I found an old article that I had written back in 2006 dealing with Burnout that I wanted to repost for you to read.
It is interesting, given my own burnout at the end of 2010, to read what I wrote back then …
It’s an unfortunate thing that burnout is common in Christian Youth Ministry, and YWAM is not immune to it.
Unfortunately burnout can too often be pushed aside as “spiritual warfare”. While this can be the case in some situations, often it is not and it requires a certain level of wisdom, discernment and trust from the leadership to work this through. As we grow as a ministry at YWAM – Reef to Outback I have seen it handled well and in the past I have seen it handled poorly.
When Linda Warren came through she spoke to us a bit about burnout in Youth With A Mission and what they have experiences in YWAM Denver. To help their staff deal with burnout before it happens one of the things that they do in their training is to get all of their staff to read Stephen R. Covey: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. I’ve actually had that book sitting on my bookshelf since I staffed a GENESIS School at YWAM Lausanne back in 2001. I haven’t read it yet, but I hear that it is good…
One thing that they really try to work on with their staff is their time management (which is one thing covered in Stephen Covey’s book). In Denver, and here in Townsville, we see that a some of our staff just don’t know their own limitations and “burn the candle at both ends” by staying up late and then being tired at work during the day.
Something that was not discussed during Linda Warren’s meeting with us was when very high expectations and responsibility are placed on our staff. Depending on how these expectations are communicated to our staff, and how the staff react to it, they can leave them with such a strong sense of responsibility that they simply can’t shut off during their non-work hours. This is where I have seen YWAM fail some of our young leaders in the past.
I’ve been here for almost eight years and know of a few people that have worked themselves into the ground trying to do everything that they could to further the vision here. I was close to burnout myself last year (that was back in 2005) and was actually released by the leadership for a three-month sabbatical. I was unfortunately not able to take the time away because we were in the middle of selling our house, but that’s how bad it got for me.
For my situation God provided another way out, and that was by bringing along Sam Werner to join me in my work in communications. I don’t think that Sam really appreciates how much of a blessing he is to me and to the base in the role that he has taken on. Tamara and I are still planning on a sabbatical for about three-months next year to refresh ourselves, raise some support and visit friends and family, but we won’t be in as desperate a state as we were last year.
Here is a final quote from my notes about how YWAM Denver works with their staff to assist them to achieve what God has placed in their heart to do:
The base needs to give people place / space to pursue what is in their heart and not hold them back. But this needs to be done within the vision of the base. If the vision does not fit in with the base then either the base will need to change or the person should be released to pursue what God has placed on their heart.
Update:
There are a few other articles about there about burnout in Christian ministry that I’ve seen in the last few days, including these ones:
- TheResurgence: Death by Ministry
- Church Marketing Sucks: Pastors Overworked; Numbers Underchecked
- History in the Making: The Tragedies of Pastoring
Photo Source: Mark Magnusson