The 18 risk factors for pastors shown below are given with statistics that show where pastors are at today. These statistics have been gleaned from various reliable sources such as Pastor to Pastor, Fuller Institute for Church Growth, Focus on the Family, Ministries Today, TNT Ministries, Campus Crusade for Christ and the Global Pastors Network. You may be surprised or even shocked at some of the realities of ministry leadership. But this doesn’t have to be you. Make the choice to build a life of character and excellence that will let you hear the Master say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”
LEADERSHIP
1. Accountability
Research has shown that a key characteristic of leaders who finish well and fulfill their destiny is that they have established accountable relationships through peer mentoring and coaching. Don’t miss out on what the body of Christ has to offer – you cannot fulfill your destiny alone!
- Fact: 37% of pastors admit to having acted in sexually inappropriate ways.
2. Feedback
Many leaders lose effectiveness by losing perspective on their own abilities or their situation. Perspective adjustment is easy if you get regular healthy feedback. The lack of a feedback channel can lead to a significant rise in the amount of conflict you deal with. If you don’t provide a healthy way to get feedback, all the feedback you get will be unhealthy.
- Fact: 70% of pastors feel they have a lower self image now than when they began in ministry.
3. Focus
How much of your time goes to what’s really important and strategic, and how much goes into busyness, ‘fire-fighting’ and the needs of the moment? The inability to maintain focus on long term goals is a major cause of failing to fulfill one’s destiny.
- Fact: 50% of pastors are so discouraged that they would leave the ministry if they could, but have no other way of making a living.
4. Conflict
Conflict, especially within your core team, is an acid that eats away at your time, energy and resources – as well as your stomach! If your stress level from conflict is high, you need to improve your conflict handling skills, or your team just needs to become more unified.
- Fact: 85% of pastors say their greatest problem is they are sick and tired of dealing with problem people, such as disgruntled elders, deacons, worship leaders, worship teams, board members, and associate pastors. Ninety percent say the hardest thing about ministry is dealing with uncooperative people.
5. Leadership Development
Growth without leadership development usually leads to one of two places: eventual stagnation (you reach your capacity and the church stops growing) or burnout. Fulfilling or failing at the call of God on your life may be as simple as becoming great (and not just good) at developing leaders.
- 50% of pastors feel they are unable to meet the demands of their jobs
7. Role
Many pastors spend 60, 70 or even 80% of their time doing things they are not gifted at – and then wonder why their churches aren’t growing and they feel like failures. You may need help in re-crafting your role to fit who you are?
- 80% of pastors and 84% percent of their spouses feel unqualified and discouraged in their role as pastors.
8. Sense of Call
Serving Jesus ought to be something that brings joy. If your life is drudgery and joyful service is a distant memory, don’t settle for that – it’s so much less than what God has for you! Get the help you need to live an abundant life.
- Fact: 70% of pastors felt God called them to pastoral ministry before their ministry began, but after three years of ministry, only fifty percent still felt called.
SELF CARE
9. Spiritual Disciplines
A pastor’s relationship with God is the well he or she draws from in ministry. If the well is running dry, get outside help to develop a devotional plan that works for you, and give to you the support and encouragement you need to work it out.
- 80% of pastors surveyed spend less than fifteen minutes a day in prayer.
- 95% percent of pastors do not regularly pray with their spouses./li>
- 70% said the only time they spend studying the Word is when they are preparing their sermons.
10. Who invests in you?
A study of church planters found that those who met weekly with a coach or supervisor built churches nearly twice as large as those with no support. Who invests in you will make a big difference to your success.
- 70% of pastors do not have a close friend, confidant, mentor or coach.
11. Continuing Education
If you are not investing in your own growth, at some point your ministry will stop growing as well. Your ministry comes from the overflow of your own heart. Who you are is what you have to give. Do you have a plan to invest in your own growth so that you can lead others there as well?
- 80% of college and Bible school graduates who enter the ministry will leave the ministry within the first five years.
- 90% of pastors said their college or Bible school training did only a fair to poor job preparing them for ministry.
12. Sabbath
You can take a day off. You can live a healthy, balanced, life that attracts others to you and your church. Don’t let circumstances dictate your schedule: a coach can help you take charge of your life and get the rest you need to function at your best every day.
- 80% of pastors don’t take a regular day off
13. Retreat , Rest and Recreation
If we don’t set aside time away from the pressures of life, they eventually overwhelm us. Rest and refreshment are part of God’s plan for your life. Structure your life for the marathon and not just for a sprint.
- 62% of pastors average 5-6 hours of sleep a night
BALANCED LIFE
14. Authentic Friendships
The support, encouragement and fellowship of good friends is a great resource in our lives. We were made by God to live interdependently, needing one another, and without others we simply can’t fulfill our destiny. Don’t settle for shallow, surface relationships. You can have real, authentic, life-giving relationships – a coach can keep you accountable to this.
- 70% of pastors state that they have no close/truly intimate friendships.
15. Workload
There is never enough time to do everything, so life is about juggling priorities. If one area of life, such as ministry, demands more than a fair share of our energies, every other area of life suffers. A coach can help you to discover what you value in life and then to set and keep healthy, biblical priorities.
- 75% of pastors report working more than 60 hrs per week.
- 80% of pastors’ spouses feel their spouse is overworked.
16. Family Time
A study of church planters found that those who spent 8 to 15 hours per week with family led churches which were significantly larger than those who spent too little time at home. Children are one of the most important stewardships God entrusts us with – if we don’t steward our own homes well, how qualified are we to steward a church? (I Tim 3:4-5)
- 80% of pastors believe pastoral ministry is having a negative effect on their families.
- 43% of pastors spend two or fewer evenings a week at home.
17. Spouse
Lose your marriage and you’ll lose a good share of your ministry credibility. In a biblical priority system, spouse and family come before ministry.
- The majority of pastors’ wives surveyed said that the most destructive event that has occurred in their marriage and family was the day they entered the ministry.
18. Social life
Do you have a life outside of being a pastor? If not, you’re missing something. A coach can help you get life under control and find time to be a human being again and not just a pastor.
- 74% of pastors spent less than one evening a month engaging in purely social time with other couples (i.e. not “ministering to” them).
Tony Stoltzfus: Used with permission
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