Get a Skill Before Going to Seminary!

I agree with most of that but I also don’t think we as a church should just accept the fact that a pastor will have to work. The members of each church must be willing to sacrifice in order to protect their pastor from having to work. Obviously many pastors will still have to work though. One job he recommends is graphic designer? I just read an article yesterday that said it was the second most useless college degree. Far better to get something that is more marketable and in which you can get hired is small towns as well as cities.

The suggestion was rather to get a real marketable, money-making skill that can bring in high income with low stress as a smart job to finance ministry, church planting, etc…

The best protection for a young pastor, his family, and his ministry is to have a “real marketable, money-making skill.” When your livelihood doesn’t rely on a church vote (or elder or deacon vote), you have tremendous freedom…

Good advice. Here is my experience:

• Learn a trade in the service. I did.
• Go to college in the service for free. That’s what I did for my BA, a secular degree.
• Get out, then get a job with the local, state or federal government using your veterans preference. I did. I worked at the Post Office for six months then snagged a $68k per year job as a contractor at the nearby Navy base, doing something mindless and easy (directly related to the trade I learned in the military for 10 years) while I did my MA at Maranatha.
• I am a full-time Pastor now. However, I have repeatedly told the men in the church that if the finances get precarious, Springfield is 15 mins. up the road, and there are a lot of state gov’t jobs just waiting up there with my name on them.

Don’t borrow $$ to go to college. Do your parents a favor and don’t expect them to borrow $$ for your college. College is doable debt free but:

• Start working in HS and save / eschew high tech toys
• If your school district has a post secondary program DO IT. Free college. Example of Minnesota: “Postsecondary Enrollment Options (PSEO) is a program that allows 10th-, 11th- and 12th-grade students to earn college credit while still in high school, through enrollment in and successful completion of college-level courses.”
• Learn to balance part time work and education and continue to work while in college
• Live with your parents as long as you can (in college)
• Get a marketable degree. I could list the non-marketable ones but ask before you pick a major. Some of the nots: psychology, art, youth ministries (you’re young … you’re half there!), women’s ministries, and more

Much of what he says resonates with me. After almost 30 years of paid ministry I am now in my 4th year of bi-vocational church planting ministry. My sons kidded me when I took a job where I had to show up every day at the same time and stay a full day now that I had a “real job” for the first time in my life.

In moving into an urban area 4 years ago to plant a church with my brother with no core group and little outside church support I knew I would need a job. Thankfully we had enough support, mostly from individuals that one of us could be full-time and my brother was a better fit for that with his experience and training. I have two master’s degrees and a DMin and speak two foreign languages but that didn’t translate into much of anything to provide a living. All that worked fine before and maybe still would if I were looking to teach or pastor an existent church.

With my education and experience I had little in the way of marketable skills. What translated into getting a job was the counseling aspect of my pastoral training which got my foot in the door as a prison drug counselor. I am now fully certified as an addiction therapist and continue to work in a clinical setting. And frankly in some ways or in different ways there are more opportunities to witness than I ever had in fulltime ministry.

Do I miss the perks of being fulltime paid ministry? To be honest, sometimes. I miss the freedom to go to conferences, speak at conferences, teach in seminaries in the US and in many other countries, to plan my schedule, and make more money than I make now (social work does not pay that well). Wow! Now I really miss it! Getting a little nostalgic.

However, working has been a great experience and God knew what I needed at this time in my life. In some ways it’s humbling and some people might think I am underemployed. But since I know it’s all of grace I’m grateful that God provided a way to serve Him, support my family and keep my Harley Road King. It’s better than unemployment!

I would not want to be full-time bi-vocational and try to plant or pastor a church on my own. It might have something to do with age but I’m not sure I’d have the energy for that. Having a church planting team with one full-time lead pastor and others who work fulltime day jobs and do “church” ministry as they can works for us at this point.

I might’ve done some things differently in my training if I knew then what I know now. For one thing I would not have majored in Bible on the undergraduate level. Those were different times. We can’t go back so just keep moving on.

Josh,

Graphic designers are always in need. The problem is you really don’t need a degree in order to have this as a skill. In fact, I am putting together a product for young pastors so they can supplement their incomes by developing skills in need in the marketplace.

KML

Jim wrote:

If your school district has a post secondary program DO IT. Free college.

That’s what I did. The Tacoma Public School system had what is called the “Running Start” program. Eligible kids could go to Tacoma Community College for free, and have credits count towards both remaining high school and college credit. I got my Associates the same time as my high school diploma.

Steve wrote:

I would not want to be full-time bi-vocational and try to plant or pastor a church on my own. It might have something to do with age but I’m not sure I’d have the energy for that.

I am becoming more and more fond of the idea of a plurality of elders. There’s just too much for one guy to take on alone, sometimes. By plurality, I don’t mean an “Assistant Pastor” who handles the youth and is a “staff member.” I mean a full-fledged, full authority fellow Pastor who shares the burdens and responsibilities of the church.

May I suggest that men consider having a job during seminary. Preferably a dirty one. When we were in seminary, my friend and I were musing as to how out of touch some pastors were hard work. My friend’s co-workers included a guy named “Smiley” who had survived having his throat cut and was one of many who had done time. I worked my summers with a similar group. We suggested a class for seminarians called Steel Mill 101.

With the trend toward more churches being unable to have full-time pastors, a marketable skill is a necessity. It also comes in handy when you find yourself between churches with no unemployment. Our church has one full-time pastor and two bi-vocational elders. Because of a lack of marketable skills, I’m the one with a good job in retail, which means working most Sunday afternoons.

[Ron Bean] my friend and I were musing as to how out of touch some pastors were [to] hard work.

Ron,

I agree. Even after Bible College, I worked for 5 years at various secular jobs before becoming a full time pastor. But even with that, i found myself becoming more out of touch with what people in the congregation were going through. I became less sympathetic to their reasons why they were not as involved in the church as I thought they should have been. But now, after being thrown in to a stressful commute and working two part time jobs, I totally understand why certain people could not be “faithful” to the midweek study or some other event. I don’t even want to do those things after a 10 hour day! God is using my current situation to teach me more compassion for the Regular Joe who works hard all week and needs to be shepherded accordingly. Thank God we have a great High Priest who worked a blue collar job for most of his life and has been touched with our infirmities!

[josh p]

I agree with most of that but I also don’t think we as a church should just accept the fact that a pastor will have to work. The members of each church must be willing to sacrifice in order to protect their pastor from having to work.

Josh, I understand your sentiments and if a church is big enough and has the resources as well as the needs for a full time pastor or a team of them….GREAT! The pastors can pour all their energy into the work of shepherding. Like I mentioned…those who preach the gospel should live off of the gospel (1 Cor. 9:14). I think that aspiring pastors today need to go in with their eyes wide open to the realities of our society, economics, etc. and know that the typical church of less than 100 people may require a bivocational pastor…and he needs to be ok with that.

Didn’t they close down 30 years ago? Here locally maybe you can get a job delivering pizzas…does that count?

does an associates degree earned at the same time as a HS diploma, taught by HS teachers (that’s the way they work locally…and they are really popular), mean anything? Did you really learn anything?

For example, did you take a science class from a professor who has a PhD in the subject?

I know, I live in a pipe dream!

This is really putting pressure on colleges though, because a lot of students are graduating from HS with many of their Gen Ed credits already…I ask myself, REALLY??

How many people complain that students don’t learn anything in HS…and now they are getting college credit to boot???????????

I hated high school. I found myself actually challenged intellectually, for the first time in my life, at community college. I got a general Associates Degree, so I didn’t focus on any one thing:

• I recall that the Psychology 101 guy had a PhD.
• I took several English classes from a lady with a MFA in writing
• I didn’t take math there
• I took Philosophy from another guy with a PhD

All told, I learned a whole lot more than I ever would have in high school. I got good grades, and wasn’t judged as a high school student. The teachers themselves didn’t even know who the high school students were, unless they acted their age!

Another note, I do remember that my Biology teacher in high school had a doctorate. He used to tell us about how boring doctoral work was as a comic ploy to get us to do our homework. E.g. - “You think this is bad, let me tell you about this …”

your situation sounds extraordinary, at least compared to the experience here in Kansas. Most community college here is taught by people with a Masters, but not likely in the direct discipline they teach. By that I mean a math class might be taught by a math teacher with a BA in math, but MEd. Did you have the college classes in your high school? What city/state were you in?

[Mark_Smith] How many people complain that students don’t learn anything in HS…and now they are getting college credit to boot???????????

My daughter did 1¼ years of post-secondary [at Hennepin Community College]. Now she is at MIT in grad school. So she learned something somewhere.