It seems my tri-vocational role has gotten the best of me. As of Feb. 2016, I am no longer a tri-vocational pastor. In fact, I'm not sure if I'm a pastor anymore because one of the positions I had to drop was being a church pastor. With "just" being a hospital and US Army chaplain, I am now in ministries where no one calls me a pastor, but a chaplain. I was with this church for 2 years as an English Ministry (EM) pastor and earlier last month I was "invited" to resign from my church. From my experience of being an EM pastor in several different churches of Presbyterian, Missionary, and Baptist denominations, I am starting to see a pattern in how pastors are "invited" to resign from pastorates, especially the EM pastorate.
From my personal experience as well as talking to several EM pastors of different Korean American churches, there seem to be two major patterns to why EM pastors resign from a church every 2 to 3 years.
The first pattern that leads to a pastor's resignation is that the position is not financially viable for the pastor and for the church. Many Korean American churches are in need of EM pastors, yet many EM pastors don't seem to be able to hold down their positions for a long time. Even in Christianity Daily's ministry jobs webpage, there is a continuous request for churches looking for EM pastors on a weekly and monthly basis"”mostly during summer and winter. I see this as trying to recruit EM pastors who are seminarians graduating from school and leaving current positions to find full-time positions in other churches (This seems to make most sense given that graduations take place around June or December. Also, it takes about 3~4 years to graduate from seminary. And EM pastor's tenure is about 2~3 years because pastors don't always start ministry from first year of seminary). It is widely known that most EM pastor positions are part-time positions. Why? Probably because churches are not able to fully support a pastor whose department is not able to financially support itself. Most English ministries consist of students who do not have the sufficient means to donate enough money to the church. But a Korean church in America needs to have EM for the English speaking (younger) members. So the EM necessarily exists for various reasons, yet due to financial reasons most churches are not able to pay enough for a seminary graduated pastor loaded with student debt, with a family to support, to be able to survive. Unwillingly, many EM pastors resign for very practical reasons"”to support oneself and one's family by finding a full time position. And EM members suffer because a new pastor comes and goes, again.
The second pattern occurs probably due to the end of the honeymoon phase. According to church growth expert Gary McIntosh, all pastors experience a "honeymoon phase" with one's new place of ministry. This phase seems to vary from pastor to pastor, but for the EM pastorate, the honeymoon phase takes a bit of a different turn. When a new EM pastor comes to a church, most if not all, church members are excited to have someone, especially when the EM pastor position was vacant for months or even years. The church is willing to bend over backwards to accommodate the new EM pastor and is willing to work with him/her. Personally for me, this was through the church willing to let me attend to Soldiers one weekend per month as part of my Army Reserve obligations. For the first couple of years, my church was very willing to let me be absent once a month and have guest speakers come. Although not every EM pastor is in the military, I would assume that other EM pastors hold various part time jobs or are still in school. As the honeymoon phase ends after about the first year, the church (whether it's the senior pastor, board, or church members) start requesting and expecting EM pastors to be more actively involved"”such as preaching occasionally for an early morning prayer service, attending Wednesday night services, etc. Such requests and expectations for EM pastors to be more involved in the church can cause conflicts with what the EM pastor is doing aside from the church, such as being part of the military, having a second or a third job, or being in the middle of finals week at seminary. Although the first "no, I can't" doesn't necessarily cause frustration between the church and the EM pastor, I wonder how many times an EM pastor has to take time off work or choose to not participate in the extra church events because (s)he has to work as a waiter? One way or another, with rise of requests and expectations come frustrations from both parties, and frustration leads to chasm in relationships, unfortunately leading both parties to sever ties. The church can always try to find a new EM pastor, and the EM pastor can always find a new church position; sadly it is the EM members who suffer from another lost relationship.
I am not writing this column to remedy the issue, but to call out the elephant in the room. Most pastors I've talked with have mentioned the financial issue of being a part-time pastor and the difficulty of juggling a ministry position and a second or third part time job outside of a church. Some of the reasons why most EM pastors are not able to be open about the short tenure of EM pastor positions may be due to the fear of being perceived as "money-loving" (1 Tim. 3:3) or being labeled a "hired hand" instead of a shepherd (John 10:12). What pastors and churches may oversee is the sad reality of church members who experience the saying of hello and goodbye on a very regular basis.
Reverend Joseph Choi is a senior chaplain of the Spiritual Care Department at Providence Little Company of Mary Medical Center in Torrance, CA. He also serves as a chaplain for the U.S. Army Reserves.
