Loneliness
The typical minister is one of the loneliest souls in town. Outside of the church assembly, church groups, and church meetings, the minister is a loner. Not because he wants to be, but usually because very few people feel qualify to become friends with "the man of God" or "the woman of God".
Yes, there are ministers who do ooze the air of being above the friendship circle of their members, or the lay people of the community.
Of course, the minister has the Lord for his/her best friend. But in terms of human connection outside the church setting, the minister remains friendless.
He may have minister friends, but that is often a professional relationship, not a real friendship. And having fellow ministers as friends can be a shaky, tricky thing, because he could soon lose one or more of his members to one of those so-called friends. And suddenly the minister who "stole" the member may begin to avoid the minister whose member has been "stolen".
Often the minister is pastor to everyone else but he has no one to give him pastoral ministry when he really needs it. Church members just don’t know how to befriend their minister, so they keep their distance from him, except to talk with him about “church business”.
Yet, like any other human being the minister needs company. He needs friends besides his spouse and nucleus family, but no one seems to understand or care that he really does need a friend.
“After all, he has a special relationship Jesus, the best friend anyone can have! So whybother him with flesh-and-blood friendship?”
That seems to be the unspoken thought of the preacher’s church members. They just don’t get it. The man is lonely, and it’s eating him up that no one seems to want his company outside of church halls and walls.
Every now and then the minister hears few of his members talk about their latest recreation ~ golf, bowling, basketball, etc ~ but do they ever invite him to any of the fun stuff?
Furthermore, the minister is expected to call, write or visit members who are bereaved or sick. But when it is the minister who is bereaved or sick, he sees no one come by to visit; he hears from no one; no one sends a Get Well card. Very rarely does a member contact the minister just to find out how he’s doing.
No comments:
Post a Comment