Ministry burnout had its most recent heyday during the COVID-19 pandemic but has existed far beyond in churches big and small. Pastors and other ministry leaders, overwhelmed with the responsibilities of ministry coupled with larger-than-usual unrest and distrust in the body of Christ, recently faced many challenging decisions that motivated more than half of surveyed ministry leaders to consider quitting.
While ministry burnout is common for every church leadership role, evaluating and assessing personal feelings alongside ministry outcomes and goals will help leaders regain their focus, passion, and strength in the face of burnout.
In this article, we’ll discuss ministry burnout and how it affects a congregation, define some causes of overwhelm, list some key ministry burnout statistics, and explore how to avoid burnout with practical steps.
May this article help any pastor or ministry leader feeling the overwhelming force of ministry burnout recover and restore the joy of your calling?
Burnout in Ministry
”Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”
Galatians 6:9 (New International Version)
Many of us have seen pastors and other ministry leaders come and go in our churches. Some may have also seen how ministry burnout can negatively affect the ministry and personal lives of beloved leaders who must leave their church under less-than-ideal circumstances. When church leaders suffer burnout, the congregation suffers with them; however, the leader’s family bears most of the brunt of the burnout.
What is Ministry Burnout
Ministry burnout is mainly characterized by the emotional, mental, and often physical exhaustion leaders experience. Pastors, priests, missionaries, and ministry leaders face some of the most burnout-inducing responsibilities, but anyone involved in ministry can tend toward burnout by not taking care of themselves.
Here are a few key markers of burnout:
- Emotional exhaustion: Feeling overwhelmed, drained, and unable to cope with the responsibilities and work of the ministry, which leads to diminished enthusiasm and joy.
- Depersonalization: Developing a cynical, negative, and apathetic attitude towards the ministry and people being served, which leads to a disconnected focus on simply surviving the day-to-day responsibilities with no passion for future growth or development in the ministry or congregation.
- A low sense of personal accomplishment: Feeling ineffective and uninspired in ministry, leading to lower productivity and obsessive over-thinking about the difficulties and overwhelm of the tasks ahead.
- Detachment and escapism: Trying to escape the stress of ministry through unhealthy behaviors like detachment from friends and family, feeding ruinous addictions, and hiding from responsibilities are indicators of depression that lead to increased isolation and lack of motivation.
How Ministry Burnout Impacts Others
While every situation is unique, there are some typical reverberations the church community and the leader’s family face in these situations. The pastor or ministry leader may feel alone in their overwhelm and exhaustion. But others can often tell something is wrong before the leader accepts the problem’s existence, leading to more significant unrest and confrontation.
Here are some general ways ministry burnout affects others:
Impact on the Church
- Church disillusionment: As the church leader grows detached and disillusioned, the people follow. Small comments by a downcast leader make their way through the people’s hearts and minds.
- Unhealthy church culture: A leader’s stress and dissatisfaction with their ministry role will also affect other church leaders who spend time doing ministry with the burned-out leader. This can create a harmful work environment for others, especially those directly under the affected leader.
- Decreased effectiveness: Church operations and spiritual guidance suffer greatly as others try to manage the leader’s disillusionment alongside their responsibilities. Time and effort that could be spent on healthy ministry are then diverted to attend to the bombs dropped by the burnt-out leader.
Impact on the Leader’s Family
- Emotional distress: The emotional toll hits the leader’s family the hardest, leading a spouse and children to experience heightened stress, emotional exhaustion, and persistent fear. This is often the worst part of ministry burnout.
- Increased conflicts: A healthy family dynamic is often replaced by a dysfunctional one, which increases conflict and misunderstanding between spouses and children as the struggling leader begins disassociating from family in addition to their church responsibilities.
- Negative perception of God: Children especially become disillusioned in their understanding of who God is when they see a parent struggling with the effects of ministry burnout. The family is the church leader’s primary ministry but often becomes the lesser, and they suffer as a result.
Ministry burnout is a wildfire that spreads far and wide. The varied adverse effects hurt the church leaders and those who surround them. Taking care of oneself as a leader involves preventive measures such as self-evaluation, submission to others, and knowing the causes of ministry burnout.
Causes of Ministry Burnout
“Moses’ father-in-law replied, ‘What you are doing is not good. You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out. The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone.’”
Exodus 18:17-18 (New International Version)
The various causes of ministry burnout may or may not be relevant to all leaders’ unique situations; however, a lack of management of some general issues often leads to pain further down the road.
Here are some contributing factors to be aware of:
- Lack of work/life balance: Overworking includes the inability to spend a whole day removed from ministry responsibilities to focus on family or yourself. This can include physical elements like being tied to your phone or email as well as non-physical aspects like stress, anxiety, and worry about the ministry in your absence.
- Inadequate support systems: Many pastors are weary from the weight of the church on their shoulders and do little to ease the burden through a support system. Instead, they internalize their stress and assume the total weight is theirs to bear alone.
- Dealing with emotionally challenging situations: Ministry leaders are often involved in crisis ministry because the unexpected always occurs. Our church members will experience pain, loss, and suffering in a variety of areas, and it’s our job to be with them through those moments. Challenging moments like crisis management, pastoral counseling, and funerals can wear down the leader over time if not managed well.
- Disconnection from one’s calling: The work of ministry can become the goal in itself, distracting the pastor from a passionate initial calling to the monotony of maintaining every day responsibilities to survive. This can lead to feelings of spiritual dryness where the leader feels the Lord isn’t involved in the ministry work.
- Overweighted focus on numbers: Most church leaders want high numbers. They want high church attendance, high mobilization of church members, and high financial giving. Feelings of inadequacy occur when those numbers level or drop because a pastor is focusing more on quantity versus quality.
Ultimately, the church leaders facing ministry burnout have internalized their issues instead of looking for help from God and others. Whether it’s because of shame, guilt, or ignorance, these leaders avoid their problems by working more or ignoring ministry burnout symptoms instead of introducing ways to manage and heal them.
How to Avoid Burnout
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
Matthew 11:28-30 (New International Version)
Learning how to recognize and address ministry burnout is critical for church leaders. The ways to do this may not be apparent or appealing, but they are helpful in the long run.
The keys to avoiding burnout can be expressed through three simple words: Trust, Rest, and Refuel.
Trust
One of the biggest causes of ministry burnout is pastoral focus on themselves as the lynchpin for all ministry. Instead of relying on others to lead their ministries independently, many overworked pastors or church leaders become micromanagers and insert themselves into various areas of church ministry.
Even worse, a pastor who lacks a team or the ability to mobilize volunteers often decides to oversee all ministries alone.
Learning to trust that God is in control and can lead others just as well as he leads you in church management is the largest help but a stumbling block for many leaders.
You can learn to trust more by:
- Implementing teams and allowing them to operate under your guidance without your involvement.
- Knowing it is God who draws people to himself (John 6:44) regardless of our participation.
- Understanding that everything doesn’t rely on you to accomplish God’s work in the church or community.
Rest
A lack of rest is also a significant cause of ministry burnout. Learning to rest is incredibly difficult for many visionary leaders but is essential for healthy bodies and ministries. Many pastors see rest as unproductive, leading them to fill days off or vacations with more work, which belies an unhealthy relationship with their ministry.
These feelings of unproductiveness show that the pastor thinks God’s will or work in the world relies on the leader’s constant productivity.
Rest will become easier once a church leader learns to trust God and others more.
You can learn to rest more by:
- Starting slowly with short periods of rest from ministry work and increasing the time of rest as you become more comfortable with trusting.
- Allowing your spouse, family, or friends to hold you accountable while resting, keeps you from doing more work while taking a break.
- Taking up other work during restful periods that isn’t directly related to ministry but will help you overcome the itch to do something productive (i.e., gardening, building, exercising, or other hobbies)
Refuel
Ministry is about giving and receiving: giving to those who need it and receiving a supernatural increase in our ability to minister from the Holy Spirit. However, giving without receiving is also possible, leaving us spiritually, emotionally, and physically drained. This usually happens when we begin to live apart from relying on God.
The often unspoken truth is that many church leaders can and do operate their ministries somewhat separate from God. This doesn’t mean these ministries always operate this way, but it does mean that the ministry’s work has, at times, become the focus of more than God’s plans.
Refueling involves trust and rest but also reorienting our vision, goals, and actions toward God’s will instead of our own.
You can learn to refuel more by:
- Having a support system of other ministry leaders and people you trust to help you discern and decipher your relationship to ministry and how God is leading you.
- Taking time to grow in your own relationship with God and being willing to submit to discipleship from other leaders you trust by taking a focused retreat, attending conferences, finding a Christian counselor, or simply visiting other churches and being a congregant instead of a leader.
- Focusing on personal devotional times that involve reading the Bible and talking with God intimately instead of on a surface level, allowing God to speak to you instead of you filling the whole time with your concerns about the ministry.
Recognizing and addressing the causes of ministry burnout is essential for healthy leaders and ministries. Focusing on self-care, support systems, boundaries, and an increased relationship with God can be helpful preventative measures.
Important Ministry Burnout Statistics
“He makes me lie down in green pastures,
he leads me beside quiet waters,
he refreshes my soul.“
Psalm 23:2-3a (New International Version)
Ministry burnout can occur in any church leader. You most likely may be facing elements that can lead to a larger issue in the future. Knowing some statistics about ministry and burnout will help you assess and analyze your situation and help you formalize a plan to combat it.
- 91% of pastors have experienced burnout in their ministry showing that it is an almost universal experience.
- 70% of pastors constantly fight depression. There is a significant need for pastors and other church leaders to find counseling to safeguard their mental health.
- Around 50% of pastors feel discouraged in their roles as ministry leaders and would leave the ministry if they had a clear path toward another career. Feeling stuck in your position makes ministry more work than a calling.
- 80% know that their ministry has negatively impacted their involvement with their family, revealing that putting ministry over family is a significant cause of burnout.
- 70% of pastors do not have one close friend. Isolation in ministry leads to unaccountability from those who know you best and can speak into your life and situation.
- 1 in 3 pastors are considered “healthy”. Most pastors and church leaders are working at a deficit.
- 50% of pastor’s marriages will end in divorce because the families often suffer the most.
- 90% of pastors report working 55-75 hours per week, showing that ministry often involves overworked leaders.
- 40% of pastors report serious conflict with a congregant at least once a month. Continuous church conflict hurts pastors and other church leaders.
- 50% of pastors feel like they are unable to meet the demands of their ministry, indicating that they do not have the necessary resources or volunteers to help them manage their responsibilities.
- 70% of pastors feel underpaid and undervalued as a result. Volunteer church leaders may feel undervalued as well.
- 80% of church leaders will not be in ministry in ten years, and only a small fraction will make a career out of ministry. Many leaders do not see ministry as a viable long-term choice.
- 100% of pastors know someone who has left the ministry due to burnout, revealing that this is a huge problem.
These statistics show us how common ministry burnout is for pastors and other church leaders.
Conclusion
Conflict, discouragement, poor mental health, too much work, and isolation are common themes in ministry burnout. Combating these issues with better self-care, time management, and consistent support systems will help leaders build healthy relationships with their ministry.
Despite the overwhelming statistics and causes of ministry burnout, church leaders can change the tide by taking time to trust, rest, and refuel. These are essential steps in overcoming the various causes that lead to more significant problems in the future.
Maintaining accountability through support systems is one of the best ways to combat burnout. Grow your support team of trusted leaders and people in your life who can and will hold you up during the difficult times of ministry. Websites like Church Giving can also help by giving insight into potential problem areas of ministry and offering helpful insights and solutions.
If you need someone to talk to, MentalHealthHotline.org lists a few resources, such as its own hotline that says it offers “spiritually informed and empathetic help” (866-903-3787) and the Christians in Crisis hotline (844-472-9687). In addition, consider finding a Christian counselor you can meet with regularly to help you walk through the often tumultuous waters of ministry.
