3. Develop a Good Circle of Friendships and Relationships
It takes time to build a great circle of friendships, but healthy friendships are crucial to longevity in ministry.
Good friendships with people who ARE in ministry can be a great help in talking over issues that friends who are not in full-time ministry may not fully understand. For me, spending time with other pastors has been helpful because we go through similar issues, and we encourage each other and give each other great feedback about situations we face.
I also rely on good friendships with people who are NOT in ministry but who work in another arena. I don’t want to get so ministry oriented in my thinking or views that I lose touch with how the rest of the world lives and thinks. It gives me a broader perspective and a well-rounded relationship base.
We need a variety of friends. I need friends who are honest with me, who challenge me, encourage me, listen to me, who are my peers, who are more experienced than in me in some areas—it takes a circle of friends.
My wife is my best friend. I like hanging out with her. We do ministry together. We are in love with each other. All of this takes intention. We work at our relationship, and we protect our relationship. The minute we begin to take each other for granted—which happens because we are human beings—things get difficult, so we work on keeping our relationship fresh.
When Holly and I had young children, we learned to split our vacation time into two parts: time with the family and time with just the two of us. At first, it was splitting one week into three days alone and four days with kids. Later, it became one week with just the two of us and one week with the whole family. We made sure we had time to allow our marriage to be refreshed.
Investing more time than is “convenient” for family, friends, children, and others in general is so important. Spending time with people who you are not ministering to but just being a friend to.
