The music minister cleaned out his office soon after he was fired. One thing that upset the pastor was the small “sign” the music minister left. The pastor took me down to the empty office to see it.
The second book we studied for our “leadership development” was “Creating Magic” by Lee Cockerell.
The author was a retired high-ranking member of the Disney team. The pastor used this book to correlate Disney’s systems to the church. We were assigned a chapter each week, and we were to find ways we could use some of the things that Disney implemented that would help our church services and programs. It wasn’t a terrible idea, but comparing the church with Disney was a little strange.
Anyway, I told you all of that so that this next part would make sense.
The music minister took this book and stood it up on his bookshelf… the only book he left in the office. You saw empty shelves and this “Creating Magic” book looking at you when you walked in. It was as if he was saying that this church had created anything but magic, and we could just keep the book. I thought it was genius, even then.
Of course, at the time, I patted the pastor on the back and felt sorry for him because it really bothered him. But I still thought it was a subtle but strong message to leave. I liked it so much that I would do something similar later in the year.
The music minister had purchased a house in Tree Town a few years earlier. It just happened to be in clear sight of the pastor’s house. The pastor commented on many occasions that he just couldn’t get away from him. He said it felt like he was watching him all the time. Funny how things like that work out. He couldn’t wait to get rid of him, but he didn’t go away. It was like a constant reminder. The pastor didn’t like it, and to make matters worse, the music minister would remain in Tree Town for the next several months.
We had Easter in April, which meant we had the Egg Hunt. The Egg Hung was a considerable undertaking. We moved it to the county fairgrounds because it had gotten too big for the church property.
The Egg Hunt was one event that I was proud of for how successful it had become. It had grown from something very small to a significant community outreach. It was well attended. Cars came rolling down the lane of the County Fair Grounds two years in a row to the Egg Hunt. Parents loved it. We had separate hunting areas for different ages of kids and an Easter Bunny. We had prizes, games, food… It needed some tweaks, but it had almost gotten bigger than the fall fest, which was huge and so much fun. I saw these events as opportunities to visit and get to know people in the community who didn’t or wouldn’t normally come to church. It gave us a chance as a church to show the love of Jesus. It brought us together, it gave everyone in the church something to do. It was a mission field within our community but outside of our church campus. I always loved planning these things. In my mind, these events were successful because they reached the community with no strings attached. We weren’t asking them to join our church, we were just loving them.
The egg hunt and fall fest were probably enough for one part-time person to handle each year. They each took months of preparation and planning.
I haven’t even scraped the surface of things that fell under my job description. There are many more that I’m sure I’ll find the time to write about in the future.
On the same day as the Egg Hunt that year, we also had a Passover Seder Dinner. It was extremely interesting and educational, but it was a lot to hold this on the same day as an Egg Hunt.
These were all good things, but this church had a staff of 5 people… and without the music minister, we were running on a team of 4. So anytime you added something extra, it added to everyone’s workload.
The pastor repeated one famous line regularly: “you aren’t allowed to say that something isn’t in your job description .” Ok, I get this to some degree, but if you can’t ever say no to anything, where are the boundaries to protect you from being overworked and burned out? Where are the safeguards? What exactly is a job description good for? Our job description was whatever the pastor and the church wanted us to do, and many of those things they wanted genuinely weren’t in my job description.
Please understand me. I enjoyed all these things. I even thrived in doing them, but in 2019 it seemed like I couldn’t get ahead.
I can’t say enough about the people that helped me. There were amazing volunteers that were always there to help. Many were just a phone call away. There were some extremely talented people in the church. I liked to say that the only thing I was good at was finding people who were really good at things. This church had artists, decorators, cooks, people who were amazing with sound and lights, and people who could build and paint anything I could dream up. I could go on forever. This church had people who could do just about anything. It was fun to be a part of this team. I genuinely miss that.
In April of 2019, we found out that my grandmother had cancer. My relationship with her was strained, and this news took me to an emotional place I can’t even describe. I was still dealing with the fatigue and losing weight from my surgery; I didn’t mind the losing weight aspect of things, but overall I was tired and didn’t like how I felt. So I began to pray earnestly that God would restore my energy.
May of 2019 brought Mother’s Day. Mother’s Day was also baby dedication day. I was in charge of contacting all new mothers, getting all the information together, putting together the PowerPoint presentation, choosing and packaging gifts for each family, and speaking during the service…. It was an involved service to plan. But, again, one I thoroughly enjoyed planning.
My kids and I also decorated photo booths for these particular Sundays. I would work on those things after my regular workday. It wasn’t uncommon for me and my kids to be at the church until 10 p.m. working on something.
My son graduated in May of that year. Anyone who has had a senior knows that the graduation months are full of their own responsibilities. There are senior pictures, invitations, parties… it’s a busy season.
The church held a special service for seniors. This service was one that I got to sit back and enjoy. It was nice.
Running on an already empty tank, I wasn’t ready for the next thing May brought. I didn’t expect or have room for an added responsibility.
Summer for a children’s minister is busy. For a full-time person, it might be doable, but for a part-time person who was only paid for 20 hours each week, there were some weeks I was working more than twice that much, and I still couldn’t catch up.
In April, the pastor called me into his office and told me I needed to create a Wednesday night summer program for kids ages three through 6th grade.
He didn’t care if there was a Bible lesson; it just needed to be something for them to attend at the church each Wednesday. I didn’t have a budget; we would set that as we went. He said I needed to look at the calendar and plan something fun for each week. This summer program would involve around 50 kids. I would purchase all of the supplies and set up the activities… I was speechless. It was like I was drowning, and instead of throwing me a life ring, he threw me an anchor. It knocked the wind out of me. I didn’t have space to add anything else, physically, mentally, or emotionally. He insisted that we needed a summer program because we hadn’t had anything during the summer the previous years. Our AWANA program was over in the summer, but we had day camps, VBS, and week-long away camps… I tried to explain that we did have summer programs; they just looked different than the rest of the year.
I also explained that parents didn’t particularly want to help with anything extra during the summer. They were tired. They had volunteered all year and just wanted to stay home with their families during the summer. And what was wrong with encouraging parents to stay home with their families during the summer. What if we provided a curriculum and equipped the parents to do something at home each week? None of my arguments worked. I was near tears when he finally told me I had to do it; I didn’t have a choice.
And for the record, this wasn’t in my job description.
He promised he would hire an intern to help me; He would even help me for a couple of weeks…
He did hire an intern, but even with her help, we couldn’t keep up. As for if he helped me…well, I’ll go into that later.
Why was this Wednesday night program so important to the pastor? I actually know the answer because he told me.
The previous church he pastored did not offer many extra programs for children. He felt like this affected the spiritual growth of his oldest child. So he wanted more programming for younger children to fill that gap for his younger kids while at Tree Town Baptist.
Look, I’m not against summer programming in churches. I can see how it can be beneficial. But, after stepping away from this kind of thing for the past couple of years, I’ve realized that all of that programming can take our focus away from what matters. We become so good at checking the boxes for attending church activities on our invisible Christianity checklist that we miss the real meaning of Christianity. We spend so much time at the church building, with church people, doing churchy things that we never get out into the community. It becomes more of a country club instead of a ministry. I still think that it’s ok to encourage parents to spend time at home as a family, and I still believe that equipping parents to teach their children the Bible at home is more beneficial than slip and slides at a church. Remember, the pastor said I didn’t need to plan a Bible lesson; he didn’t care if we even prayed or mentioned Jesus, just do something fun. I think this is why I was so upset that he insisted I add this to my schedule in the Summer of 2019. I’m not saying that you need a sermon or devotional every time you meet at the church. I’m not even saying that you can’t just have fun events at the church, but if it was just for fun, why couldn’t we have compromised and done something less frequently. It was just a whole lot to do just for the sake of fun.
Did I stand up to him and tell him no? Did anyone in the church notice my fatigue and realize I was working more than I should be? Did they offer to pay me more? Did I speak to the Personnel Committee and tell them I felt overworked and underpaid? Did I tell the Personnel Committee about my misgivings about the pastor and how he managed the staff? I didn’t.
And I think it’s important to reiterate that none of the things I was asked to do or did are unheard of for Children’s Ministry. There’s nothing wrong with any of the events we had and nothing wrong with a summer program. It’s just that I was part-time… Part-time, all the time, not just when it was convenient. So instead of trying to fit a full-time ministry into a part-time position, we should’ve been doing the opposite.
Another essential thing to note is that the pastor knew how overwhelmed I was. I had told him on so many occasions. But since he didn’t seem to think it was an issue, I felt like I was making a mountain out of a molehill. I was embarrassed to admit my defeat, so I kept pushing through. That falls on me. I should’ve taken better care of myself.
But let me insert this here for thought… and to remind me and those reading that power and position mean something… When someone in a powerful position (such as your boss or your pastor or, in this case, both) makes you feel like you should be able to push through and keep going; Or makes you feel like you should keep adding things to your schedule and keep trucking along… it needs to be said that their opinion carries a lot of weight. Whether spoken or not, the actions of someone in authority and their expectations mean something, and that’s on them.
I say all of that so that someone reading this and experiencing this kind of thing will realize before it’s too late that it’s ok to say no to something. It’s ok to ask questions and push back. If you feel overworked, stressed, emotionally drained, and spiritually empty, don’t allow those in authority to make you feel bad about that. Don’t let them give you the idea that if you were spiritually stronger, you could handle it. Sometimes, the ego of those in authority keeps pushing you instead of what should be; A pastor’s ego isn’t the voice of God.
Just because it’s “ministry” doesn’t mean you have to be ok with self-destruction.
But did I quit? I did not… I put my head down and kept going. I wouldn’t fail. Children’s ministry was God’s work. Wasn’t ministry supposed to be hard? Wasn’t there a certain amount of suffering that came with the calling?
Until Next Time,
Whitney