Some friendship seeds were planted but ended when people left to start church plants or moved away for new jobs. Others sprouted up quickly but were later revealed to be shallow and hurtful, destroyed by gossip and insecurity. Still others were choked out by the frantic busyness of life. Between jobs, kids, responsibilities, and ministry, friendships were relegated to the background of life.
Slowly but surely, a few friendships took root, and the roots sank deep. Some of these were fellow youth ministers at other churches. Some were fellow pastors in my own church community. Some of the deepest were the very people I was called to lead and disciple—my volunteer team and interns. It surprised me to find that my best friends at my church were those I served alongside.
With relationship comes risk, however, and there are a few that stand out to me:
A deeper level of hurt. The deeper you go in a relationship, the deeper you can wound and be wounded. When we initially arrived at our church, another couple seemed excited to be friends with us, quickly inviting us into the deep end of the friendship pool. We eventually learned that the motives behind this friendship were impure, and what appeared like the seed of friendship sprouted a root of bitterness. The couple eventually left the youth ministry. It wasn’t just a lost friendship; it was a lost ministry partnership, and students experienced the painful ripple effects.
A potential lack of respect. When you’re buddies with the team you’re leading, one’s sense of authority can quickly dissipate. A friend of mine recently had to confront his best friends and roommates about their attitudes as volunteers in his ministry. They were operating with a sense of entitlement, showing up late to meetings or not respecting some of the boundaries because he was viewed as their friend first and their leader second.
A closed community. I’ve seen plenty of volunteer teams who really like hanging out. They love each other so much so that they forget to spend time with the teens they’re called to disciple. The mingling before a worship gathering finds itself filled with cliques, only these are now divided between student and staff. Others may interpret “we’re close” as “we’re closed.” Without a sense of awareness, a team can become self-involved.
The risks in these friendships are weighty, but so are the rewards.
A shared mission. C.S. Lewis writes in The Four Loves that friendship stems from a common interest or insight, that friends must journey together toward something for their friendship to blossom. There is a clear common interest between pastors and volunteers: We all want to see young people grow closer to Jesus. That mission binds us together, gives us something to spark passionate conversations, and allows us to support and encourage one another in our endeavors.
A team camaraderie. When your team genuinely loves each other, it makes ministry fun; really fun. Some of my favorite moments in recent memory are the times I spent laughing and sharing life with members of my ministry team. Like any family, we have our dysfunction and quirks, yet we transcend these as we emphasize one another’s gifts and strengths. The love we share spills into our students, who see our deep friendships and strive for a similar sense of community with those around them.
An expression of the love of Christ. Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes this about Christ in The Cost of Discipleship: “He is the Mediator, not only between God and man, but between man and man, between man and reality... Between father and son, husband and wife, the individual and the nation, stands Christ the Mediator, whether they are able to recognize him or not. We cannot establish direct contact outside ourselves except through him, through his word, and through our following of him. To think otherwise is to deceive ourselves.”
If Jesus is our mediator, what better place to find true friendship than with those who are also pursuing him? He is the source of all healthy relationship, and thus our partners in the gospel should become our dearest of friends.
Joel graduated from Multnomah University with a B.S. in Bible & theology and youth ministry. He is currently the high school pastor at Red Mountain Community Church in Mesa, Arizona. He and his wife, Katie, live in Gilbert, Arizona, with their two children, Copeland and Eloise. He blogs at http://joelmayward.blogspot.com/.
A good friend of mine who was a youth pastor at his church for more than four years was seriously burned by one of his closest friends who was a member of the youth staff. Because of their close friendship, the lines that separated youth pastor from volunteer started to become blurry. This volunteer started to make major decisions without consulting the youth pastor, which ultimately resulted in great division among the students. It wasn’t long before the volunteer left the church, along with about twenty of their students, and started attending another church up the road. My friend told me that their close friendship made confronting his volunteer that much more difficult and awkward.
Another caution I would offer to the youth pastor is in the area of accountability. I am not saying anything new when I say that ministers need to have relationships in their lives where they can be brutally honest and open with a trusted friend. They need to have relationships where they don’t have to be on and are able to hang out with people who are not parishioners in their church. My heart aches for pastors who do not have one or two relationships in their lives where they don’t have to worry about being judged or thrown out of their congregations because they shared something they thought or felt.
It becomes muddy and messy when youth pastors confide all their thoughts and feelings with someone within the church or a member of the youth staff. Even though youth pastors may feel as though they trust someone completely, when you share intimate details of your life with someone in the church, you are giving that person potential ammo to use against you at a later time. There have been times I thought I was sharing something in confidence, only to find my vulnerability used against me later. I know that sounds overly cautious, but pastors need to watch their own backs. I’m sure you have your own or have heard stories.
Finally, the last word of caution I would offer regards the gender issue. The work of ministry naturally causes people to draw closer to one another. We must be aware of how close we allow ourselves to get with members of the opposite sex. It only takes a few years in ministry to hear stories of pastors or youth pastors who do not create healthy and safe boundaries with the opposite sex and end up falling into sin.
So, while there is not a black or white answer to the question, any and all youth pastors must use some level of caution and wisdom when it comes to initiating and sustaining friendships with their volunteer youth staff.
Jason is an associate pastor in Independence, Missouri, where he primarily works with youth and young adults. He thoroughly enjoys speaking and teaching God's Word and has done so at a handful of camps and retreats over the years. Jason always keeps his disc golf discs in the trunk of his car just in case the opportunity to play should suddenly arise. He occasionally jots down some of his thoughts at www.JayMcPherson.blogspot.com. Jason is married to Rachel, and they are expecting their first child in June 2012.
Part of this is for the simple reason of needing to keep your sanity. Ministry is an amazing privilege, and it can be life giving and a joy to be able to walk alongside people on their spiritual journeys. But it can also be hard. And draining. And frustrating. And there will be days when you hate it. On those days, you need friends and people outside your faith community with whom you can relax, be yourself, vent, and not worry about the repercussions. If you don't have those people in your life, it's going to drive you crazy, and you'll probably internalize a lot of stress, frustration, and anger, and that's not healthy or sustainable.
It's also healthy to have plenty of friends and acquaintances who aren't connected to your faith community or to any faith community. These are the people who will keep you honest, who will help give you a reality check every once in a while and provide much-needed perspectives that you wouldn't get from those in your churches and ministries.
There can be some real rewards of having close friends work as volunteers of your ministries. For one, it's a gift for our youth today when you can model what authentic Christian friendships and relationships look like. Serving in ministry with your close friends is one way to do that.
It's also an added gift to enjoy the people you're serving with; being in ministry with people who know you well can make it more fun and can help you get through those times when ministry gets hard.
But there are risks in having those close friends work with you in ministry. Your friends aren't perfect people (nor should you expect them to be!), and sometimes they'll do things that you disagree with. They'll be late to youth group, forget to show up, plan a game that isn't the smartest, or share things with students that may be inappropriate or that don't fit with where you'd like to see the ministry be theologically.
Having to discuss those types of things with volunteers is never easy; you don't want to offend, and you certainly don't want to lose them as volunteers. But it's even harder when the conversation has to happen with your best friend. I think there is the potential to want to let things slide or not have the important conversations that need to be had when these situations arise.
On the other hand, hopefully you have the type of relationships with your friends where you can be frank and to the point, and they'll totally get where you're coming from. That'd be great. But the reality is that those types of conversations have the potential to be pretty awkward and can hurt friendships. And when you're doing the tough work of ministry, you need all the friends and support you can get.
Being able to minister with your friends can be a real blessing, both to you and to the students in your ministry. But I encourage you to choose wisely which of your friends you ask to help out; depending on the strength and personality of your relationship, it could be a real blessing or a real frustration to your ministry.
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