I love Erwin McManus’ book The Barbarian Way. It has helped me change the way I look at the huge and awesome God that I serve. The theme of the book is about living out our Christian lives, as either Barbarians or as civilized Christians. As my perspectives changed, my heart changed, and with those changes I believe God took the opportunity to challenge me to see if the changes were genuine.
It wasn’t too long after I read the book for the first time that I felt God moving me out of my comfortable position as a full time youth pastor into a world that I had experienced before, but on a different level. God was calling me to serve as a bi-vocational youth leader. I believe there are two different types of bi-vocational youth leaders, the first is the leader who gets paid by a secular job and a minimum salary from their church, the second, is the leader who is paid by a secular job, but they are in a church that cannot pay them in their current situation (The full time volunteer leader). I don’t know what God has in store for me in the future, I never thought he would have called me out to do what I am doing now, but he did, and all I can do is follow, but in this journey I have learned so much, so here are a few highlights:
Bi-vocational is Uncomfortable: Life is already busy enough! When I was full time at my previous church I had a full schedule and at times I wondered how I would ever get everything accomplished. However, it was easy to have full days to focus on the ministry tasks at hand. Bi-vocational leaders have to balance work, ministry, family, and personal time and on top of it all we have to manage personal spiritual growth as well. It is uncomfortable, but God uses the uncomfortable. I have to rely on him more now than I ever have. It was real easy to rely on myself and the time that I had to devote to student ministry when I was full time, and that is why I believe the more comfortable we are, the easier it is to look to ourselves rather than to God.
Bi-vocational is Humbling: There seems to be a negative connotation in the pastor/youth pastor field when it comes to bi-vocational ministers. It’s almost as if bi-vocational ministers are considered ‘coach class’ versus ‘1st class.’ If bi-vocational youth workers look to other ministers for some kind of approval, many times it’s not going to come, and discouragement can easily set in. I get the grunts and the weird looks when I tell other youth pastors what I do and my situation. I have had people ask me, “What, you couldn’t handle it full time?” and I have heard others say things like, “Well, he/she must not be qualified since they are part time or a volunteer.” The criticisms and judgments are out there, but once again, it comes back to God and the position he has put us in, when we realize that it is God and not us, it humbles us to put all of our trust in God’s plan and not man’s opinion.
Bi-vocational is Rewarding: Bi-vocational youth workers have a distinct advantage over full time ministers. They have the opportunity to work and do life with those who are not believers. Full time ministers get bogged down by the details of the church and do not have the opportunity to spend a lot time with those in the world. Bi-vocational leaders have the opportunity to broaden their understanding and their methods of reaching out to unbelievers. My rewards are different than this. Another church hired me for publications and websites. I am working in a larger church and I get to watch and learn from a larger staff than where I serve in student ministry, and I believe God will use that in the future. It’s real easy to look at what we don’t have and all of the negatives of our situations, but if we are definitely in the position God has placed us in as bi-vocational leaders, then there are more rewards and positives surrounding the situation than you can see.
Nick,
Thank you so much for your touching article. I started as a full time volunteer youth pastor and now I am at a church that can pay me some funds. But it is true that we bi-vocational pastors have some advantages. I personally started a college ministry from kids at one of my jobs. If I hadn’t been working there some of the kids would not have ever had the opportunity to hear about God. I use to get down on myself about not being full time and I still want to be full time someday but I know now that God has me here in this position for a purpose. I meet ungodly people everyday and I get the opportunity to tell a lot of them I am a pastor. The responses I get are amazing. I have spent an amazing amount of time in my secular job, counselling and loving others. I wish that the rest of the “Christian” community would see the benefits of bi-vocational and really understand that it is more full time than so called “full-time” staff are. I was a restaurant manager for the first four years of my ministry, I would work up to 80 hours a week in my job, 20 hours a week with the ministry and still have to spend time with my wife and kids. It wasn’t easy but when I walked into a local christian bookstore and was told I couldn’t recieve a pastors discount cause I wasn’t full-time. It makes us feel like what we do isn’t important. The good news is, I don’t serve them, I serve God. So when life gets you down and usually it’s other christians that throw the best darts, I can look to my Father in heaven and know I please Him. Thank you so much again for sharing your story. God has plans for us all and I am eager and determined to reach the end for the prize Paul talks about. God Bless you and your journey.