The choir rose for the anthem while I fingered the sheet music that had been hurriedly thrust into my hands before the service. The choir director had suggested I bring in the congregation to sing the last stanza with the choir. It was a familiar hymn.
Simple enough, I thought. I put the music aside and prepared for the worship service.
As the choir sang, I sat back and enjoyed the anthem. Shortly before the last stanza, I confidently stepped to the pulpit. With a sweeping gesture worthy of Leonard Bernstein, I signaled the congregation to sing and was met with . . . an organ solo!
If I had been able to read a musical score, I would have seen it-the instrumental interlude. Several seconds later, the choir and congregation began singing at the appropriate time without my direction. By then I was sheepishly hiding behind the pulpit.
After the service, one of the choir members said, “We asked you rather than the other pastor because we expected you would know more about music!”
Expectations! Every pastor knows their weight. If it’s not sight-reading music, it’s being asked to give the invocation at the local D.A.R. even on your day off because your predecessor “always made time for us.”
While frustrating, expectations like these are usually benign. They can even provide a good laugh at the local ministerium.
But expectations are also the taproot of every pastor’s effectiveness and satisfaction. If we’re not offering the kind of ministry our people expect, they will be disappointed, and we’ll feel discouraged and inadequate. When a pastor’s own expectations are violated, even more serious consequences ensue: strained family life, joyless ministry, eventual burnout.
Often overlooked but most important, we are shaped by what people expect of us, especially in the first pastorate. One study by Drew University Theological School of its recent graduates concluded that the primary task of the first five years of ministry seemed to be “to acquire the self-image of being a professional capable of providing the services a congregation declares it needs from its minister.” Rather than fulfilling their own sense of calling, fledgling pastors usually try to satisfy the expectations of their congregations.
Slowly and subtly, for better or worse, we tend to conform to the image significant people have of us. It is crucial to find or develop a church atmosphere that allows us to be the kind of pastor we’re called to be.
We begin to deal with these expectations by realizing they enter our lives in two quite different ways.
External Expectations
Many expectations are external. They’re in job descriptions, memoranda from denominational leaders, and conversations in the barbershop about what kind of person should serve Old First Church. Whatever their form, they’re imposed from outside.
Often the clash of external expectations comes because they are incongruent or even mutually exclusive. Churches want their pastors to be both cloistered, contemplative scholars and aggressive, decisive administrators. Other churches expect their pastors to have specialized skills (preaching or counseling or youth work) and yet be generalists competent in all areas.
In addition to inherent contradictions, external expectations may clash for another reason: competing groups each expect the pastor’s time and energy. Community leaders expect involvement in local affairs, especially if former pastors traditionally joined Rotary or organized the high school baccalaureate. Denominational executives often expect significant involvement beyond the local parish. Local colleagues expect support of the ministerium and its projects. Most church members assume their pastor will be devoting full time to them. And, of course, there’s that often short-changed source of external expectations-the pastor’s family.
It is obvious that we must always struggle toward clarity and consistency in external expectations. Are church and pastor clear on what they expect from each other? Does fulfilling one expectation make it difficult or impossible to accomplish another?
Internal Expectations
Beneath those expectations placed on us by our environment, we have many others within our own minds. These internal expectations often originate from our reference group, those admired and influential people who’ve shaped our image of ourselves as pastors. Some have called this important group our “symbolic audience.”
One pastor described the adjustment difficulties of his new minister of music. Each Sunday’s “highbrow” anthems were far outside the musical tastes of the congregation. After long hours of discussion, the pastor discovered the recent graduate was still trying to please his esteemed professor of music. His music was really selected for his “symbolic audience,” even though the professor was now hundreds of miles away.
Early in my ministry, one of my own deeply admired mentors said it was “intellectually inexcusable” for a pastor to read fewer than two books a week. This internal expectation became more powerful for me than many external ones. Only after several years of guilt and frustration have I finally admitted that it is unrealistic in my current situation.
Most pastors live with unfulfilled internal expectations. For example, one study found that most pastors surveyed named scholars or authors as the people most influential in their lives. Yet the study also discovered that the same pastors spent an average of only 38 minutes a day in sermon preparation and another 27 minutes in general intellectual activity. Internal expectations were shaped by scholarly mentors, yet only an hour a day was spent in intellectual pursuits. What a prescription for frustration!
Perhaps we would each do well to ask ourselves, “Who is my ‘symbolic audience’? What reference groups shape, even subconsciously, my pastoral expectations?”
Until after World War II, most pastors’ reference groups were restricted, I suspect, to local colleagues and friends throughout their denomination or tradition. Certainly for some this remains true today. But with the media explosion of the last thirty years, my guess is that more pastors today take their cues from a core of nationally known “superpastors.” You know them. Their names continually headline seminars and conferences. Their faces appear again and again in Christian magazines. In short, they’re successful. We want to be successful, too, and so we subtly take their expectations as our own.
Several years ago I attended a conference led by a successful pastor whose large church is a national model for evangelism. As he described the intricacies of his program, I wondered if the small church pastors were thinking, How can I ever begin to organize this program in my church? Comments during the discussion period revealed that some pastors felt more discouraged than motivated. By taking the leader as a model, their expectations were raised to seemingly impossible levels.
Most of us need successful role models. Without them to inspire and challenge us, we can easily slide into quiet, comfortable mediocrity. But whether we identify with scholars, superpastors, or beloved seminary professors, it is crucial that we understand how they shape our internal expectations.
It becomes clear that dealing with what others expect is only half the battle. We must also get a handle on what we expect of ourselves. The key is realism. Are my internal expectations realistic in light of my time, gifts, and resources? Or have I internalized an unrealistic pastoral image? Am I trying to please a symbolic audience? How does my reference group subtly shape my expectations?
When Expectations Clash
In a perfect world, the internal expectations that drive every pastor would be entirely understood and realistic. Churches would expect exactly what pastors wanted to give. During the interview process, all expectations would be freely shared, clarified, and agreed upon. Both could then live happily ever after.
In the real world, the opposite often happens. Pastors don’t comprehend their internal expectations. Churches expect pastors to fit into preset molds. Both often wait until the heat of battle to discover what they really expect from each other. Moreover, expectations are never static, never settled once and for all. They are constantly in flux and must be renegotiated periodically as circumstances change.
But even in a far-from-perfect world, expectations can be shared, clarified, understood, and resolved peacefully. Here are some strategies in dealing with clashing expectations.
Always get important expectations in writing. Upon arriving at my first church as an assistant pastor, I was told I could expect to be called as an associate pastor in one year if I did a good job. When the year was up, the pastor expressed much appreciation of my work. Yet the elders waited another six months to initiate my call as an associate pastor.
During this period, I felt frustrated, wondering if they weren’t telling me something. To me, I had proven myself. I was hurt and angry that the church was not keeping what I thought was its end of the bargain.
Only later did I discover the one-year benchmark was never suggested by the Session but was only the private encouragement of the pastor. I should have discussed the issue fully during my candidacy and asked for written performance criteria upon which my call as an associate would be based. Times for periodic review of my performance and progress toward that call should also have been spelled out.
The frustration of this period taught me an important lesson. Until that time, I had believed that asking for written confirmation of important agreements communicated distrust and was somehow demeaning and unspiritual. After all, this is the church! Now I’m convinced that written agreements build a solid foundation for pastoral relationship, with less danger of disharmony through needless misunderstanding.
Consider job descriptions. The common attitude “Oh, we all know what the pastor’s job should be” usually means, “We each have our own private expectations which, when added together, would leave in doubt whether Jesus himself could satisfy them!” A written job description forces the church (and the pastor) to wrestle with the fact that no one can do everything well. Both parties can then realistically set mutually agreeable pastoral priorities. An accompanying benefit is that both parties will also realize what the pastor is not expected to do.
Rapid turnover in lay leadership and our natural tendency to hear the same statement with a multitude of subjective interpretations also argue for written evaluations. “We all think you’re doing a good job, Pastor!” says little and can be very deceiving, as some pastors have tragically discovered. Written performance reviews give the pastor concrete help in identifying strengths as well as areas needing improvement.
They are also a silent but eloquent answer to disgruntled members on the warpath because “the pastor is not doing his job” (not doing the job I personally want done). Written objectives and reviews are important insurance that the pastor will only be held accountable to the church board’s clear and consistent expectations. If different factions think the pastor is too heavily involved in one area or slighting another, the problem must be addressed to the board. Rather than the snare many pastors think they are, written objectives and performance reviews set pastors free from trying to please a hundred bosses.
Do not postpone dealing with clashing expectations. The more painful the crunch, the faster it must be addressed. This is what I failed to do when I expected to be called as an associate, consequently enduring months of needless frustration.
A seminary friend went to serve a rural church in Wyoming, where he discovered the previous pastor had done all the church’s janitorial work, from mowing the lawn to cleaning the toilets. He had even purchased all the supplies himself! The church budgeted nothing for upkeep. Believing this expectation inappropriate, my friend immediately confronted the Session with his unwillingness to continue these duties, and other arrangements were made.
Conflicting expectations are like a tight shoe. They begin with a pinch, but if left unattended, they soon become painfully tender to the slightest touch. Despite most pastors’ abhorrence of conflict (including me!), the time to deal with it is at the first pinch. Ignoring it only allows the tension to rub away more layers of good will. Clear communication and calm renegotiation of expectations is much easier before the pain develops.
Be willing to suggest equitable tradeoffs. Often those things a pastor is most gifted or motivated to do clash with expectations of others. Normally the pastor must take the initiative by suggesting fair tradeoffs.
One friend of mine accepted an assistant pastorate that primarily involved youth work. He wanted to retain his habit of regular exegetical study, although he realized that in this position he would not preach frequently. To satisfy his internal expectations, he negotiated with the church board to include in his job description one half day per week to pursue personal studies of his choice.
With a little imagination, many clashing expectations can be turned into win/win situations that both pastor and congregation can accept.
Separate role expectations from personal expectations. Role expectations involve perceptions of the ministerial occupation. Personal expectations involve all the intangibles regarding the pastor as a person: attitudes, personality, mannerisms, dress, everything. Every pastor struggles to draw a line between legitimate role expectations and those personal expectations that are out of bounds.
Upon arriving at a church in the “steel valley” of western Pennsylvania, I was warned by a trustee: “I see you’re driving a VW Rabbit. Of course, you came here with it, but I wouldn’t suggest buying another foreign car around here.” Although said in jest, the message was plain: “We expect our pastor to buy American.” Fortunately, I knew him well enough to joke in reply, “When America starts building better cars, I’ll buy one!” My message was also plain: the car I drive is my own business.
Role and personal expectations clash most often when they are unnecessarily intertwined in the mind of the congregation.
One pastor was called to a church that had for decades been served by a formal and highly proper pastor. The new pastor was also a strong and effective leader, but at first the church had difficulty accepting his hang-loose personality. In time, however, the church began to see the new pastor could fulfill their pastoral role expectations while having a quite different personality from his predecessor. Helping churches appreciate this difference can eliminate much unnecessary conflict.
Realize that some battles of expectations may be entirely within us. A pastor complains that his people expect him to be a saint. In fact, his own aloofness and internal acceptance of a perfectionistic lifestyle have prevented him from hearing his people’s earnest pleas to climb off the pedestal and join them. Another pastor complains that her elders never give her freedom to try new ideas. In reality, a new idea that turned sour in her previous pastorate has frightened her away from taking any more risks. Her board reluctantly filled the leadership vacuum but wishes she would be more assertive.
We can easily project internal tensions onto the screen of our surroundings. Unless resolved, these inner battles are carried along like sandburrs into each new ministry situation. When they begin to prick, we may unjustly lash out at those around us, making a bad situation worse.
One of my own internal tensions concerns my relationship to wealth. Like many individuals raised in middle-class homes during the sixties, I am suspicious of anything that smacks of materialism, yet have never lacked a comfortable lifestyle. I know I have not yet fully come to terms with how money can be used without being abused.
This inner tension sometimes makes me uncomfortable around wealthy people. Part of me condemns their possessions as crass and extravagant while another part secretly craves what they have. I wonder if people in our relatively affluent congregation look down on me because my home, car, and dress do not equal theirs. Usually these feelings have no basis in reality, but it’s easy to project my own hankering for affluence onto my people and then unfairly berate them for not pursuing a simpler lifestyle.
Often an empathetic, objective third party, perhaps a spouse or trusted colleague, can show us which tensions have no sound basis.
Finally, believe that expectations can be changed. No pastor’s image is set in granite. Church members in the 1970s reported a much wider range of pastoral expectations than they did in the 1950s. (See the fascinating research in Donald Smith’s Clergy in the Crossfire, Westminster, 1973). For example, the traditional image of the pastor as “shepherd” personally tending to every need of the flock was challenged by the image of the pastor as “equipper” of the laity for ministry. Today’s expectations are gradually becoming even more flexible.
This flux in pastoral images is good news to any pastor caught in the clash of conflicting expectations. We have a great opportunity to redefine a congregation’s pastoral image.
For example, formulating a written mission statement forced our church’s leaders to set new pastoral expectations more in keeping with where we want to go as a congregation. Careful teaching in new members’ and new officers’ classes, as well as sensitive preaching, have also helped a new pastoral image to take root and grow in our church.
Often pastors can encourage change in expectations by planting the seeds of symbolic gestures that over time will grow in influence.
A friend of mine was offered the previous pastor’s free membership in the city’s most exclusive country club as he began his ministry at a wealthy and prestigious church. Although my friend loved golf, he politely declined the membership because he didn’t care for the image it might project. This single act established quite different expectations for his ministry in the minds of his people.
While being shown around the church building during an interview trip, I was appalled to be taken up a narrow, steep, and winding staircase to the pastor’s study in the church bell tower. Talk about ivory tower seclusion! All but the hardiest parishioner were physically denied access to the pastor. If I had taken the position, my first act would have been to counteract the former expectations by moving the pastor’s study to an area of normal traffic flow.
Expectations are the lifeblood of ministry. What others expect of us and what we expect of ourselves determine what we will become. In all expectations, we need to strive for clarity, consistency, and realism. When expectations clash, church boards, denominational executives, individual parishioners, and our own symbolic audience might all play a part. But hopefully the final arbiter will be Jesus Christ himself. It is the Lord’s expectations, when filtered through Scripture and the indwelling Holy Spirit, that provide the guiding compass through the labyrinth of pastoral expectations.
Richard P. Hansen is pastor of Palos Park Presbyterian Community Church in Palos Park, Illinois.
Copyright © 1984 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. Click here for reprint information on Leadership Journal.
