Perhaps you've heard the story about the man who rolled over in bed one Sunday morning and told his wife he wasn't going to church. "Yes you are." She said, pulling on his arm to get up. "No, I mean it, I'm not going. I don't like it there. The people are mean, the music is horrible, and it feels like it just drags on forever. I'm not going today." he said, adamantly. His wife rolled her eyes. This wasn't the first time she had heard all of this, but he was never successful at convincing her. "Honey, get up and get dressed, you can't be late and you certainly can't stay home... you're the Pastor."

I love that story. You don't have to be a Pastor to relate to it. Everyone has days when they don't want to go to work. Fortunately for me, my work is only one day a week (I'm just kidding, don't email me).

Our church is currently in a three week series called Essential Oil, all about living a life poured out in worship. You can catch it HERE. This coming Sunday will be our final week of the series and it's been powerful! Want to know my favorite thing about it? I'm not preaching it.

THE WORD

1 Corinthians 3:6-9

I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God has been making it grow. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. The one who plants and the one who waters have one purpose, and they will each be rewarded according to their own labor. For we are co-workers in God’s service; you are God’s field, God’s building.

Each year I take a personal retreat in the fall to seek the Lord and begin laying out the following year of sermons, series, and events for our church. A few weeks later our Pastor team goes on a retreat together to finalize the calendar. I used to think you couldn't possibly follow the Holy Spirit if you planned sermons way in advance, but if the Holy Spirit can speak to us about Sunday's message on Saturday, He can speak to us about next February's series in October. We just have to see that far out to seek Him for it.

So, when I told our worship Pastor that I felt led to give him a three week series the following year, he shared with me that he had already felt prompted by the Holy Spirit to begin preparing one. Holy Spirit is a planner!

Our church has benefited greatly from not only Pastor Will's teaching, but all of our various pastors who preach faithfully several times throughout the year. But let's be honest, people are always a bit confused when someone other than the lead pastor walks up on the platform after worship. We've all had the experience of trying to get a friend or a neighbor to come to our church, only to have them finally show up on a Sunday that something "abnormal" happens: a different speaker gets up, the music cuts out, or worst of all, the Pastor gives a sermon on... TITHING! *Cue the dramatic horror music and screams!

It can be frustrating when you come to church expecting one thing and get another, but it's important to keep in mind that church isn't about "getting" or "going." Church is about becoming. We are a part of the Church to glorify God and become more like Him. If church is just a place that you go to consume content on Sundays, it will be sure to disappoint you often. But if church is a body you're connected to, in and out of season, you'll realize variation from week to week is ultimately for your good and for the good of the whole.

3 REASONS WHY I DON'T PREACH EVERY SUNDAY

1. It's not healthy for ME - I need rest

I'm well aware it's not the norm for the Lead Pastor to be out of the pulpit for three weeks in a row without being on sabbatical or vacation. Here is what is normal:

• Over the past several years up to 40% of pastors have reportedly given serious consideration to leaving full-time ministry. source

• It's been estimated that up to 80% of pastors will not be in the ministry ten years later and only a fraction make it a lifelong career. source

• On average, seminary-trained pastors last only five years in church ministry. source

Burnout is normal. These statistics are drawn from all types of churches, the average size of which is 80 to 100 people. I grew up in churches where the pastor preached every single week, without fail. Not just Sunday mornings, but Sunday and Wednesday evenings too. They also visited everyone in the hospital, did house calls, drove the Church van, and taught Sunday school among a million other things. And we wonder why pastors are flat-lining. If we're going to be good stewards of the people, ministry, and resources God gives us, we must consider doing some things differently.

For this reason I set a rule for myself: I don't preach at our church more than 40 Sundays a year. The past two years I've preached around 36 to 38 Sundays total. This isn't just because we hold four services on Sundays, though that's certainly a factor. Its because the responsibility of feeding the flock each week is a weighty one and should not be taken lightly. If we are to steward it well, we must allow time and windows for rest and refreshing.

LEADING VS FEEDING

It's not uncommon for people to assume when I'm not preaching that I'm "off" or on vacation. You can see the wheel's turning in many heads when they see me sitting on the front row as a recipient while someone else preaches. I totally get it. I don't cringe when people assume that all a pastor does is just preach on Sundays. Pastors tend to be too easily offended when they hear those kind of assumptions. The reality is, preaching is the most visible thing we do. Most people will only know that aspect of our job and we shouldn't fault them for not understanding the full scope of a pastor's responsibilities. If we're honest, a pastor's list of duties differs drastically from church to church. The title "pastor" can mean a hundred different things to a hundred different people!

The two most important aspects of pastoring are feeding and leading. We are to feed the flock the Word of God and lead the flock in the direction God is calling us to go.

On the weeks that I'm scheduled to preach, feeding has to be a top priority. I have learned I'm typically no good to anyone until Sunday's message is finalized so, I typically try to have the sermon mostly nailed down by Tuesday or Wednesday and reserve meetings and other appointments for later in the week.

On the weeks that I'm not scheduled to preach, I'm able to lead at a much higher capacity. I can give a lot more of my time and head space to strategic planning and areas that otherwise get pushed to the corners of a normal week. Just to give you some perspective, during this current three week window that I'm not preaching on Sundays, I've been able to:

• Preach at a local High School outreach event

• Make a bunch of headway on a book I'm currently writing

• Minister at a community event that one of our members coordinated called Revival at the River

• Schedule some one-on-one meetings with leaders and members

• Spearhead some volunteer work on our future campus

• Prep for a session I'll be teaching at our upcoming denominational Assembly

• Hire and onboard a new staff member

• Write a couple of blogs

• Take my family on a four day vacation to the beach!

Sure, I was able to take some time off, but I've also gotten to focus on leading in ways I wouldn't have been able to if I was under the weight of preparing Sunday messages.

SABBATHING VS. DAYS OFF

Hear my heart, I in no way want this to seem prideful or braggadocious; we don't make our numbers a common talking point but I think it's important to understand the context for what I'm about to say. In the past two and a half years our Church has almost tripled in size and we have gone from two services to four services each Sunday. The only way for that kind of growth to not CRUSH leaders is to have extremely healthy boundaries that we refuse to compromise.

Each of our staff members, including myself, are required to take a day off and a Sabbath each week; allow me to explain the difference between the two. Our day off (which, staff-wide, is typically Saturdays) is a day for us to take with our families and do what we wish and enjoy how we desire. Being in ministry, it's not uncommon for our day off to get interrupted from time to time. Sometimes an emergency happens: something at the Church breaks, a family needs help, a death takes place. The nature of our job is to run where we are needed. Thankfully we have developed and are continuing to develop a culture where the whole Church takes responsibility for being in the ministry as Ephesians 4 says, so the responsibility is shared.

We treat our day off as a gift but our Sabbath is to be guarded. On our Sabbath, to the best of our ability, the phone goes unanswered. Texts aren't responded to. Life gets put on pause. This day is to be an offering to the Lord. Notice in Exodus 20:10 it says, "but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God." The Sabbath is not just a day FOR you, but also a day TO the Lord. So, we rest. We unplug. Maybe we fast... or maybe we feast.

Our staff notes at the beginning of each week what day each person is Sabbathing and we make a conscious effort to guard one another's Sabbath as sacred. As pastors, Sundays are work days for us, so we have to be intentional about taking another day to rest the way God instructs us to.

2. It's not healthy for THE CHURCH - we need multiple voices

Before I move further, let me clarify that I do believe it's important for a Lead Pastor to be the dominant voice in the church. Paul instructed Timothy, the pastor of the church in Ephesus to, "Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction." But he also said, "the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others."

It's clear that in Acts there were multiple leaders speaking into the life of the Church. Acts 2 says the people devoted themselves to the Apostles' teaching. Each day that they came to the temple, it didn't matter whether James, Peter, or Thaddeus was speaking. Everyone came hungry to hear God's word, regardless of the vessel communicating it.

In 1 Corinthians 14 Paul instructs that in the gatherings "two or three prophets should speak." He also instructed that space be given for some to sing and others to give encouraging words. In other words, get used to hearing from more than just one person. This doesn't negate the reality that leadership structures should be in place and that there should be clear and defined voices within the local body, but the body will be healthier when there are multiple voices speaking into it.

PERSONALITY VS. PASTORING

When Jill and I were youth pastors, we worked really hard to raise up leaders around us and develop them. When we began empowering some of them to preach in our youth services, I became frustrated by the amount of students who would stay out that night or find something else to do. They seemed to think that if the youth pastor wasn't preaching, it was ok to just skip that week.

You might think that's teenage thinking, but I've found adults can be even worse. Not only do they stay out, they'll tell you to your face they don't like it when you're not up there.

I'm not being critical and I would encourage you to reserve your judgement of people who say such things. It's natural. Part of maturing spiritually is learning to own your faith separately from the people who have played an integral role in leading you to Jesus. We ALL have to learn to do this at some point. This is why the passage at the top of this blog is a rebuke from Paul. He was tired of people arguing over who their favorite speaker in church was!

"You are still worldly. For since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere humans? For when one says, “I follow Paul,” and another, “I follow Apollos,” are you not mere human beings?" 1 Corinthians 3:3-4

We may not be vocal about this, but we all have our favorite Preachers. In the west, we've almost made preaching out to be a sport. We have our favorite teams (churches) with our favorite players (preachers) and our favorite plays (sermons). A church that doesn't actively fight against this tendency naturally ends up with a culture where the Pastor is a celebrity and the church is a fanbase.

Now, let's keep this in balance: a church should be supportive of it's pastor. Pastors are supposed to lead from the front, as any good shepherd does. But they also must point people to Jesus as the answer and not themselves.

After several years of developing leaders in our youth ministry and building culture, the voices of other leaders not only became accepted but also celebrated. In one of my final years as youth pastor I preached less than 20 times the entire year. Our leaders had become great communicators and our students valued their voices and received whole-heartedly from them. They stopped playing hooky when word got out that I wasn't preaching.

I would never teach so seldomly as a Lead Pastor, but the goal is still the same. We want to build a culture where man is not the center, God is. Regardless of who brings the Word each week, we're all hungry to hear and grow!

3. It's not healthy for OUR FUTURE - we need to develop leaders

Four and a half years ago, when our previous Lead Pastor shared his desire to transition the church to us, Jill and I immediately began seeking the Lord about the future of the youth ministry. BSM (Breezewood Student Ministries) had been our baby for 12 amazing years. As much as we knew the Lord was calling us into a new role, we still mourned the passing our old one.

As we began sorting through the possibilities of who would step into the student pastor role, we realized the list of names from inside our ministry far surpassed the list of names from outside of it.

We began with a list of at least five or more leaders who had been by our side for several years, who we had the privilege of developing and discipling. Over the next few months it became very clear that God had set apart one in particular as the successor.

By the time he stepped into the role officially, he had not only preached many times over the years, he had also preached through several series. He had spent years by my side planning events, shepherding students, and implementing systems. He had made his fair share of mistakes, learned to take responsibility for them, and had learned from my many mistakes as well. We couldn't dream of bringing anyone else in after we had invested 10 YEARS into his development.

To this day he is one of the best disciple-makers and leadership-developers I know. He and his wife already have a solid team of leaders around them who are also being empowered each week to lead with integrity and faithfulness.

LEADERSHIP LIDS

When it comes to church growth, one of the most important things you can do is identify lids in your leadership that are preventing your church from reaching and making more disciples. I don't believe every church should be a mega-church, but I do believe every church should be good stewards of whom the Lord sends.

One of the most common lids that prevents a church from growing is the pastor's inability to let go of responsibilities and let others lead. When we don't give others the opportunity to use and grow in their gifts, our church's reach will be limited to our individual ability.

The parable of the talents found in Matthew 25 tells us that the wealthy man gave each steward an amount that was directly tied to his ability. Each of person is limited to their individual ability, but the church is limited only to it's collective ability.

As Deuteronomy 32:30 says,"How could one have chased a thousand, and two have put ten thousand to flight, unless their Rock had sold them, and the Lord had given them up?" When Church leadership embraces and empowers members to lead, our reach increases exponentially!

CONCLUSION

I'm not preaching this coming Sunday. I used to think I needed to keep that under wraps. "Don't let people know or else they won't bring their friends and they'll stay out themselves!" Not anymore.

There will always be people who don't get it yet. They will eventually though, that is, if we remain consistent in building healthy culture. Our Church is already adapting so well. Now, when one of our other leaders preach, instead of hearing things like, "When are you preaching again?" I hear things like, "What a great Word! Why are you here? Go home and rest!"