Are You Expecting Too Much of Your Pastor?

If you asked most Christians what they expect from their pastor it’s likely they would want a good preacher who cared about the congregation and led the church well. And that is the right answer. However, if you asked for more specifics, what this actually looks like from week to week, you might find that our expectations for pastors are not as right as they first seemed. We have lost sight of what our pastors are actually called to be. Paul wrote of being “all things to all people,” but we have asked our pastors to do that in profoundly unhealthy ways.

More than just finding ways to connect with people well and properly contextualizing the gospel to reach unbelievers, we want him to exhibit every spiritual gift God intended to be dispersed throughout the entire church — to simply be all things we need and demand. The cultural expectations on pastors are mostly unbiblical, entirely impractical, and generally downright unrealistic. It has become an untenable situation, a burden no man can bear.

Here are five roles people often expect pastors to fill that God didn’t actually call them to be.

1. CEO and Business Maven

Pastors are shepherds, overseers, preachers, and caretakers. Somewhere along the way the American church began to see them more as organizational heads responsible for five- and ten-year plans, capital campaigns, global vision, and overhead. Streamlined systems and strategic hires take precedence. (In large part this has to do with how we see the church as a whole: an organization or corporation rather than the family of God and emissaries of His kingdom of servants.) While none of these is inherently wrong, they should not be what church members look to the pastor for. He is not primarily a leadership guru who determines the church’s growth trajectory, but rather a spiritual caretaker and navigator keeping the church pointed toward Christ-likeness and gospel clarity.

2. Financial Expert and Planner

When that young couple finds themselves buried in credit card debt, that family is underwater on their house, or that wealthy elderly couple is estate planning, who do they turn to? Naturally, the guy with the seminary education, right? Well, not really. It is good to look up to and respect our pastors, but we must recognize the limits of their expertise, for our sake and theirs. Pastors ought to be wise people, as Proverbs describes wisdom — rooted in the fear of God and in tune with God’s way of thinking. But that doesn’t make them experts on every area of life (especially nothing so complex as capital gains, compound interest, dividends, loan deferrals, and whatnot). We need advisors who know how to balance budgets, set goals, invest wisely, and give generously. And frankly, our pastors often need the same professional advisors to help them.

3. Marriage and Family Therapist

A pastor should have insights for numerous issues that face married couples, parents, and children. The Bible offers hope and direction for every struggle. The gospel transforms people. The Holy Spirit changes hearts. And the pastor can usher people into these realities. But there comes a point in various dire and complex circumstances when a family needs care from a trained professional. Pastors aren’t the right people to help an addict, a couple with a dysfunctional sex life, a victim of abuse (especially if he/she is still experiencing this abuse), adoptive parents dealing with a traumatized child, and so forth. Pastors should care for these families’ souls and fold them into the community of the church for support and care, but they need trained and focused help to guide them through therapy, counseling, and whatever other steps they ought to take to find freedom and wholeness. We wouldn’t ask a paramedic to do heart surgery nor should we expect our pastors to take responsibilities beyond their training.

4. Sociologist

From cycles of poverty to systemic racism to abortion to gender confusion, complex and contentious issues weigh upon our nation. And have for decades upon decades. Injustices are woven in and through society. And pastors should (must!) speak to these. Pastors should be proclaimers of biblical truth from the pulpit, consistent in the words and ways of Jesus Christ. But pastors should not be called upon as experts in the intricacies, history, and difficulties of these issues. Yes, pastors should seek to be aware and knowledgeable, but just like everyone else in the congregation they need wise, educated voices to inform and teach them. When we demand that pastors address every issue specifically we are asking them to take their eyes off the mission God has called them to. There is a time and place for him to address events and crises in our nation, but not on our terms. It must come from a place of awareness, of conviction, and of biblical clarity as the spiritual caretaker for a congregation.

5. Political Pundits and Spokesmen

For a long time the American church has had an uncomfortably close relationship with politics, and because of this pastors have been treated as unofficial (and occasionally very official) spokesmen for political agendas and candidates. We look to them to tell us how to vote on particular issues and which candidate to vote for. And we ask them to stand with us in our animosity toward opponents. Once more, it is vital for pastors to speak biblical realities that inform political views. It is crucial for pastors to proclaim a gospel that shapes cultural and political involvement. It is vital that pastors leave their congregants with no question as to where their true hope lies and what kingdom they actually serve. This leaves little room for punditry or toeing a party line. That is not the place of a pastor and not something we should ask or expect of them.

Leading the Body of Christ

None of this diminishes the leadership or importance of the pastorate. To say the pastor should not be leaned on in these ways doesn’t reduce his significance but rather strengthens him in his leadership by allowing him to be what God has called him to be. He can focus on spiritual leadership and shepherding and helping people see how the gospel of Jesus Christ and the whole counsel of Scripture should shape their lives. And it strengthens the church too. We need to remember how the Bible describes the church — as a body. Each member, each part is vital and each serves a unique role. When the pastor leads the body and the members serve according to their gifts the whole church is built up.