Using my mirrors to look behind me, the street showed cars parked on both sides. According to my dispatcher, I needed to deliver my empty trailer to the loading dock by reversing three blocks — through intersections without lights. As I eased through the first junction, horns blared, tires screeched and voices yelled. Arriving at the loading dock 15 minutes later, I wondered if any of those drivers would feel different if they knew they had just cursed out a Presbyterian pastor.
I have been a part-time pastor and tractor-trailer driver for 20 years. As such, I have found a lot of inspiration in the Catholic Church’s worker-priest movement begun by Father Jacques Loew when he started to work in the docks of Marseille, France, during the 1940s. According to a 1951 Time Magazine article, the church hoped “putting young priests into secular clothes and letting them work in factories [would] regain the confidence of the French working class, which had almost completely abandoned the Catholic faith.”
Today, as we deal with the negative effects of lower church attendance caused in part by the COVID-19 pandemic, numerous small congregations are struggling to stay viable. The 2022 statistical report for the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) notes that 1,836 churches (21.1%) reported 25 or fewer members. Fewer members mean a drop in finances, affecting staffing and operating costs. Full-time job opportunities with reasonable financial remuneration for pastors and seminary graduates are becoming more difficult to find. We must re-examine how ministry to small congregations can continue when full-time positions are unavailable.
We must re-examine how ministry to small congregations can continue when full-time positions are unavailable.
When studying at seminary the only future I saw for myself was as a full-time pastor. But, after serving in that role, I accepted an unexpected invitation to be the chaplain at Westminster Choir College in Princeton. As I coordinated chapel services, student counseling and taught, I began to view ministry more expansively.
After nearly two decades working in higher education at Westminster and then Fairleigh Dickinson University, I wanted a change. However, I could not locate a full-time pastoral position, so I served in multiple part-time pastorates for eight years. It was during this time I also became a worker-pastor to help financially support my family.
I would disappear from church life on Sunday evenings, only connected by cell phone. At 3 a.m. on Monday, I would drive to Elizabeth, New Jersey, get in my tractor trailer and deliver goods throughout Long Island, New England, Pennsylvania and Delaware. I would resume pastoral duties by Thursday, making hospital calls, responding to parishioners and planning the Sunday service.
During those secular working days, life was radically different. I was not greeted politely by someone saying, “Good Morning, Pastor” or “Doctor,” or “Dean.” It was more like: “Hey, You!” “What do you think you are doing?” “Get moving,” “Stop blocking traffic,” and numerous other unprintable phrases. However, it was a reality in another kind of workplace.
My current part-time pastoral position has lasted 25 years. When I began working with the congregation there were 13 active members. We now have about 40 members. However, we have no paid church staff, and the church building is large. So on a Sunday morning, about 50-60 people including 20 young children worship in the tower room speaking in Asante Twi. Around 130 adults and children pray in Spanish in the church’s reconditioned basement. The pastors of these two churches are also worker-pastors. One works in municipal government, the other is a realtor.
The worker-pastor model has allowed me to avoid burnout.
This unique type of pastorate can be successful within certain parameters. I have found from experience that one can avoid professional burnout and exhaustion because parishioners know that the pastor is unavailable on certain days except in an emergency. This gives the pastor the necessary personal time to spend with family or in study, reflection, rest or relaxation.
Additionally, I’ve come to believe that the worker-pastor should choose to work only with small congregations that are unable to support a full-time pastor. Jesus did not say, “Where 200 or 300 are gathered in my name;” he said, “Where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there with them” (Matthew 18:20). Serving 25 or fewer Christians is a calling that we must not ignore. Finally, the pastor, of necessity, must train members of the congregation to fulfill necessary duties that a full-time pastor would normally consider doing.
As a worker-pastor, I have watched the power and presence of the Lord at work.
As a worker-pastor, I have watched the power and presence of the Lord at work. A young mother raised her three children with no support from her divorced husband and became a vibrant, inspirational worship assistant Sunday after Sunday. A single grandfather was depressed and lonely before he found fellowship and inclusion in our church family, where he now volunteers as a sexton. A retired tree surgeon conducts a weekly Bible study class and is always ready to preach a sermon when I am on vacation.
I believe the need for worker-pastors will continue to grow as church membership declines. Perhaps the question we all must answer is: how can we encourage and support this work? The need is there. The question is, how will we address it?
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