sucked into things you didn’t know about or even think about before you entered can really cause you to lose focus on why you wanted to do that job in the first place.  Ministry is no different.  There will be things you encounter that are “part of the job” that you won’t like.  When we choose to focus on those things and lose sight of why we entered ministry to begin with, then both our students and we lose.  Stay focused on your calling.