The Puddles

When a congregation decides to “call” a pastor to its church, it is a long and thorough process.  Many “jobs” are like that.  Many jobs are not.  But there are stark differences between hiring someone is the secular world and calling a pastor to a church.

Besides President of the United States and other political positions, how many jobs out there interview the spouse of the applicant and review the immediate members of the applicant’s family before hiring them? That actually happens in the church.  It is not a formal part of the “call” process.  But it happens.  I was interviewed, maybe not with the same questions that they asked my husband, but it happened.  Each time my husband has reached the final stage of the call process with a church, I have been invited to attend a weekend with the congregation.  The premise is usually to introduce the pastor’s family to the congregation and to show the pastor’s spouse and family around the community, but the other side of that premise is that they are getting to know you to see if you will be a good fit for their church and community.  Trust me, if my children were crazy and wild during this “interview” process, my husband would NOT be called.

Our behavior is watched and judged.  What my children wear, how they behave, the clubs that they join, how involved they are in church is scrutinized.  Over the last 20 years my husband has been on staff at a church, either as a pastor or a youth director.  During that time, I have been accused of being a bad parent during a council meeting which was then thoroughly discussed by all members of council (even when my husband asked them to stop).  I have been asked to teach Sunday school and then had that offered rescinded.  I have been accused of not saying “hello” to a member when they walked past me in the hallway which then caused the family to ___________ (fill in the blank with some kind of negative response to the church.  God forbid that I ignored someone unintentionally).  My children have been dis-invited to birthday parties after the family became upset with my husband.  I have had members accuse me of being greedy when the church decided to hold a fundraiser for my son during one of his open heart surgeries.  It goes on and on and on.

One of the worst times for me lately was when someone became upset with me for a  multitude of reasons with the most egregious being that I thought I was better than her because I was the pastor’s wife.  Which resulted in me going to mediation with her and her husband for SIX HOURS with an outside mediator.  After six hours of mediation, she told the mediator that she didn’t know what she needed in order for this to be resolved and I told her out of frustration that the ONLY reason that I was there was BECAUSE I was the Pastor’s wife and that normally disagreements between members do not involve an outside mediator and entire day spent negotiating a resolution.

The families of the pastor receive very little in return for the hours missed with Daddy so that he can be with others during emergencies, or when church members feel free to talk negatively about the Pastor (a.k.a. their Dad) in front of them, or when people act inappropriately and you are not allowed to say anything.  The Pastor is someone who is truly called to serving God and sharing His good news to others.  Not the spouse.  Not the children of the pastor.

And yet, we are not allowed to become angry with others.  We must consider the many factors that may be going into that person’s decision to behave that way.  It is NOT alright for the Pastor to defend himself.  He/She must ALWAYS submit.  That is what you are taught.  We must listen to those who are angry and try to find a way to peace.  We must consider the rough life of poverty/violence/misogyny/racism/etc. that they must be going through. We must ALWAYS hold ourselves to a higher standard even when the other person will not.  Just because they are behaving a certain way doesn’t mean that we can behave that way as well.

The church DOES NOT allow you to publicly defend yourself against those that bring complaints against you.  You have to pray that someone (meaning another member of the church) is willing to do that for you.  I think that some people know that and take advantage of it.  When I had someone going around and spreading lies about me to cover her own misdeeds, I found out years later.  Out of respect for my position as “Pastor’s wife”, the people hearing the lies did not ask me if it was true.  They just did not spread the lie any further but allowed the lie to cloud their opinion of me.  Two years later they shared with me what happened and I was stunned and sad.

Out of 100 members of a church, perhaps only 1 or 2 are upset with you.  And then because everyone has different levels of involvement of the church, perhaps only 5 out of 100 know about it from your perspective because they are leaders in the church and are privy to the entire story.  Because the pastor is a leader in the church, if he publicly said  anything about it, it would be considered an abuse of his/her power as leader.  So what do you do?  How do you handle it?  As a Christian leader, what is the answer?

We often say in the church, “the issue is never the issue”.  A member may say he is upset about the politics of the national church and is going to leave the church because of it.  Or is he leaving because he made a huge financial commitment to the church and he can no longer uphold his commitment?  There is often a deeper problem going on besides what a person outwardly says to others.

In the end, being the family of the pastor is often a thankless, stressful, emotionally-painful job.  There are days that I want to just scream from the rooftop.  I want to be the town crier and loudly announce the misdeeds of those who speak against my husband.  When I am the one attacked, I want to be the one who gets to go the council and boldly tell them how I have been wronged.  I don’t want to do the right thing.  I want to stoop to my carnal nature and lash out at those who would seek ill will against my family, but I can’t.

There is no outlet for the Pastor’s family to turn to in order to vent and process.  Of course there is always therapy (which has been our constant tool for each member of our family). But with whom can you share your trouble  with in order to deal with the pain and grief of what is afflicting you in the church.  No one.

We used to have a small group of friends that met on a regular basis with whom we shared our highs and lows in life with each other.  It was a safe place for almost six years for us to cope and deal with any and all  joys and struggles that we might be dealing with.  But that came ended right before I stopped going to church.

About 1 1/2 years ago, I just stopped going to church.  In the beginning it was because the person angry with me was heavily involved and I felt it was better to just avoid her presence and allow her to be a part of the church than to continue upsetting her with my presence.  There was nothing I could do.  I had no power.  The accuser in this situation had ALL of it. 

Then the quarantine happened, and because I was living in the same household as the Pastor my help was needed and required.  Our motivation for helping to make worship happen is because we love the Pastor/Husband/Dad.  We also love the church.  We do not allow a few bad apples to ruin the entire bunch.

If you are a member of a church, here is what I would ask of you:

• Consider the emotional welfare of the pastor and staff’s family.
• Do not assume that you know everything just because you go to church every Sunday.
• If someone EVER complains to you, make sure you next question to them is, “Have you spoken to ______ about this?”  If the answer is no, then the complaint MUST die there.  Gossip only festers and allows disease inside a community.
• Remember that everyone is human and everyone makes very human mistakes.
• Do not hold any person to higher standard than you ask of yourself.

There are so many different ways to be a spouse of a pastor.  I have seen spouses serve on church council and hold other leadership positions.  I have seen spouses do absolutely nothing.  There is no perfect way to be a pastor’s wife.  Someone will ALWAYS be disappointed in you.

In the end, the best thing that a pastor’s wife can do is to create a safe haven at home for your family.  Whatever that looks like.  A safe place for the pastor to not have to discuss church.  A safe place for your children to be their true selves.  And try to create a safe place for yourself emotionally so that you can ride the rough waves of ministry.