“Other duties as assigned” is a familiar phrase for ministers. Pastors can easily find themselves performing church maintenance, and nonprofit administrators might spend half their time managing communications for their institution. Bivocational ministers’ workweeks are even more complex, with workdays spanning multiple different career paths. The variety can be exhilarating at times, but challenges with time management, accountability, and divided attention can easily weigh us down.
In this month’s Southwesterners’ Forum, Southwesterner Chris Gardner joined Michael D. Wilkinson, professor of theology and director of professional doctoral studies here at SWBTS. Together, they discuss how ministers can manage multiple ministry hats effectively and with grace.
The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.
Michael Wilkinson 0:06
It’s really good to be here with you, and I appreciate you joining us today, and I couldn’t help but just think that if this is the last one, how appropriate, because I’m a W! So my whole life, I’ve been at the back of the line. I have been in the last seat in the classroom, so it’s appropriate that I’m the last one to do this year. But I’m happy to be here, and so grateful to have you join us today. So hopefully my experience with juggling many ministry responsibilities at the same time will be of help and benefit to you, because I think most of you are probably doing that very same thing.
Chris Gardner 0:46
So good to be here. My name is Chris Gardner. I serve as the adult and family minister at Gambrell Street Baptist Church, so right across the street from the seminary. I’ve been serving there for a little over two years, and I’m also serving as Dr Wilkinson’s assistant to the professional doctoral study program, so the Doctor of Ministry, Doctor of Educational Ministry program. So I’ve been doing that for almost two years now, I believe. And so I’m also in that same boat of juggling a couple jobs. I’m also a PhD student here, and Dr Wilkinson is also my supervisor. So I’m in the same boat of juggling several things, and it’s been a blessing. And so I’m honored to be a part of this.
Michael Wilkinson 1:37
So well, Chris can’t quite get me out of his hair. We first got to know each other when he was a student at Texas Baptist College. At that time was Scarborough College, and one of his first classes was my, I think, medieval and reformation studies, reading seminar. So we’ve known each other for a number of years, and he was one of our one of our best students and I’ve enjoyed knowing him as a student, but also now as a colleague, working together in the professional doctoral studies office for the last couple of years, and excited to be his supervisor for his doctoral studies as well. So at some point he will, I’m probably like another parent that he’s at some point going to finally graduate and get away from. So, but until then, I’m delighted to be a supervisor and work with him.
Chris Gardner 2:33
So yeah, well, let’s go ahead and get into a few questions regarding juggling multiple things in ministry, multiple jobs, wearing multiple hats, if you will. First of all, Dr Wilkinson, what ministry roles have you simultaneously had in the past? And what I know you’re doing multiple things now, even on the faculty at Southwestern.
Michael Wilkinson 3:00
When I my first ministry responsibility or job was at Geier Pprings, First Baptist Church in Little Rock, Arkansas. And I was, I had multiple kind of titles, but mostly I was a single adult pastor there, but the way I got my first introduction to dealing with multiple ministries at the same time wasn’t anything official. But one day, the church ran a preschool, and one day the pastor could not make it, and I was the newest person on the staff, and the pastor secretary called me and said, Brother Paul is out today, and so he has asked you to do the chapel message for the preschool. So I had 10 minutes to get ready, so I put some things together and went in. And I’ve got a room full of, you know, 3-, 4-, 5-year olds, and I do this five minute chapel thing, and when I finished, it was a couple of days later that she called me back and said, Pastor said he was so pleased with what he heard that you did that you get to do this from now on now. So I was both a single adult pastor and a chaplain for the preschool.
Michael Wilkinson 4:24
But really more seriously, I think the when I first got into having really multiple roles was when I came to Central Baptist Church in Bryan College Station Texas, and I was both the single adult minister and the missions minister. And I was the first one on staff to take care of both of those roles. And it was a position they created. And the singles group was small, but it was a very active group, a very strong group. And so they brought me in to do that. And they felt like, well, we probably need to add something to this. So we need, we need to be involved in missions. So let’s just add missions to this. So I went there and assumed both responsibilities. And I had three single adult classes, and we did one mission trip a year over spring break. We had a partnership with a pastor in Mexico,right on the border in Piedras Negras, and so we would go down there. And for the first two years, that’s where we went. Then he wanted us to go to some other places in Mexico. So we began to work our way down south in the state of Veracruz, and eventually he took us to to Oaxaca and some other places. But all of that time I had to balance. […] Part of it went from having one trip a year to having two trips a year. One was primarily a typical mission trip. The other tended to be more of a construction type project, where we would go and help some churches with some construction works. At the same time, I am still, you know, having to watch for the single adult program. So it eventually we developed where we were able to do some mission work in Turkey, but also quite a bit in the city of Steyer, Austria. A former church member and his wife were missionaries over there. So we entered into a partnership with them. And so again, we were once to two times a year going over there. And so there we were, with multiple mission trips a year as well, as, you know, continuing with single adult ministry. So that’s where I really got started with that. Once I came to the faculty here, then I came just as a faculty member. Then after the first year was over, I became the dean of the college, and was both professor and dean. Then I moved up to the School of Theology, then I assumed responsibility not only as professor of theology, but also as director of the professional doctoral studies program. And then I was asked to also take care of the Theological Studies Division in terms of being that the department chair. So right now, I’m balancing about three responsibilities, yeah.
Chris Gardner 7:42
And so I think it goes without saying that balancing multiple positions, multiple roles in ministry comes with challenges. So could you maybe express some of those challenges that you experience while you’re on staff at churches, or even now?
Michael Wilkinson 7:59
Yeah, the challenges are the same in both places. And I think what is challenging for me is I’m not a highly structured person. I’m one who pretty much likes to just experience life as it comes, and I don’t have a real rigid schedule. But I found that if I’m going to succeed in these responsibilities, I’m going to have to impose some structure on my life, to make sure that I take care of everything. And one of my other weaknesses, you know, sometimes your strength is your weakness, I can be very tunnel visioned on one thing and block out everything else, and so it’s possible for me to so focus in on something so hard that I literally don’t hear what’s going on around me. And what balancing the multiple responsibilities has forced me to do is make sure that as tunnel visioned as I get, I have to sort of always maintain the other thing within my vision. So it’s kind of like when I was the single adults missions pastor. Most of the time my single adult ministry took the priority, and the mission’s responsibility was a bit in the background, but it always had to be in sight, because at other times, I would have to spend more time focusing on, taking care of the mission’s responsibility. And so I sort of shifted my time a little bit, so I have to live rigidly by a calendar and make sure that I’ve got everything on there in order to not fail in taking care of certain responsibilities that are always going to be there and need to be taken care of. So for me, I had to learn very early on that I’m going to have to schedule myself carefully, not rigidly, because there’s always time that you’ve got to flex a little bit. But usually I would try to maintain some sense of well, I’m going to focus attention here, but during the course of this week, I’m also gonna make sure that I give a few hours over here so that it is maintained.
Michael Wilkinson 10:31
I think the other thing I had to learn how to do was delegate well, to get people who could take care of ministry responsibilities with me, so that when we had multiple mission trips, I had someone else who could take one group someplace, while I took a group to another place. In the single adult ministry, I had created ministry teams with ministry leaders. And so as things had to flex, they continued to carry on and do the work of the ministry as single adult leaders. So I think those two things, making sure that I could delegate well and I had good leaders to do that, and also that I had to maintain not a rigid schedule, but a fairly careful schedule that I that I didn’t very too far off, and I made sure that I put everything on my calendar so that I didn’t forget it.
Chris Gardner 11:33
Yeah, I think for me, one thing on I am learning is that, especially now starting the PhD before I entered the PhD program, I don’t want to say I prided myself on not having to, but I felt like I didn’t need to have a planner or anything like that, because I could keep it in my head. Well, then once I started the PhD program, adding the readings that come with that my job here at the seminary, from there, as well as just day in, day out, things that happen in the church or sermon prep, I really needed to structure, have structure, so I try and keep a planner for my PDS job, as well as my PhD studies and for church, and that seems to help me as well. Because I think one of the biggest challenges is many times I feel as though, if I’m leaving one job, I’m taking off that hat, and then if I’m going to church, I’m putting on that hat, when, in all actuality, a lot of times they they can run together. And so having that challenge has forced me to revert to some type of planning, like you said, maybe not so rigid to where, if something unexpected happens, my whole day falls apart. But structure for me is very important. I’ve had to realize that.
Michael Wilkinson 13:06
Well, you’ve discovered the same thing that I discovered when I started my PhD, because I was at Central when I started my PhD, still doing both single adults and missions and then adding doctoral responsibilities on top of it. So I certainly had to what I did with all of my textbooks is whatever I had to have read by the next week. I went in the textbooks and I wrote dates, and I designated certain times of my day when I would read in order to maintain the reading so I never had all of a sudden, oh, I’ve got 400 pages to read for the seminar tomorrow. And this is a time when my son was in high school, and my daughter was just finishing up grade school, getting ready to start junior high school, and with all of that, so the family needs are there as well. So it does require a time of balance. And to be honest, in order to do this, I discovered that there are some things that that have to go by the wayside a little bit. So hence, the reason my golf game is so bad, I just don’t have the kind of time to do that. The truth of the matter is, I’ve never been great at it, so it’s easy to find other things to do rather than get frustrated because I’ve lost all dozen golf balls that I started with.
Chris Gardner 14:42
That’s a good segue though to the next question. With any type of ministry, or really any role you have, there needs to be a healthy set of boundaries. I think one thing that I’m learning in ministry is the tension between sacrifice and boundaries. I mean, there are things that happen in ministry that are going to happen at inconvenient times, but we are called to lay down our life and lay down ourselves for the benefit of others. And so there are times where we do need to sacrifice our time. But then there’s also that element of you know this might not necessarily be necessary to say yes to in the moment, whether that’s going somewhere, even if it is certain church related issue that can wait. So how do you set priorities with those boundaries and distinguish, hey, this is something maybe I need to do right now, or this can wait, because I feel like that’s a common struggle that probably all pastors deal with.
Michael Wilkinson 15:54
Yeah, this is true. And I think when you are balancing two or more responsibilities, as many of you are, one of the things that is easy to get squeezed out is your marriage, your time with your children, and some other and really some some things that you need for your own personal rest and relaxation and your own personal growth. And so you do have to build in some boundaries to make sure that you maintain that. I’ve got a lot of time that I can spend preparing to teach or preparing a sermon. Again, I know that the time frame that the time crunch, it’s on there. But there are, are moments when you know my children are going to be only this age one time there is no do over. And so I need to make sure thatin balancing the multiple things that I include them in this.
Michael Wilkinson 17:00
And so in terms of priorities, I think one of the things that helped, and I’ll come back to the family thing a little bit, one of the things that helped was with each of the ministry responsibilities. Especially when balancing both missions and single adults, I asked the question, what really is my purpose here with single adult ministry? And that was the first one, because that was the first thing I really had to jump into and take care of. And so I approached it in terms of, okay, well, if the church’s goal is to make disciples, then my first priority with the single adult ministry is to do whatever is necessary to help them become fully mature, growing disciples and followers of Jesus Christ. And so that priority shaped what we did. And so it determined the activities that we did. It dictated any kind of retreats that we did. I know you just hear people say, well, single adult ministry is kind of like youth ministry, with just grown up activities. And for someone to say that means you don’t understand single adult ministry. Adult ministry, it’s not like that at all, because you’ve got a variety of people there. The common thing is they need to grow and mature in their faith in Jesus Christ. And so that became the priority that really drove everything that we did, and that really drove what we did, also in terms of missions as a church.
Michael Wilkinson 18:46
If our purpose is to go to Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, uttermost parts of the earth, to bear witness to Christ, then our mission trips need to be in some sense, either directly evangelistic, or they need to be done in such a way where they contribute to a church being able to reach their community more effectively. And so we were oftentimes in situations where there was a language, a serious language barrier, and but our presence there actually enhanced the church’s witness, and we were very careful in the community with how we conducted ourselves to make sure we were there as servants, and, you know, not as people who were telling everybody what to do. We were driven by the desire to really make disciples. Even in our mission trips, there were a lot of things that we didn’t do. So mission trips, we did not have one day of going out doing ministry and four days of sight seeing. Most of our trips, we didn’t do any sight seeing. A lot of the places we were, there weren’t a whole lot of sights to see in the first place. We were there for the people. And I think that the desire to serve and to make disciples was what drove us as a church. For me, both with single adults and missions, that meant that there’s a lot of things I didn’t have to concern myself with doing, and by focusing on that, then we would trust the Lord to grow things as he chose to do. And I think that worked, because that’s what we set up for us to do. And I think within that, what I was able to do, also with, for example, mission trips, is I was able to take my son with me to a number of places. And so he grew up with a sense of, you know, we’re doing this together as Dad and son. But also he grew up being exposed to other cultures and everything else. And I think he developed a ministry passion himself and a missions passion himself. In his various roles, he has not been a missions pastor, but he has utilized mission trips very effectively with his youth, with college students, and I’m sure he will do this eventually as senior pastor, as he’s in his church now.
Michael Wilkinson 21:30
But one of the things that also helped is, and this is one of the advantages, sometimes, of multiple things, most of my of my mission trips were heavily populated by my single adults. Now we had a huge college ministry, so in terms of numbers of people, we probably had more college students, but I had a large number of my single adults who also went on these various mission trips. And what that actually did in helping grow the single adult ministry was quite remarkable, because they were experiencing doing this kind of of international ministry together. And so that helped when we, you know, when we came back home and we’re doing things, they already know how to work together. And were very effective at doing this. So one of the great blessings to it was it allowed, I think, some some benefits to happen with both areas of ministry. And that was, that was a real joy to see.
Chris Gardner 22:33
Yeah, for sure. And I think you bring up a really good point as far as boundaries, you were focused on what you were called to do there, and by having that in the forefront, it allowed you to not necessarily push things aside, but to help you serve even more effectively, so that whenever certain things came up that you might not necessarily have to do in that moment, you could say no and not feel bad about it. And that’s something I’m trying to to work through, especially even being married and asking my wife, hey, do you feel like we’re spending enough time together? Is there something, is there a blind spot in my life that I think it’s going well, but maybe I’m neglecting something else in my life? So even I think asking your spouse or or your peers is very important too.
Michael Wilkinson 23:34
I’m glad you brought that up. One of the other things I had the advantage of when my in doing single adult ministry was my wife, Terry, was very concerned with the number of single moms that we had, and this started while we were in Little Rock, but she would usually meet with them, one-on-one, and minister them. When we got to Central, we began to have to notice just a lot of single moms, and she wanted to create an environment so that they knew that they were welcomed, and it helped that the church as a whole was very welcoming to single parents and to single moms. So that was true with the church overall. But Terry especially, really spent a great deal of time. She developed a single mom’s ministry. They met on Wednesday nights, and she basically planned and prepared things for them that would nurture and encourage them as single mothers, many of whom were in situations, in that situation that they didn’t want to be, they didn’t anticipate being, but here they are, and it became a very healing place for them. And obviously that’s something that I could not have pulled off, but she did it, and she did it really, really well. And. And I think it had a huge impact on a number of our young moms. And she was able to incorporate some of our some of our older single women who had grown children, or, you know, almost grown children, to help in that as well. So that was an enormous help. And so we were very much partners in ministry together, and that was a huge blessing.
Chris Gardner 25:24
That’s great. There’s a couple more things I want to get to before we close. But one of the the issues I was thinking through as we were preparing for this was some misconceptions that I’ve had to work through in my life, in my ministry, some spiritual principles that I needed to learn, as far as serving as a pastor, and then having other jobs. And one of the things is there’s a difference between your identity and your role. That’s something that my pastor, where I currently serve, has has taught me, and it’s been very beneficial. I think it’s so easy to fall into the trap of, I am a pastor, I am a, you know, youth minister, I’m whatever, you fill in the blank, I am this, and so then your life quickly revolves around that, to where you neglect not just your family, but oftentimes your walk with the Lord. And that’s something I’ve really had to work through, that my identity is not my role or even my calling at the church where I serve or here at the seminary, my identity is that I am a child of God, first and foremost, that I’ve been purchased by him, and so I’m his. And then with that, I have a calling on my life. We all have callings on our lives, and through that calling, it’s expressed in the roles in which we we lead out. And so I think that’s a huge spiritual principle that I try and take, especially when I’m balancing multiple things. I’m not, my identity is, I’m not a PhD student. I’m not, you know, working at Southwestern, I’m not a pastor. I’m a child of God. But oftentimes my role is expressed in these ways. So could you maybe expound on that a little bit, or share some even spiritual principles that help you?
Michael Wilkinson 27:27
You said it so well. I don’t know that I could expound on it too much. I think you have said that very well. I think it’s crucial, because we tend to fall into a trap that is very much a performance based kind of a thing. It is easy to fall into that. And the struggle I had with single adult ministry at times was the church as a whole, and then my singles group, and I say this, my singles group as a whole were reaching a lot of people. It wasn’t because of me, it was because God was working through them. But the frustrating thing was with single adults is they come and they match up and they get married. So I was constantly losing good leaders to marriage! But, you know, and you can get frustrated about that a little bit, but where else are they going to meet? Where else is a Christian really going to meet their spouse? And this is the best place for it. And even though people asked me, Are you running a dating service? Absolutely not. And I did not do things on love, sex and dating. I avoided it like the plague because I used to tell my single adults I don’t want you to get married. Because you get married, you go to someone else’s Sunday School Department, and you’re not with me anymore. And so.
Michael Wilkinson 29:02
But because of that, I think you have to really to make sure that your identity is in Jesus Christ, not in the role, because the role changes, right? And I’m no longer a single adult pastor. Would I be as effective as a single adult pastor now as I was 30 years ago when I started? I don’t think so. I am 30 years older. Back then, I actually had black hair. Now I don’t.But it was a different place, a different kind of a time, and the situation today is different. And, you know, I’m in the role that I’m in, and I believe that this is the best role for me now. So the role is going to change, but despite the changing of the role, the identity of the person needs to be the same. And if I maintain that my identity is found in the Lord Jesus Christ, that it is his name that I bear, then that will, number one, keep me humble, because I realize I am not all that, and I don’t need many reminders to tell me that I am not the greatest thing since sliced bread. The Lord Jesus Christ is who he is, and it is his name that I bear. And so whatever role I’m in, I don’t want to embarrass his name. So when it comes to dealing with people, I want to deal with people in such a way that I enhance the name of Jesus Christ, glorify His name, not detract from it. And I think that kind of focus sort of helps you with any role that you do, and especially as you face challenges of balancing multiple competing time demands and multiple ministries, any one of which could occupy 60 hours of your week.
Chris Gardner 31:26
Yeah, yeah, definitely. That’s well said. Well, we’ve talked about a lot of challenges, so I want to end on a high note with balancing multiple jobs multiple roles in ministry. So how might a multiplicity of roles make one into a more effective minister?
Michael Wilkinson 31:47
That’s a good question. I think for me, what it did is it allowed me to understand that the area of ministry that I’m responsible for is important, but it’s not the only one that is important. As the missions minister, I had to work with– I mean, my single adults were easy, but I had to work with married adults. I had to work with college students. I had to work with youth. So it meant that I had to work with my fellow staff members, my fellow ministers, in order to make this work. And so I had to recognize the importance of what they were doing, how this would fit into and enhance their area of ministry. And it also meant that if the youth pastor wanted to take his youth on a trip that was not a church wide trip that I usually planned, what could I do to help him? Because I knew the benefits that were coming to my single adults and to the church as a whole. So I think it gave me an appreciation for the church as a whole, and helped me realize that the importance of everybody’s responsibilities and of the broadness of the ministry of the local church. I didn’t assume that the church should focus all their attention on my area of ministry, because this is the key. Well, we all had keys, and they were all keys to reaching our community. And so I think that was a huge, huge benefit.
Michael Wilkinson 33:33
It’s been the same up here with multiple responsibilities. You know, obviously, as a professor in a theology class, I have not only MDiv students, but I have ThM students. I’ve got music students, I’ve got students from the Terry school and students from the Fish school. And as PDS director, as you and I both know, we have to work with those deans in those concentrations and in their courses, and we have to realize that every one of those concentrations that we offer are very significant, and so we are there to serve those other schools. I may be housed in the School of Theology, but as the PDS director, I actually have to work with with all four schools. And this is a benefit, because I’m able to to know a little bit more about what the music school is doing and what Dr Crider is doing there, what Dean Sieberhagen is doing with the Fish school, with what Dr Shirley is doing in in the Terry school, obviously, what’s what’s on Dr Grace’s heart with the School of Theology. So this has allowed me, I think, to really have a better appreciation and understanding of the importance of their areas of responsibility in ministry, and how they work together and coordinate together. Far the overall, in this case, institution, in the case of what I was doing at Central for the overall benefit of the church. And so it was, I think that was the greatest benefit, is it allowed me to see a better idea of the whole even though I wasn’t in the role of senior pastor. It allowed me, you know, from a different vantage point, again, to value all of it and again, experience mutual benefits. But between various areas, it allowed me to get to know college students. And I wasn’t over the college when I was at Central; we had a college pastor. So it allowed me to get to know some of them. It allowed me to get to know some of the youth. It allowed me to to work more closely with a number of of my married adults, and some of my older adults who love to go on construction trips, and they absolutely loved it, and so it allowed me to build relationships outside of my one area, and that has been a tremendous blessing.
Chris Gardner 36:20
Yeah, I would agree. I think you see the impact that you can have outside of the walls of the church whenever you’re working multiple jobs, especially if it’s in a place where there are lost people, and you see the light that you can be and applying your faith, it certainly can be a blessing, for sure. So well, that’s all the time we have. We really appreciate you tuning in, and we have enjoyed this topic, and be sure to look at your emails for the next time we do another one, take care.
