It Only Hurts on Monday: Why Pastors Quit and What You Can Do about It

by Gary L. McIntosh, Robert L. Edmondson, Julie Becker (Illustrator)

Pastors are quitting! Some leave for what they hope will be greener pastures in another church. Some drop out of ministry altogether. Why? The pressures of ministry are such that many pastors spend their days off simply trying to recover. When a fellow pastor was asked how thing were going in his ministry, his wry answer was 'It only hurts on Monday.'

Evidence suggests pastors are moving or dropping out at an increasing rate. The Barna Research Group found that the average pastorate twenty years ago was about seven years in length but had dropped by 1993 to about four years. The authors have researched over 60 ex-pastors and their churches to discover some of the causes of this crisis in pastoral leadership.

Topics burnout, professional isolation, inadequate education, unrealistic expectations, resistance to change, poor pastoral accountability, tight finances, personal loneliness, and spiritual warfare. Each chapter concludes with helpful and practical suggestions on what you can do to help your pastor have a longer and more fruitful ministry in your church.

173 pages, Paperback

First published March 16, 1998

Reviews

[Aaron Hand]

Very helpful, yet dated book (1998). As a pastor I can relate to these struggles and challenges. This is a profitable and helpful book for lay leaders and pastors both. Highly recommended!

[Steven Bullmer]

I bought this book on an impulse when I was at a very low point in my ministry, thinking it would be healing for me. Turns out it wasn't. But then, that wasn't it's purpose. Rather than being a book for pastors to heal from their ministry wounds, it's really written for parishioners, and could have been subtitled: "How do keep the pastor you love; because your pastor is hurting in ways you don't know about." It is also written for small-membership churches (the book assumes there are little or no staff and the pastor is doing it all). The exclusive male language was annoying to my United Methodist core values. I found that while the authors did a creditable job diagnosing the problems, the solutions were simplistic. All of that being said, I do believe there would be value here if lay people in positions of influence in their churches were to read this book, take it seriously (Yes, this IS describing what's going on in your church!), and then dialogues with their pastor to find out where he (and she) was hurting, devise a strategy to really address the issues, and present a united front to the rest of the congregation about the changes that needed to be made.

[Luke Stoltzfoos]

Not bad, but it's dated now...and tended towards what felt like a victim mentality for pastors (seeming like we had the worst job in the world, and no one could possibly understand), and the last three chapters or so were repeat (literally - much of it word-for-word). haha. So "not bad" is relative to what "bad" is...

[Dan Acker]

As has already been shared, it is a bit dated, but there some really good nuggets of insight into the life and ministry of a pastor.