Ministry Burnout: What Every Church Leader Needs to Know.
In this powerful episode, we’re joined by a licensed therapist from The Refuge Center for Counseling to explore what it means to survive Monday—the emotional drop-off many pastors and leaders experience after the intensity of Sunday ministry.
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Pike Williams: It is truly, uh, my pleasure to be here with you. Um, and I've thought a lot about this, and with the delay, I've had more time to think about it and pray about this and to pray for each of you, so I'm really honored to be here. Um, let me, um, just take a second and make sure that you, uh, know a little bit about the Refuge Center for Counseling, which is where I am a staff therapist, as Mary mentioned.
And we've got a couple of people with us here today. Patty Eller back there at our table, who's the director of development, and then Tammy Myrick as well. So, uh, we look forward to meeting you and maybe spending a little time with you today. I'm gonna be here all day. I look forward to that. So look forward to, uh, getting to know each of you.
Uh, just a brief word on the Refuge Center. We are a nonprofit, Christ-centered, uh, counseling center. We offer a sliding fee scale. It's one of our distinctives. Uh, our fees [00:01:00] range as low as $19 per 50-minute session. That's five zero. It's one of these quirky things about counselors. Uh, it's called an hour-long session, but it's technically 50 minutes, so don't let that throw you if you, if somebody says that.
But, uh, we offer, again, as low as 19, and we max out at $125 per session. It's based on income. And our mission statement is to provide excellent, affordable, and accessible, uh, mental and emotional healthcare services to people in need. Uh, we have a wide range of clients, and we have a lot of clients. The Refuge Center was founded in 2005.
It's grown con- uh, consistently, rapidly, and, uh, last year we saw about four, about 4,000 clients and did about 40,000 sessions. Now, if you do some quick math on that, that's about 700 or 800 sessions per week. And, uh, so we have a lot of opportunity to kinda hear what people are struggling with. And of course, that's no different than people that you know, the people you lead, [00:02:00] uh, people in your church and maybe, of course, ourselves.
So this is not something that just happens to others, as, uh, as Mary was just saying. We are human too, and you guys and, uh, men and women are certainly that as well. So that's a little about us, and we have more information at our table and be glad to answer any questions, okay? Um, let me go ahead and go to the next slide here.
Here's what I would like to do, um, this morning. There's really just a couple of things, uh, that I wanna stress. This, this question of surviving Monday, um, and how do we keep ourselves together as we, uh, encounter the ups and downs of life, but especially for you all when you're coming off of a very stressful and, uh, emotional and very important Mon- uh, Sunday.
And so just a couple of things as I was thinking about this that seemed real important. This concept of internal alignment. Simply stated, what do you believe to be true? What are your core values? [00:03:00] What is true for you in the work you're doing and personally? Okay, and make sure that you come to grips with that.
And if that changes over time, okay. But it is important to align our behavior or what we're doing to what we believe to be true. And we'll talk a little bit more about that. So that's the internal alignment piece. And then, of course, what happens when that's not happening, when I'm not the man I want to be or the pastor or the leader that I need to be and I've, uh, I, I made a mistake or I just missed or I failed and I'm just not feeling good about where I am.
And so to have a place where we can go, i.e., healthy relationships where we can talk when things are not going well. And that is essential. And I love the quote or the clip from the video that talked about, you know, you can go fast alone, but you can't go far. And, uh, that is, just seems to us in our world of, uh, clinical counseling to be so very true.
Uh, I just need to define a couple of terms here real quickly. [00:04:00] And where we're headed is, of course, I've got a little, uh, uh, a, so a couple of activities actually at your tables for you to do a little bit later to engage this material a little bit. And, uh, um, we'll get to that shortly, but let me define just a couple of terms.
First of all, for, just to ground us in what do we mean by mental and emotional health, just a working definition here today. Just the ability to remain true to our values as we cope with life circumstances and relationships. Um, it can also be considered our state of wellbeing, so that brings to mind a continuum, a continuum of, you know, how is my emotional health, my mental health, uh, on a 0 to 10 if 10 is the very best it can be.
So, um, and then it's applicable to all of us, as I said. You know, we all have had life happen to us. We have, we have, um, we have been impacted by life, either as children, uh, as adults. Uh, someone said it this way, and I really appreciated the way they said it, it talking about the concept of sin. They said, "We are both [00:05:00] victims of and perpetrators of."
And I thought, "Wow, is that ever true." Uh, at least for me it's true. And so I've been on the receiving end of it and I have done it, and both of those can have a profound impact on the way we think about ourselves. And this becomes the crux of it. What is the story I tell myself? Or, of course, this can be advanced by the enemy, for those of us who might think about that, uh, that we are dealing with an adversary who loves to work in lies and deception and remind us of things in the past that were long since over.
But nonetheless, when we think about mental and emotional health, we're thinking of our inner world. We can think of, uh, our soul, our psyche, this inner landscape where no one knows what's going on in there unless we disclose it. And so we'll talk more about who are trustworthy people to disclose some of that information to.
There's a term here called cognitive dissonance. And, uh, when I first heard this term- And by the way, this is a second career for me. I retired from the Procter & Gamble company, so I was in the corporate world for a long [00:06:00] time, an engineer by education, did supply chain work there. But then I, uh, felt led into this work through my own story, uh, and in my own life.
And, uh, when I was in, uh, grad school and they were talking about cognitive dissonance, wow, that I could definitely relate. But it is a psychological discomfort that arises when our beliefs and values, uh, conflict with what we're actually doing. Okay, now, the biblical term for that we might think about is to have a divided heart.
Okay? To be, to have a divided heart or to be, uh, double-minded. And the Scripture's really clear on what that does to us, right? Was it, what does, how does it impact us? And, uh, we become unstable. Uh, we may, uh, have divided loyalties and divided allegiance. So this becomes a really important concept. It's always interesting to me when science catches up with what the Scripture's already told us.
So it happens all the time, doesn't it? But nonetheless, cognitive dissonance is the clinical term, and we'll talk about that. Uh, again, my focus here is gonna be really on you as [00:07:00] compared to the people that you care for. So if I say it in a way that doesn't sound like that, I'm really trying to, uh, address these comments to each of us personally.
Uh, the last thing I wanted to just touch on here is this word of emotions. I was late to this party. Uh, in an engineering school, nobody's interested in emotions. In fact, our sort of, the person we looked up to would've been Spock on Star Trek, the Vulcan. Uh, you know, it was all about, "Hey, nobody cares what you think or f- or what you feel about it.
Where's the data, and what's a logical presentition- presentation of the data? If you're upset about something, go away and come back later when you're thinking straight." So, uh, if any of us, and this would be, I th- I would offer probably true for every one of us, if you've ever been in a competitive environment, uh, could be you were competing for attention in your family of origin, maybe in academia, could be that you were competing in sports, uh, and certainly, uh, competing in the, your, the jobs you occupy now.
Any [00:08:00] time where it's showtime, it's game time, this becomes a place where we learn pretty early that emotions are really not needed or not welcome, unless maybe anger can be helpful if you're playing a sport or something. But there's a sense in which we can learn to deny our emotions as if they're bad, and we should not acknowledge their presence.
And really, um, research says something completely different. It suggests that these emotions are there to signal to us that something is wrong. Now, how many of you like it when the red light comes on the dashboard of your car or truck? Right, it's just, like, the worst feeling. "Oh, my goodness, what is this about?"
And yet, if we just keep driving down the road and ignore that, what's likely to happen? Something's gonna break, right. Something's gonna blow up. It's gonna be bad. In fact, that happened to my, one of my children. She was driving back from UT Chattanooga. The, one of the red lights came on, I found out later, and, uh, she, uh, told me [00:09:00] later when we were doing the autopsy of a blown-up engine, she said, uh, "Well, uh..."
I said, "Honey, did any of the lights come on?" She said, "Oh yeah. Yeah, sure did. Actually, several of them." And I said, "Well," I said, "Well, what did, what did you do?" She said, "Well, you know that picture I have of my friend there on the dash? I just put it right over them." I said, "Well, why?" She said, "Well, it was bothering me."
And I said, "Okay, shame on me for not teaching you more about, you know, how to respond to the red lights." And isn't that a metaphor for how we think about emotions? That, and the truth is, and research bears this out, if we don't care for them, not only do they not go away, they actually get worse or they grow in intensity.
And this has been shown to be true through what they call functional MRI research. I'm not gonna get into that this morning, but I just want you to know there is a sound basis for caring for our emotions, and all I mean by caring for them is notice them, have a vocabulary to speak them. Because when somebody says, "How are you doing?"
[00:10:00] It's nice to be able to tell the truth, and to be able to tell it with a word that is, uh, more reflective of the truth instead of me saying, "Well, I'm frustrated" when I'm really feeling lonely and angry, that I'm lonely. Okay? I, rather than hide behind the word I'm frustrated, just to say, "I'm, yeah, I'm a little bit angry because I'm feeling very alone in this right now."
So, uh, but emotions are a powerful tool, and I just wanna advance that for our consideration, okay? I think that's all I need to say about this slide, so let me just blow on here. I'm not gonna spend much time on this slide. This is just intended to tell you, as if you don't already know it, anxiety is up.
Depression and anxiety are up in our culture. Uh, I think we've probably all read about that. Um, and, uh, here in Tennessee is no exception. You can see the data there. It's nearly double what it was reported to be pre-COVID. Um, and um, and we have now become the 13th worst state according to this data. Uh, we're five points higher than the [00:11:00] average.
Uh, we have more and more people moving here, and that's really great because it gives us a chance to care for people. It gives us a chance to make a difference with more people. But it's also a challenge, is it not? Because we have more people coming, there's more people to meet, there's more people to integrate, there's more people to care for.
So this is our world. Um, now, here's something from my remarks today. I was thinking about how to talk about what I wanna talk about, and I think there are some parallels in our work. A clinical, uh, counselor, a licensed counselor or a licensed therapist, is limited to some degree in what we can do. There are things we can't tell people what to do.
And we'll talk a little bit about that later. We can't tell them that. We can explore with them what's happening, what are they doing about it, uh, what have they tried, what would they be willing to try. We can ask a lot of well-placed questions, and we can introduce concepts and ideas that we think would be helpful to them, like boundary setting.
One, of course, we're gonna get to hear [00:12:00] more from an expert on that. But, um, but there are many tools that, that people can benefit from. But there are a lot of parallels, I believe, in our work. We're interested in whole, I'll say whole person care, as I think you are. It's not just what you're showing, it's how you're going.
It is what's really happening in your mind. It's not just the behavior. We can... You know, faking it is not a long-term sustainable recipe for health. And then of course, spiritual care. This is your wheelhouse. And many clients, here's some data that you may know. I think everyone here probably knows this.
Nashville has more churches per capita than any city in the US. Okay? Uh, the Pew Research says that over 51% of adults in the state of Tennessee state that they go to a church service at least once a week. And so we would be shocked in our world if those people are not showing up in our office, okay, to some degree.
So we do see a lot of people who come in explaining to us that their faith is important. [00:13:00] And of course, we honor that, we respect that. And a licensed counselor, I, I would submit it's clinical malpractice if a licensed counselor, I don't care who you are, didn't consider that a potential clinical resource for a client.
If somebody comes in and they're telling me they're going to church every week, I'm gonna be thinking, "Awesome. How is it helping? What's getting in the way of you going more?" If it's a helpful resource. And people come in with all kind of things. Uh, yoga helps them, uh, hiking helps them, uh, artwork or doing art helps them.
And so we view those as clinical resources. And, and, uh, and we, we often will, uh, encounter theological questions, and I want to assure you that we send them back to you. Okay? If somebody's wondering what the Bible says about divorce, we would ask them, "So are you in church? Do you have a Bible study leader?
Who do you know that you trust to help you unpack that?" Because a big decision certainly deserves your very best information, and so, uh, we're gonna send them back to you. That would be our goal with that. Okay? So I want to just let you know that for those of you who may not be as familiar about what the kind of work we do and, [00:14:00] uh, some of the things that we're sort of, uh, guided by or bounded by in our work.
Other things, other parallels you can see there, I won't read all those to you. But part of it is we are gonna kind of challenge the status quo, are we not? Every, every time you speak, you are presenting some truth that someone either they haven't heard it or they're being reminded of it. And we know we never get change without truth.
Truth creates some tension. It shows me which s- side of a line I'm standing on. If I get on the scales, holy cow, I've gained five pounds. So truth, uh, helps us be- get in touch with some things we may want to think about changing and address. Uh, the people coming to us, and I would say to you, they want to trust us, and they need safety and confidentiality to do so.
Um, it's not unusual that we have people coming in and they say something like, "Yeah, my faith used to be important to me," or, "I used to pray." And then as we, uh, ha- have a chance to hear what's behind that, someone hurt them or they felt like they were overlooked or minimized or [00:15:00] treated in a way that was w- that was harmful.
That's bound to happen in life. No one's perfect. And then sometimes there are people who have injured people that we care for and that you care for. So they're coming to us and they'll be coming to you for a different experience, and that's awesome. So we, uh ... They want to trust, and they need safety to do that, and then of course there's a high risk of burnout to the work we do.
So there's some parallels to our, our work. Uh, one thing I wanna stress is this last point, the end does not justify the means. Sometimes the end, we could say it does. Uh, if it, someone's gonna mess with one of my children or something, okay, whatever it takes, you know? But for most of the work we do, the way we do it in the eyes of God is really important.
Fair? That the way we go about this, that, that what's underneath the hood, so to speak, of the way we're moving through our work is very important, and there can be a real tension there. Okay, let me, uh ... So what I'd like to do to, uh, kind of move through this part of our [00:16:00] conversation is, um, talk about ethics.
Now, I wanna talk about ethics be- from a standpoint of think of these as values, if that helps. We think of them as, uh, ethics because we are bound by these ethics. If you're a licensed counselor or licensed therapist, you have ethics. And these are not necessarily problematic ethics, but they are some bounds that we have to operate in.
And I wanna just share these with you just for information, but really to give you a jumping-off point so you can think about, what, what value do I have as a pastor or a leader that maybe correlates with that or that makes me think about this, all right? And then I'm gonna give you a few minutes at your table to think about, uh, some, maybe it's an action step or two that you would like to consider, uh, taking with respect to where you feel like, "I need to work on that.
I'd like to tighten that up. Maybe I've drifted from this," or, "I'm actually doing this really well and maybe I should expand it." So, uh, we'll talk about that, but that's all I mean by ethics. [00:17:00] These are values that are describing how we treat each other and, uh, or others, I should say. For our mutual benefit.
And, uh, so you can see the questions there. I won't read all those to you. Uh, f- a clinical supervisor of mine said it this way, "You can't lead where you don't go, you can't teach what you don't know, and you can't preach what you don't show." And it's a statement that's kind of funny, and it's interesting, and it's true in the sense that we can fake it for a while, we can, but it's ultimately not sustainable.
And so the invitation there is let's try to get aligned internally and get some people around us who can provide support when things are not going well. So these ethical principles in our world are these, and I'm gonna talk about them in just a moment. And what I'd like to ask you to do at your tables, if you would, please, if you don't already have your envelope opened, if you would get the envelope and pull the, the papers that are in there out.
Each of you should have a copy of some worksheets. Uh, it'll ... You have to [00:18:00] flip past the first page or two, and you'll probably, uh, need to get something to write with if you don't have it already. Um, again, let me explain this to you. Um, what we're gonna be doing at the table is give you a chance to consider...
We're not gonna do all of these. We're ... I'm gonna give you a chance to consider a few values that you think are true and important for you to stick with. When you felt called or you felt led into this work, and you think back to that day, and you think back to that time when you were preparing, what was true for you?
What, what was the story you told yourself that this is, this is how I want this to go. This is how I want it to be. Uh, when we get married, we think about, "Here's how I want my family to go," and we inevitably, we take some good things from the past, hopefully, and then we leave some bad things. And so probably when you started this work, you may have thought, "This is how I want to be."
And then, of course, the pressures [00:19:00] of the work can s- can cause us to drift and veer, and we wake up, and we go, "Wow, I'm not sure how I got here, but I'm not 100% sure I'm on track with the things I really value." And so to the extent that we're not, this leads to this inner world of conflict around cognitive dissonance that I mentioned before.
And cognitive dissonance, I didn't say this, but it manifests itself in many ways. Uh, certainly emotional discomfort, mental discomfort, uh, um, the idea of imposter syndrome. If people really knew, uh, me, they would have never hired me for this job. These are things that can, uh, become real-life issues that we think about when we're by ourselves.
And, uh, this is a, as I said before, a wonderful place for the enemy to try to take advantage, and will. So, uh, these, uh, these ethics are, uh, important as we move through our work and we move through our life to come back to. So I'm gonna give you a chance to do that [00:20:00] as I talk about these, these, the, the, uh, ethics and give you a chance to talk about and identify your personal values.
Now, here's the deal. Lining up and getting lined up with, uh, our behavior to our values, there's some real benefit to that. Some of these I've talked about, some of I haven't. Um, getting clear on who we are, what we stand for, what we're gonna do, what we're not gonna do is so helpful because it allows us to have healthy boundaries, to say no when it's necessary for everyone's benefit.
Uh, sometimes leaders can exceed the capability of their organization, uh, by saying yes to too many things and... Or, um, but that's, uh, just an important benefit of this. Protects us and others from over-functioning or working harder than others, leading to burnout. It allows us to model healthy humility, just acknowledging the truth is we all have finite capacity.
We do. Uh, we don't like to admit it, but it's true. And, uh, and so it becomes really a prioritization exercise. Um, and, uh, sometimes we need to refer work to other people when it's [00:21:00] appropriate. Certainly true in our profession, and I would offer it's probably true in yours as well. Uh, it provides a decision-making framework free from emotion or impulsivity.
One of the things about emotions is we tell people you don't make decisions when you're in your emotion, okay? But you, but you do want to use them when you are in a relationship and someone you love says, "You seem like something's bothering you." And then we lie and say, "No, everything's fine." And, and they really want to know.
People... And by the way, and I think you all know this, I hope you do, I just was in a continuing education thing a week bef- a week ago Friday. Only 7% of communication happens with words, 55% is body language, and 38% is tone. Okay? So what that says, among other things, is don't try to lie to people that are close to you, because they'll read your body language and they can tell by the tone that that's not true
Okay? Better to say, "I don't know. Yep, something is wrong, but I don't know what it is yet," but you will. Okay. So... Uh, but it does require [00:22:00] honesty, um, um, leading, uh, to safety and connection for others. Now, there's a cost to this, okay? You all know this, too. If I try to say no, or if I enforce a boundary, it takes courage.
Some good ideas may need to be delayed, or they may need to be passed on altogether. Again, they're good ideas, but are they the best idea, okay? And these are things we have to consider ultimately. Uh, it may require some increased dialogue with people. Remember, disagreement is not necessarily bad because out of this we can, we can have, uh, a greater sense of common purpose and understanding.
Others may pressure you to function unethically or against your values to get their need met. I won't ask for a show of hands, but I'm sure that's true. Has to be. This is how I think we should do worship. This is how I think we should do the service. This is how long I think this should go, whatever. Uh, you all have been there and have experienced that.
And so, uh, there will be some tension there as you, uh, proceed c- in a way that's [00:23:00] consistent with what you believe the Lord has called you to and the values that go with it. Uh, processes for handling concerns may need to be clarified/enforced. Others may criticize or ultimately leave. And expect the adversary to challenge and be prepared for that.
One of the things you're gonna see as we move into the table exercise is there is space on your sheet to capture a pr- a, a verse, a meaningful verse. So like, for me, one of the things, uh, in my history, I was in an addiction ho- a home where, uh, there was alcohol addiction. And I learned early on the best way for me to get along is to be a peacekeeper and to just try to keep everything smooth, and I was hoping that it wouldn't
it would help minimize, you know, conflict and, uh, and alcohol, alcoholic-driven or alcohol-driven outbursts. And so I learned basically how to tell lies and deceive and pretend. And so, uh, this idea of, um, you know, um, m- moving, um, moving into a place where I'm now trying to tell the [00:24:00] truth, um, it requires me, even at this stage of life when I find myself struggling with being a peacekeeper, not a peacemaker, but a peacekeeper, for me to have a verse memorized that speaks directly to that issue for me is so helpful.
So when we think about that, some of you, I'm sure, uh, scr- memorize scripture. I would just encourage you, uh, think about how you fight spiritually. But scripture memorization, and particularly with verses that apply directly to your situation. So there's a little space on your sheet for that, okay? And I would en- just encourage you in that.
One of the ... And why do we do that? Why do I even, why am I even saying this? Matthew 4, when Satan came to our Lord and Savior, what did he do? He quoted scripture. And it wasn't just any scripture. It was scripture that was directly to counter and address what Satan was saying, right? And so that's, that's just the
That's just a good template for us to consider using. So consider that, if you would, please. I'd [00:25:00] invite you to. Okay, so here's what we're gonna do. Um, I'm going to just cover a few of our ethics briefly, and then I'm gonna give you a chance to jump off into your own values. And, uh, there is place on there for you to write in a different word than the word I've chosen.
I'd like for you just to, as it says here, consider personal areas of vulnerability for you. And there's a place in there for you to start, stop, and continue. And then, uh, so some of those action steps could be there's a conversation I'd like to have. There's a process or a policy change that I'd like to think about making.
And then, uh, maybe I need to communicate something to my leadership team or my team of elders or whoever your support team is. And, um, so you can think about that. Okay. Hope that's clear. So you're gonna have a chance as I'm talking here to, and I cover each of these, uh, ethics, to think about. So autonomy, what is the value for you that, um, reflects autonomy?
Now, autonomy simply means in our world others are ultimately responsible for their lives and choices, and [00:26:00] I'm responsible for mine. Okay? So you may think of a different word like freedom. For me, that means freedom to follow God. That's what I value, let's say. And, and so but anyway, if there's a different word that's better than autonomy, but it means, uh, uh, giving people that we work with and support autonomy to, to live their life, and that means we are gonna lose some people sometimes.
Okay? That's gonna happen. We don't like it. We're not looking for it to happen, but it does happen. Um, the, um, there, one of the things you can think about with autonomy is this would be a place where we make, we may wanna ask ourselves honestly, "Do I try to control too much?" If I interviewed people, "Hey, what's it like to be with me," would you say I'm a control freak?
Okay. Do you feel like ... Or do you feel like you wish you had more degrees of freedom in your job than, uh, than you feel like maybe I've given you? Those are just good healthy things to think about. But really for yourself, um, you [00:27:00] know, what are the, what are the choices that you would like to make, uh, around autonomy?
Do you feel like you have enough degrees of freedom, for example? Uh, the rationale for this, of course, is we don't know the whole story, other people's value system may not match ours, and others may not yet be ready for change. Anybody experience that where you want something more for someone than they want for themselves?
Happens in our worlds. So there's your form. Okay? And if you got that, if you can just pull that out in front of you, you can make whatever notes you want to. I'm gonna, as you're writing, I'm just gonna, um, I'm gonna roll through, like, two more of these, and then I'm gonna give you a couple more minutes to finish this part up.
Beneficence, it's a word we use. It just means the obligation to do good or the obligation to help others achieve their goals and needs. Okay. You may have a different word for that, but it's trying to make a meaningful, uh, uh, you know, be a meaningful help to people. The rationale is to stay within the scope of my profession, my practice, my training, make meaningful progress, and informed [00:28:00] consent, what a client can expect from the therapist.
Now, in your world, I don't know exactly what that looks like, except it is important if we're going to do good, if we're gonna make progress, that we ensure that we're operating within our scope. In other words, this is, this is my wheelhouse. And now if you need that, then you need to go to Mary's wheelhouse and let me introduce you to Mary.
Okay? Uh, or, you know, as, uh, as Mike shared, and I thought this was a great story and, uh, just a good illustration, uh, he mentioned that there was someone who came to church and they were looking for a more liturgical experience. And he quickly said, "You know, let me refer you to a church that'd be perfect for you to do that."
And then as only he can say it, I think, he was able to say something like, "And you know what? You're gonna be happier there and we're gonna be happier as well." And, you know, uh, there's a lot to be said about helping people find what it is they really desire, and realizing that we're, we can't be all things to all people.
And that's liberating and freeing and allows us to focus. So beneficence, that's the, the thought there. Now, [00:29:00] non-maleficence is just the another crazy word, uh, in our ethical pillars. It just means do no harm. An obligation to do no harm. Now, this is really important, and this is where we need to check ourselves.
Some of us sometimes need to be on the injured reserve list, okay? In other words, I'm not doing okay. This is my truth. Uh, could be because my marriage isn't going well or could be I've got a child who's struggling. Could be that, uh, something has creeped into my life that I need to creep it out of my life, and I need some time to do that.
Whatever. But, uh, I'm not, basically, I'm not ready to play the game. I don't mean to trivialize this by playing, but I mean it's like a sports analogy. I can't go. And so, uh, but the obligation to do no harm is an important thing to consider to establish and maintain safety, maintaining confidentiality, refer people out if needed.
And this thing about dual relationships, okay? Let's think about that for a second. How do you manage dual relationships? Someone that you [00:30:00] know, uh, is a, maybe this is a very close friend, someone you play golf with on a regular basis, and, uh, they're asking you to do something that you know is counter to the direction that the church is gonna go.
How do you handle that? Okay, it's hard. Uh, but, but, um, monitoring the people that you get into relationship with is really important. I think you all know that. Think you've probably been trained to do that. And, and it's a very helpful thing for all of us. Certainly it's true with therapists. Uh, we have to maintain, uh, objectivity.
Um, and so it's really important, so I would never counsel a family member or a friend, um, or someone I was previously in a, in a, uh, a relationship with, okay? All right, so and then let me just cover this one more. All these are in your packet. Um, yeah, fidelity just means walking the talk or doing what you say.
Um, and I just wanna put a plug in. This, healthy people are drawn to honest people. [00:31:00] This may sound counterintuitive, but even if people don't agree with you, they will be attracted by your honesty. Okay? Because it's rare. Uh, Chip Dodd in his book Voice of the Heart says, "If a person is willing to say no, then their yes is meaningful."
But have you ever known someone who's just yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. And then you find out that really wasn't a yes. They said yes, but they didn't really mean it. And so, but what I'd like to do, I'm just gonna pause here. Uh, actually I'm gonna work through these, these other slides. There's justice.
It's in your, it's in your packet there. Um, and, um, and this is an important one really from the standpoint of m- be careful with classism. Be careful giving your power or your authority to other people because they have resources or power or position. Be careful, okay? Uh, and there's a way to navigate that.
You can certainly, everybody I hope is welcome at your church, and everybody's welcome at our counseling center, but that doesn't [00:32:00] mean anyone should have a higher status or stature than other people. Okay? Does that make sense? I hope. So, but it's, it's a challenge. And then there's this last one is veracity, which means telling the truth, and, uh, that's not easy to do sometimes.
Okay, now I'm gonna switch gears real quick to this other thing, and then I'll be wrapped up. This is mental health through relationships. Sorry, um, you can, we can use a house metaphor for this. You know, um, if we think of your personal study as your personal private space, this is where no one knows I'm trying to learn how to play guitar, but there's a guitar in there, and only a few people know about that.
That's my private space. But meanwhile, I've got a kitchen, I've got a dining room, I've got a living room, I've got a front porch, I've got a driveway, and I've got a street out there. And the exercise, it's called relationship mapping, and it's where do people belong. Who is in my study that I need to get out of my study?
Who is on the, maybe on the porch that I'd like to invite in, I'd like to get to know them better? [00:33:00] Um, there are some people that need to be kept at the street or need to be sent to the street who are problematic and so forth. So you can think of a house metaphor. But what I wanna talk about is really the circles of connection idea, and I think this is a good, uh, picture, uh, to kinda capture this idea.
As we think about moving from an outer circle to an inner circle, one of the things that is true is we need transparency with vulnerability or increased transparency with vulnerability, okay? Um, and, uh, when we think about your circle of int- intimacy, that innermost circle, you can see how we're describing there are people that are friends, there are people that you play golf with or you fish with or you do things with, there are people that you're responsible to, people you're responsible for, and so forth.
So don't be too hung up on the details of that. But it is important to figure out, um, where am I, and the point that I really wanna focus on here is that circle of intimacy. [00:34:00] Now, uh, this is very important because this is a place where we need to be able to be completely honest. Okay? This is, uh, there's not gonna be many people in this circle.
Um, hopefully God, and the Lord Jesus, and the Holy Spirit would be there for those of us who are believers. Hopefully our wife or husband, if we're believers and they're believers, hopefully they would be in there. And then one or two good friends, and I mean really good friends. And, um, and I appreciate what, uh, Mike said about this when he said, "Yeah, and these are people who won't volunteer either."
Okay? Meaning they're not, they're not looking for this. They have full lives. They have things going on. And so they're not necessarily trying to, uh, wedge their way into that circle. Now, I imagine some of you can think of people who have kinda done that. "I wanna be close to you. Let's hang out together."
And, uh, some of that's well-intended, some of it's probably not well-intended, okay? But discerning, the ability to discern who needs to be in my circle of [00:35:00] intimacy, and then pursuing that. Uh, these are people who would love you, really care deeply for you. They're not competing with you, and they will tell you the truth.
I would advance the idea, and again, I'm not trying to tell anyone what to do here on this, but consider someone outside your church, okay? Um, and I'll be honest with you on this. I've been praying that whoever came today, I've been praying that everyone here who does not have at least one person like that, that you might find that person in this room.
So I hope that as you get to know each other and mingle a little bit, uh, maybe just pray about this. If you're feeling lonely and you're like, "I don't have somebody," and ask other people, uh, maybe how they've done this, okay? So, uh, this is just such an important, uh, part of our life. Um, what do you do in this circle of intimacy?
This is a place where you're honest. You open up about, "Yeah, here's where I'm off track. This is where I'm struggling against the enemy. This is where I'm vulnerable. This is where the enemy likes to exploit me. Here's my Achilles heel. What's yours? Let's pray for each other. I'm getting [00:36:00] ready to go home for Christmas.
Guess what? I'm likely to go back to that person I don't like being. Would you pray for me?" All those kind of things, okay? And then the next steps on this piece of paper for you would be, so what is a next step for you that will help you, um, to move forward in this? And I say invite someone to dance. All I mean by that is invite someone in.
Don't be afraid. One of the things I mentioned, uh, in the intro that I do lead groups. I lead groups with men. Uh, and frequently, frequently, frequently, almost always, men are very, very lonely because they don't have someone with them, and they don't know how to find someone. And so, uh, groups are a great way to enable people, including ourselves.
So don't be afraid to try out a group. We offer groups, but there's a lot of groups you can plug into. Um, but go find them. Somebody should've told us this was as important as learning to write checks when we were in school. But finding and keeping a good friend is essential to our mental and emotional health.
I think that's all I wanted to say. I want to give you just a [00:37:00] minute more about, um ... Let me go back here. To, uh, just to finish maybe making a few notes. And as you, if you think about that, who is in that, who is maybe in your circle of intimacy that you'd like to push out a circle or two? Uh, who thinks they're there but they're not?
These can be instructive. Um, who would you like to be there? Maybe you know a person. But pray about it. I definitely want to stress that. Pray about it and ask God to bring the person or persons into your life. Uh, and know that we all need that. Um, I do have a couple of books here. I'll flash these up real quick.
Um, Emotionally Healthy Spirituality by Pete Scazzero. Some of you may be familiar with that. It's a great book. Uh, he tells in there about he nearly lost his marriage because he was, uh, not able to know what he's feeling and was unable to share that with his wife. Uh, this second book is an excellent book for things, uh, around depression and anxiety.
And then The Voice of the Heart is an excellent book. Um, [00:38:00] and, and Chip Dodd is writing from a Christian perspective. It's not a Bible study, but he is writing from a biblical and Christian perspective. So those are good books for you to consider. So thank you for your attention. I appreciate it. I'm glad to be here with you and thank
you.
