Latest / Church Staff Book Club / Are You Leading *Through* Your Marriage or Singleness?
Transcript
- Jonathan Malm: leadership that is not relationally rooted could become performance. Hey, welcome back to the Church Staff Book Club. My name is Jonathan Malm. And I'm Jason Young. We are on chapter three now of our second book of the podcast, The Emotionally Healthy Leader by Peter Scazzero. If you want to pick up the book, it's been a great read so far. But the cool thing about this podcast is you don't have to. You can just watch this and follow along that way. Or if you read, hopefully what we do with this podcast is enrich, maybe renew or refresh some of the ideas that you read and maybe help you see it in a different perspective. Our goal with the Church Stuff Book Club is that we just learn together. We always go further when we go together. We always learn better when we learn together. So that's our hope. This chapter, Jason, was about. Singleness and Marriage, which was interesting. It's at the start of the book and I'm like, if we had been writing this book, I feel like I would have put this book toward the end of the book. But it was some really good stuff. What did you get most out of this? mean, this is your second time reading this book, but what do you feel like you out of this chapter the most? Well, I told you when we were, before we got on today, that there's not a lot, if anything, that I remember. So this year been married 25 years, but nobody really said this kind of stuff to Stacey and me, you know, years ago. And so I think it was really in this book that he put language around this idea. And here's the idea to answer your question, that marriage or singleness. So if you're married, great. If you're listening to a single, great. But marriage or singleness, it's not separate from leadership. And so when we look at it from like God's perspective, Think about it this way, that out of your singleness or out of your marriage is an opportunity to showcase, if you will, God to the world. So His kindness and His love and things like that. the biggest idea I never really thought about, and I know you're thinking, you know, may be listening and watching and you're like, Jason, that's obvious. How do you not? I don't know, maybe I'm slow. But it's this idea that leadership and your marriage and singleness are separate. That's how I, you know, it's like, it's secondary to leadership and they operate independently of one another. And I think I did a lot of that, unfortunately. So this was a great chapter just to remind me of how not to do that to become an emotionally healthy leader. Yeah. The story that he gave was that he married this wonderful girl that was like, they were both pursuing God together. And he, you know, fleshed that out a little bit in the second half chapter of how they met. how they decided to stop being single, right? But then I thought this was an interesting thing she said. This is something my wife would have said to me. She's like, if we be separated, my life would be easier because at least we have to take the kids on the weekends. And I'm like, ⁓ what a like, like a stab to the gut. like, he was working so much in his ministry and neglecting the spousal arrangement, like his wife, right? Like, and it's interesting because that's. That is a common thing where like the ministry is everything. And I feel like, you know, when I grew up, I went to a Christian school and we'd read books about missionaries and there's sort of this mentality of like, you give your all, you know, like the guy who, I forget the mission, I think it might've been Hudson Taylor. He, you know, was working on someone who was diseased and there was a hole in his glove and he died. And it's like, it's this like tragic story, but it's like, wow, that's what we need to die for the cause of Christ in ministry. We need to reach the unreached people group and then get speared through as I'm leaving the plane. Those are all the stories I grew up reading where it's just like that we pour out our life on the altar of ministry. And that can then bleed into, okay, yeah, I committed to my wife, I committed to this marriage arrangement, but it's secondary to the altar of ministry. And he kind of challenges that notion, which is interesting. I mean, there's this reality of The wife typically, because it's typically a male, a pastor, it's changing, but the wife is almost the appendage of the leader and they just kind of go along with it. I remember one pastor that I went to a church, his wife was a doctor and he was the pastor. And he went to a conference one day and they were like, that's not gonna work. Like they just told him like, your wife can't be a doctor and be a pastor's wife. Like they were like, that can't happen. And it was so interesting seeing him navigate. that yeah, it could happen. It's not the traditional teaching like you said on marriage, but it's really a healthy approach that like, your relationship, and this was what was kind of challenging again, growing up with what I grew up with, that your marriage is first intimacy with your wife, enjoying your wife, enjoying your kids, intimacy in a weird way, like parenting your children, and then ministry comes after, and that's. Not a common belief for a lot of pastors nowadays. No, not at all. It's almost like, and he talks about this in the book where I'm over here doing ministry and you, you know, we hear this, you compliment, you, you know, add to, you don't take away from. And so it's almost like my language. This person is like a ⁓ tool to help your ministry. get better and that's his primary motive. And you're like, well, that doesn't sound or feel good. It doesn't, but I have seen this on repeat many, many times. And really what he's saying is that marriage or singleness isn't something that we manage alongside ministry. It's not like there are two vehicles driving down the same highway. That you jump between. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so he kind of really portrays the tension with this and answers the question, well, isn't there a a better way. And I love what he talks about that marriage and or singleness, right? Is one of the primary places God forms us for leadership. But sometimes we don't think about it that way. We think about it the other way. Like ministry is what forms us for leadership. And so I love this idea that we're talking about. Let me ask you this question, Jonathan. Why, and there may not even be a single answer to this, but why do leaders tend to separate? personal life from you know leadership life or leadership impact or ministry world like why why do you think that is I Think some of it starts with and maybe we can flip the conversation to singleness for any single people watching right now is is we get you know, I know so many people who start in ministry when they're single and They build the patterns of their life in their singleness and when you're single you can work 12-hour days you can just live at the church, you know, like ⁓ you can, you know, work all day, go home and shower and then go to, you know, team night, that night, right? It's like that kind of reality. And then when you get married, especially if the person is not on staff or if the person is on staff, they have their pattern, you have your pattern and that pattern is not going to change. Like it doesn't feel like it should change, right? Maybe, you know, it should change, right? But I think that's part of it. I think there's, you know, I think there's other sides of like, that's just kind of the traditional way we approach work in our culture too. like, you know, I go home, I text my wife during the day every now and then, but like, this is my work time and then I go home and that's my family time. And we very much segment. And there's like, there's a reality that that's kind of how it's built. It is going to be that way. Like, ⁓ it is going to be separated. But yeah, I mean, I had this kind of thought the other day. I this was maybe a few years ago, but it's like, we... so much focus on like bringing our work into our home. Like we shouldn't do that. Don't bring your work into your home, right? But like, maybe that wouldn't be such a problem if you brought your home into your work a little bit more, right? Like you integrated a little bit more, not having no boundaries, right? But like having like, you engaging with your family even whenever you're at work or whenever you're like, are you able to like kind of balance these? I don't know. It's a weird idea. But here's the thing. What I loved about this chapter, and I feel like I was looking back on the time that I was single, working in a church. Because again, I was probably that guy that was doing like 12 hour days. All of my friends were at church. And my dad was actually, my dad was my pastor. And I remember I started kind of feeling a little burnt out. Like I was like frustrated. Like I'm like, I can't hang out with my friends. Cause my friends aren't at church all the time, right? Like I can't hang with my friends. People keep asking me for stuff. And he's like, Jonathan, you have to believe that your time with your friends, and this is what he says in this book, and what Peter says in the book, is just as valuable as your ministry. And I love that he actually said that, because we don't say that. We think of time as friends, like, okay, friends are optional, but he said that your singleness is actually something, just like with marriages, that is something that should be first before your leadership, which is crazy. So what I started learning to do is I can say, do you have time to help me with this? Yes, I do have time to help, but no, I don't. because it means I'm going to not be able to invest in those relationships that are important to my life, right? And so I could joyfully say no, I don't have time for that, and honestly say no, because I truly valued, I started valuing the time with friends. And I do think that helped whenever I got married to integrate a little bit better my wife into my ministry. It also helped that she was in school, so like she was in like pre-med, so she was studying all the time, she was like in night classes, right? It like our life in general was like crazy, right? But I do think that helped a little bit to not have that impact or conflict that so many people have when they get married from going from single to married. Yeah. No, it's really good. I mean, when you think about, and you referenced this and he highlights this on repeat that your relation, your relational life. It's not this private thing, but it actually is this thing that God wants to use to form you, but also to preach to other people. So whether you're single or married, it's really an opportunity that His message can, you know, find its way in that particular channel. So friendships, nurturing friendships. you know, I love that He writes about it. Your dad talks about it. And I almost feel like this chapter quietly challenges this achievement driven ministry. It's like, I'm willing to, and you mentioned this at the beginning, sacrifice all this, even people, married, my friendships if I'm single, whatever, for the purpose of achieving this big, great, whatever, insert adjective, ministry. And so when we begin to think about that in a little, a deeper way, sometimes I wonder about this idea of fear. and how fear is a really big driver in the lives of leaders. And so I guess the question that floats in my head is like, I wonder what fear drives leaders to maybe protect ministry over relationships. Cause you often don't see it the other way around. And I'm like, huh, like why does that happen? I think it's sometimes the, what is it? The of the urgent. The thing that feels the most urgent can derail us. That's what we put all our, I mean, you know, the term is the squeaky wheel gets through grease, right? Like, but I know some people that live like this, where everything is, they always are reacting to urgent situations. So in ministry, what you have is someone calls you at 2 a.m. They're having a life crisis. That is the most important thing right now. And so when we're, only focusing on the urgent, urgent, urgent, urgent. Unfortunately, what happens is the relationship that's not in urgent care right now, because we've neglected it so long, becomes an urgent care, and then we need to focus on that. I think that's often what it is. It's a fear of someone who needs me is not going to be able to get access to me, right? ⁓ Again, none of us get into ministry because we want to have clean boundaries, because we want to have our know, Saturdays and Sundays to relax with our family. Like no one gets into ministry. We get into ministry because we have a heart for people. We get into ministry because we feel passionate about the call of God. We feel passionate about the church, about, know, yes, I want to devote my life to this. We do want to do that. It's not like, and so sometimes these words like self-care, which you said is in there, which I'm like, kind of like, ugh, can't, self-care, like what, like what about God care? Like I care about God, don't care, right? Like all these words kind of feel bad. Cause we're like, what if we miss out on this ministry moment that we're supposed to have this divine, ⁓ you know, setup or whatever that we use. We use these words, right? Like this divine ⁓ interaction or divine interruption that like, what if we miss that moment and we just missed the call of God on what we were supposed to be doing. And I think that's, I think that's often there's a story in here of a pastor that lives in China and she's like, I can't turn off my phone at night. What if someone needs me at 2 a.m. Right? And like that's the way she lives her life. from emergency to emergency to emergency. Consequently, her life is an emergency because she neglected. That's right. That's right. Yeah. And I mean, I'm not going to sit here and pretend that I didn't live like that for many years. And I'm sure if we had a therapy session, we could flip the switch and have a therapy session. We could found out. You're eating you had last week. I'll hold it for you. Yep. I got it right here, baby. Always ready for me. ⁓ But I mean, the reality is yet we bounce from need to need and feeling needed. In fact, he talks about this. This was, I never thought about this until he said it. And maybe you're listening and watching right now and you get this. If you're married, your spouse is not primarily there for your support staff or as your support staff. If you're single, your closest friends are not primarily there for your support staff. And you're like, well, they not to support you. That's not, that's not what I'm saying. Or you're saying. almost like you're using them as a means to be your support staff without really prioritizing the friendship or the marriage or whatever as the ministry that God has entrusted to you. Because the reality is if you're single, you can see, and I've heard this, singleness is like this holding pattern, right? And really it's not, it is a very specific holy calling for this season. And some seasons are longer than others. But that can be a whole nother episode, but it's really a holy season that he wants to form, you know, things in you, but he also wants to use it to preach to others. If you're married, you know, same, same principle applies. It's, it's a place that he wants to preach from, but he also wants to use informus. And, those people don't serve to support something that you're achieving or building. It's actually really, you know, really important. So. And I know we can unpack this a little bit more for him because he's got some components in here specifically if you're married and specifically this one, the single chapter, I was tempted to skip it honestly, because I'm like, I'm married. I'm not anticipating being single. Right. But what I did really love and I never, mean, I should have thought about this, but I'd never really thought about it. It was that he said, you know, in, in, Catholic circles and more in like early church up until the Protestant Reformation, honestly, uh, it was the, single people that were considered the like leaders of the church. Those are the people you were investing in. If you think about it, know, priests are single. Like there's this celibacy, there's this ⁓ nuns, monks, there's this, if you're going to be in ministry, there's kind of this assumption of celibacy, which there's some stuff that Jesus said that kind of points to that, right? That's why the Catholic church grabbed that. They didn't do it just because they thought it was a great idea. And then the Protestant Reformation happened. And now in Protestant churches, largely it's like, if you're single, there's something wrong with you. Whereas in the Catholic church, singleness is something celebrated. That is, if you're going to minister, you need to be single. We're like, well, now if you're single, you're probably like, there's probably something wrong with you or you're get in trouble or like you shouldn't be single. But the idea is that like, man, God uses your singleness. It isn't just a holding pattern like you said, but like there's actually beauty in it if that's the season you're in or if that's the thing you feel like God is calling you to a celibacy. Like I am going to be single my whole life. I hadn't really thought about that. I kind of, for me growing up in Protestant. Protestantism, mean, Catholic traditions are like, like, ⁓ it's so traditional. Like it's so like manmade traditions, but like there is precedent in scripture that like, yeah, there's, it is good to be single and to use that singleness for God. But again, letting that singleness be a testimony, not just a stage of life, right? Like not just like, ⁓ that just happens to be where I am. It's, yeah, it doesn't reflect anything on my ministry, right? Like it actually informs the ministry. And I thought that was really interesting. I don't think of that very often. Yeah, same. Again, we keep things separated, right? Like we're like, my personal life is my personal life and my, except for at 2 a.m. whenever my ministry needs to, like my ministry always invades on my personal life, not the other way around. Well, and we sometimes, so two comments and a question for you. Sometimes we think of singleness, like life is linear. So you're born, you're growing up, you're single, you're married, you have kids. You know, there's this aspect of, of linear evolution, relational evolution, if you will, and your credence, you know, where your credibility builds as you move along in this linear pathway relationally. And what's interesting is ⁓ potentially the church has unintentionally, and I'm speaking big church, this doesn't apply to everybody. So don't email me and say, my church isn't like that. This isn't every church. Just it's accepted this rule, whatever you're gonna say. I don't know what you're gonna say, but whatever. Yeah, totally. But I wonder, maybe this is not a comment. Maybe it's just, I'm just thinking out loud here. I wonder if the church has unintentionally, isolated, marginalized, ⁓ not discredit, but kind of like set aside single leaders because they don't have that marital status or that linear evolution. They still got ways to go, right? So we unintentionally kind of like, you know, set them to the side a little bit or discredit them. And again, I don't know if that's true or not. I just sometimes wonder if there's any validity to it. I would say we value single leaders until they're 30 and then we set them aside because there's something wrong with you if you're, maybe that age might be different for 35 for some churches, 25 for some churches. And again, this is probably more in the evangelical mega church. You don't have to be a mega church, you're kind of in that model of like we are looking to grow. We were looking to reach new people. We are slightly evangelical evangelistic rather in our approach. And so single people below 30 have all the energy, all the drive, all the excitement. But then you're like, better get married by 30. Otherwise there's something wrong with you and you're probably going to be sort of kind of put down. Yeah. It's almost like we there's the shift from. What can we get from you until you hit whatever that invisible line is to like, what is wrong with you? Right? And if you're single watching listening right now, like. Let Jonathan and I remind you, let this book remind you, let God's message remind you that singleness is not incomplete leadership. You are complete for where God has you right now. And he wants to use wherever you are right now, single or married, but specifically talking to single folks. To It is incomplete though. I will say, if you don't have, if you're doing this alone, know, whenever God was talking in the garden saying, it's not good that man be alone. He wasn't, yes, he was talking about marriage, but he wasn't necessarily talking about marriage. We're supposed to do this in community, right? Like, that's one of the things that Peter says. He's like, you should have companions if you're single that walk through, especially if you're a lifelong celibacy that will walk through you, walk through these things with you, which segues us into our resource for today. I love these segues, but we, Jason and I have launched a new coaching and community program for Connections, guest services leaders, if you're involved in welcoming or getting people connected to your church, it can be a lonely road. You might be the only one who carries the burden for that at your church. Maybe every week you feel like you're drowning and you can't get above water to catch your breath because there's constantly the urgency, the emergencies that are coming up and you're just trying to survive. We've created this group for you. Some of the high level leaders around the country that are doing this at their churches. that have maybe already solved the problem that's stumping you, that you just can't figure out. There's coaching in there, there is community, shared resources, lobbylabs.co. I want you to check it out. I think it is maybe the thing that will help you feel like you're not doing this alone. But yes, it is maybe incomplete though, if you don't have that community, if you don't have that connection. And I think, yeah, it goes back to, it's not good that man be alone, mankind, woman, man, we should not be alone. which means maybe our spouse or those companions should be walking through this ministry with us, right? Like again, not doing the work. I remember my dad, my dad, was called a pastor at church that had gone through like a massive church split. you we'd been, I was in high school at that time. And one of the things he said to the congregation is he said, I'm your pastor, my wife is not. And he's like, I'm giving my wife permission to go to another church if she wants to. I'm giving my wife permission to not be the pastor's wife that does the women's ministry, that does the thing, that does all the things, right? I'm not going to sacrifice my wife on the altar of ministry. Like now she is yours, with her what you will. And I think that was the same thing. He didn't maybe say this about us, but I would say as a pastor's kid, I don't feel like I was sacrificed on the altar of ministry either. I was not under the microscope. The first time he got voted in to be pastor, and then I went to summer camp that like next week. And then I came back with blue hair and like. My dad could have been mortified, like, ⁓ my son embarrassed me. I'm the new pastor. What are they gonna think about me? But he came back, he's like, that was an interesting choice. That's all right. He did not care. I wasn't doing it out of rebellion. But like, he could have been embarrassed. He could have like, you know, said like, what did you do? We're the new pastors. They're trying to respect me. But like, he did not sacrifice me on the altar of his ministry. And I'm really grateful for that. I feel like I still love the church because of that. Where a lot of pastors' kids maybe don't. I think you should bring the blue hair back for what it's worth. It was cool. They told me it was going to be temporary. so like, was like, long did it last? And then I get back and it's like, it's like two weeks later, it's still blue. I love that your dad did that. And you, you know, you talked about our spouses. ⁓ This makes me wonder if, if my spouse, you know, or your spouse, if they interviewed us about our leadership. what would they say, right? Because we sometimes think about leadership outside of being married. And what's interesting is that our spouses see the leader before our platforms ever do. And so, you know, sometimes we, I don't know that we get it confused or we don't see it or we don't prioritize it. It probably varies by leader, but. Your marriage is given to you. It's given to me to invest in, to prioritize, let God preach from. And I don't know if it's in this chapter or I read this somewhere else. So forgive me for not remembering where it is, but you can't fake intimacy at home and then think you can have authenticity at work. Not necessarily sex, but like intimacy is like getting close. Yeah, yeah. like, I it was interesting. He said that they prioritize 20 minutes every day of being naked together, like actually physically naked, not necessarily sex, but just naked. And I'm like, I have a four year old, a two year old and a baby. That ain't possible for me. feel like, anyway, he was not saying you need to do this. He was saying this is way that we've been able to do that. That's something we're prioritizing, but yeah, in a side. This is one of those great moments I could see maybe a lot of dudes. I don't know, maybe ladies would do this too. A lot of dudes like writing that little note down, slide, yeah, highlight it and like, hey baby, this isn't coming from me. This is coming from another godly pastor. his wife agrees. So baby, 20 minutes. Some of you are like, heck, I'll settle for 10. Honestly, two. Yeah, two. We'll go 30 seconds, right? But the whole idea is thinking about something that might work for you. listen, if you read this book, this isn't what I love about him and I love about his wife is their stories are real and raw and they come from a place that they learned from really suffering, from failure, not from we did this right and we want to tell you about it. It was specific and you set up the... talking about his wife was like, look, you know, almost like I'm out, you know, we've got to figure something out here for our relationship. And he talks through it. I know we don't have a lot of time to unpack this, but there's so much good here. He talks about these, you know, triggers and he talks about oneness and, you know, limits and just all these different things. We don't have time to unpack them here, but. Some of you listening, you may not be in the best place. If you're single with relationships and friendships, maybe you're dating somebody or not, married, you and your spouse, you're not in a great spot. And maybe you're just navigating and struggling through some things. What's interesting is, that in our marriage and in our singleness, things in our own lives surface, right? And so the closer we get to someone in a relationship, these things surface. And I think sometimes that's why in ministry world, we don't have to get so intimate. And I don't mean sexually, but emotionally or mentally intimate. And so some of those things don't showcase, they don't get showcased to other people. And that's why some people think about us in a certain way, but the closer we get and the more exposed or emotionally, mentally naked we are, people see all of the little things about us, our triggers surface. And so what do you think? Let me ask this, how do you think leadership amplifies those triggers? Yeah, I mean, this kind of goes back to the address your shadow a little bit. ⁓ Yeah, yeah, it does. I think it's kind of one of those like what is happening at home you take into your work, right? Let me talk to you a little bit. I mean, I just want to talk about one of the notes that I wrote in my, as I was reading this book is, and I think this is a common feeling. I grew up as a pastor's kid. I was also on staff at the church. And I had this internal thing, my dad never said this to me, but I had this internal thing that my dad was not my dad between 8 a.m. and 1 p.m. on Sunday. I didn't talk to him. I referred to him as Pastor Rick. I didn't have any questions for him. I did not add any burdens to him during that time. I did that before I was on staff, I did that after I was on staff, And then at 1 p.m., whenever the last person left the church, hey dad, and I would hug him and it was good. That was not like an unhealthy thing, right? But he talked about in this book that some of the best moments of intimacy with his wife are whenever he saw his wife across the church and went to her and grabbed her and just hugged her in the middle of ministry. And I was like, what? I kind of wish like, I don't think my dad would have been against that, but I think I wish I'm like, would it have been a better relationship with my dad if I had just like went and grabbed him while he was talking to someone and just hugged him. And I just came into his ministry a little bit more, right? Like, and that's some of the things that happens right with church is like your wife is, she's doing her ministry, I'm doing my ministry. And then at 1 p.m. or whenever your last service, whenever the last person in your service, that's when we're now spouse again. Like, yes, she's, you know, she's the first lady until 1 p.m. and now she's my wife again, right? But I love that as a way to integrate the, whether it's your parenting or your spouse, or you could talk about your singleness, those companions that you have were like, they are in my ministry. They are part of my ministry, meaning that like they get priority just as much as the person I'm talking to. I don't know. That was a big, big thought I had that I just wanted to make sure and point out that I really liked that. And I think if you're a pastor's kid, a pastor, you can relate to that. Was there any thought that you were like, this is the one thing I wish people could see? It's related to what you just said, that the people around you, your team, your ministry, if you will, at your church, feels the overflow of your closest relationship. So it could be spouse, if you're single, could be like a close friend. And I always think about this, that leadership that is not relationally rooted, could become performance. Man, that's really good. And so the focus is how can we be relationally rooted and realize that's where God- Relationships for the sake of relationships, not relationships for the sake of what we're trying to accomplish. That's right, bingo. Because remember this, the gospel is first lived in proximity. So the relational rootedness before it's preached publicly. And so, you when we begin to live in that world, what we eventually do is we reproduce the love we're experiencing in and with people. So remember this, the question isn't today, whether you're leading or not. You are leading. You just have to answer the question, where am I leading from? And where am I allowing God to form me first? Man, that was really good. That's a great way to sum up the episode. Hey, we hope you enjoyed this episode. Be sure if you haven't subscribed already to subscribe. If you wanna grab the book, it's The Emotionally Healthy Leader by Peter Scazzero. We're early in, we're gonna keep going through it, but hey, find us on social media, ask us questions, engage with us. We love to do that. On Instagram for me, Jason Instagram's primarily for you, the best two, right? And we will see you next week.