Hey everybody, it’s Randy Larson with the Five Two Network. I want to share with you three tips on how to avoid pastoral burnout.

First, you need to have friendships outside of your church.

Anytime that you have a friendship with an elder or a member at your church, there’s this sense of responsibility that you have to wear your pastoral hat, and you have to be a good example. You have to manage your emotions the right way. But if you have a friend outside of the church, you can share, “Man, my marriage is really struggling”, or “I’m butting heads with an elder at the church staff member at the church”, and “I’m angry and I’m frustrated”, and you don’t have to worry about messing up their church experience. So tip number one, you need to have friends outside of your church.

Second, you need to give yourself permission to have fun.

What we find with pastors is that we tend to focus on everybody around them. We take care of the needs of our parishioners, we take care of our neighbors, we take care of our family, often neglecting our own hearts and souls. So you need to join that pickup basketball game rec league. You need to pick up a hobby that is just fun. It doesn’t check any boxes. It doesn’t help you reach any of your goals at the church other than it helps you be a more healthy person and pastor for the people that you lead.

Third, you need to take Sundays off.

And I’m saying not just not preach, I’m saying don’t go to your church. Don’t go to any church! When I would try to take a Sunday off and go to another church, I could not help but deconstruct the service that was happening at the other church. I’m taking notes in my head of, “I don’t know about that song” or “That transition didn’t work”, or, “I liked that introduction to that sermon, but I don’t know about point number two or how the pastor kind of wrapped up his sermon”. I could not turn my brain off and just take it in.

Spiritually, I got more out of going on a hike. I got more out of sleeping in and just taking off that pressure of making a Sunday morning happen every week.

So I hope that these tips encourage you and helps you avoid pastoral burnout. At FiveTwo, we believe that the world needs healthy churches, and healthy churches are led by healthy pastors. So take one of these tips, or take all of these tips and put them into practice.