There are times for every minister when nothing seems to be going as it should; when the major and minor trends of our experience seem pervasively and permanently stuck; when, worst of all, that which has for some time been quietly crumbling around the edges now appears to be caving in and our most desperate efforts to turn our inner world around are filled with frustration.
Left alone, this sort of malady can become an inner fixture, difficult to uproot. It tends to take over our sense of ourselves, causing us to believe we aren't worth much, or that we aren't doing anything of particular value or significance. We can end up feeling we've lost our touch ... as a preacher, a pastor, a soul winner, a leader, and this has inevitable repercussions in our personal life and relationships. In all this, we may well become oversensitive, paranoid, petulant, chronically reactive to others, and probably angry enough on the inside for it to show a bit on the outside.
There's no easy answer to these struggles, especially when they've become ingrained or habituated ways of thinking and feeling. We'll probably need to expend some time, significant clinging faith, and determined energy before we actually find ourselves wading out free of this "slough of despond."
Part of the challenge is that many of us are impatient, believing that just a little effort should produce immediate rewards. As we know, however, some demons can be driven out only with prayer and fasting; and to quote the rest of the passage, "nothing else can [drive them out]" (Mark 9:29, TEV).
In other words, to find our way back may well involve walking up to our necks in the mud for much of the messy return journey. And this usually continues, it seems, without us even noticing that, after expending our efforts, the mud is no longer up to our necks but now only reaches to the chest, then the waist, and then to the knees. Finally, we realize in a flash of joy that we are on solid ground again.
We must each deal with God ourselves, as we search for a way out. We know that, but it's nevertheless a liberating reality to remind ourselves of it. I don't mean that no one else can help us (indeed, the help of trusted confidants or a mature spiritual friend may be crucial). I believe, though, that we are personally responsible for getting out of the slough. In other words, our healing is not up to some unpredictable force, fortune, or fellow, but up to our own grace-filled initiative and determination, through the indwelling Spirit. We can not stand by passively hoping while we wait for someone else to find a way to pull us out.
I also believe it's important to affirm, at least for the sake of my own soul, that the road back does not need to pass through the fields of psychology, or even theology. Various "...ologies" tend to overcomplicate our lives and can be deterrents to actual spiritual wholeness. The mountain pass over which we travel to wholeness is most truly, then, that which is ultimately called "the way, the truth and the life." The way out calls for us to take a spiritual journey. Ironically, these are the things in which we ministers are experts.
Where may we start? What's our first focus as we turn to leave our despondency? One biblical passage is genuinely sufficient in handling the essence of this question.
With the people of God in personal and corporate exile, separated from their deepest spiritual roots and realities, Jeremiah lays down this magnificent reassurance and challenge:
"For thus says the LORD, 'When seventy years have been completed ... I will visit you and fulfill My good word to you, to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans that I have for you' declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for calamity, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.'" (Jer. 29:10-13, NASB).
I believe deeply that those words and that promise, especially the closing declaration, apply beautifully to care worn Christian ministers no matter how oppressive their turmoil might be.
