The Ministry Iceberg

Ah! It’s good to have another day off work! 🙂

The other day while I was in the car my thoughts drifted back to the first time I coordinated a large church event. I remember I was amazed at how much time it took to plan, prepare, run and clear up afterwards. I had been to similar evenings before as a participant, but I had no idea how much work was involved in staging such an event. I’m equally sure that the majority of those who attended that night saw only fraction of what was involved, in much the same way as you only see a small portion of an iceberg above the water:

A couple of weeks ago I had lunch with a friend who’s deeply involved in lay ministry in the Church and I shared with her the image of the “ministry iceberg”. We spent quite some time talking about this and about work-ministry-life balance. Unfortunately, I’ve known lots of good people who were involved in ministry – young adult groups, Bible studies, social ministries – and they eventually ended up quitting, exhausted and burned out.

It’s often said that if you want something done, ask someone who’s busy. I’ve found this to be equally true in parish life. It is those who are already far too busy who are at the top of the pastor’s list when he’s looking to hand out jobs. This routinely results those people being overloaded, like “too little butter spread on too much bread”, to quote Samwise Gamgee. This has happened to me a couple of times and it’s not pleasant, being run so ragged that I’ve been of no real help to anyone.

Over the last few months I’ve worked very hard at forging an improved work-ministry-life balance and getting better at saying “No”. I’m interested to hear about your experience with similar situations: Have you ever got burned out? What do you do to prevent it?