No one’s job is easy today, but do you work 50 to 70 hours a week as a public figure? Do you keep up with constant technological advances, deadlines to meet, people to accommodate, licenses to be renewed and yet create work that’s fresh, innovative, interesting and applicable to a large variety of people?
A church pastor must do all of this and more. Senior Pastor of TC3 (Treasure Coast Community Church) in Jensen Beach, Gordon Mularski, laid it all out across his desk. He states, “A pastor must be proficient at many things.” Currently, Pastor Mularski is working on implementing a discipleship program, attending to church building plans, keeping up with the church’s financial responsibilities, connecting his congregation to the community through the Double Dog Dare “Pay It Forward” initiative. He must also walk his own personal spiritual journey, oversee his staff’s spiritual needs, look over last year’s victories, and prepare a sermon each week that has enough depth for a seasoned believer yet is simple enough for a new listener.
Whew!
He's also planning a church trip to the Holy Land, recording videos for social media, choosing music to correlate with his message and has implemented a financial help program.
A pastor’s work involves a very public life, not just for himself, but also his family. They are in the limelight, receiving phone calls at all hours and receiving criticism and threats. They deal with society’s breakdown and cultural shifts toward the occult and crime. However, a pastor and his family are also normally highly regarded, honored, loved, prayed for, and supported by the church.
When I was a child, my local pastor was a part-time reverend. He worked another job. Today’s culture has altered a pastor’s work, making more demands upon him. Approximately 54 percent work more than 55 hours a week, and 18 percent work more than 70 hours a week, causing stress. Many pastors are depressed, fatigued, and short on money for bills. (Church Leadership)
Yet these men are not quitting in high numbers.
Most pastors are committed people who have learned how to handle the necessary role of servant-leader. Pastor Gordon Mularski calls it, “The Art of Pastoring.” He admits that at times he must disappoint people “at a level they can tolerate.” He has not and will not sacrifice his family for his work. Fruit of these comments are his two grown children who do not have issues with the church.
The role of a pastor is not a job, it is a calling; it’s not easy. Pastors need rest, time away to refresh and renew. They need vacations with their kids and quiet dinners with their wives. They need less criticism and more prayer.
Gordon Mularski has pastored Treasure Coast Community Church for 15 years. His greatest blessing has been seeing the life-changing work through the power of Jesus in a very real way. His Atlantic Ocean baptisms often include entire families. Generational and cultural barriers have been broken too—a former prostitute and a man with a $100,000 Mercedes were baptized the same day.
Not long ago, the congregation was challenged to pray for three people every day for a specific time period. Shortly afterward Treasure Coast Community Church held a baptism. A woman told Pastor Mularski, “These three women you baptized are the three names I prayed for daily. They are my sisters!”
Pastor Mularski emphasizes the need for church leaders to ask God’s favor in everything they do, and to help a congregation understand that they themselves are the church, not a building. He adds, “Wherever you go, look for opportunities to be used by God, even in bars. Walk with a sense of mission.”
Pastoral support is necessary. The church itself is necessary. The two come together. To pull a vibrant church and its leadership out of a community would leave a gaping hole of loss—food pantries, kids’ clubs, teen youth groups and a host of other programs. Each year, 4,000 churches close their doors. Those communities become dimmer. Darker.
Keep the lights on in your community. Support your pastor as he stays and keeps a commitment to his calling as Gordon Mularski has. As you do, you support your church. Its presence is significant.
If you’d like to reach Gordon Mularski or for more information about Treasure Coast Community Church, contact: 772.334.3999; email: info@tc3.org
Contact Kelly Jadon: kfjadon@gmail.com
(C) 2018 Kelly Jadon