I found this article and was amused by it. check out the blog it came from here. I will make my comments in brackets.
If you enter pastoral ministry…
10. Not everyone will like you. (This is an absolute given. Do not enter the ministry if you want everybody to be your ‘friend’, ‘respect your opinion’, ‘agree with you’ and ‘understand the motive behind all you do’. If You are a people pleaser then you are going to get tired very quickly. Please your people by honouring God first and foremost).
9. You will make people angry regardless how godly you handle yourself; it comes with the position. (Try to avoid this if you can but often people have agendas, love the last guy more than you, have loads of ‘friends’ who ‘think the same’ and will question your motives, no matter how Godly).
8. You will feel like a failure often; and when you do appear to succeed, the fruit that is produced cannot be accredited to you. God alone gives the increase. Thus, there is little “sense of accomplishment in ministry” that you may be accustomed to in other vocations. (This is a bit cynical. In inner city ministry you can feel like you are banging your head against a brick wall. We see the same people day in and day out and they just are not responding despite our pleas and petitions and loving concern for their souls. Any victory, no matter how small, can seem like a fountain in the desert, which in many cases turns out to be a mirage upon closer inspection. You take your failures on the chin and you celebrate any fruit. Who cares whether people give you kudos. God sees all things, even those we often do in secret. We’re after his ultimate validation of ‘good and faithful servant’).
7. You will fight legalism and liberalism, along with laziness, ignorance, tradition, and opposition. (Oh yeh Baby! Bring on the encouragement – and that is just in your own heart! well, maybe not the liberalism bit. Depending on your context. The fight within the church is often more wearing than the battle without. Be prepared).
6. Not everyone will respond positively to your preaching, teaching, or leadership. You will bring people to tears with the same sermon: one in joy, another in anger (I have done this). (This depends on what you say, obviously. I probably just rankle believers and offend unbelievers with my no holds barred approach to pulpit ministry. In my church, you never get much genuinely helpful feedback – unless you are a part of our preachers training programme, but here I refer to general the congregation – “that was good/challenging/interesting/a blessing/wrong/too long/too short/” doesn’t count – although I have made people walk out, get angry and cry. I am aiming for “sob in repentance”to get the full set! Here’s hoping. In this culture, they tell you nothing, unless you get it wrong, then they tend to form an (dis)orderly queue).
5. You will be criticized, rarely to your face, and frequently behind your back. This criticism will come from those that appear to love you, those that obviously do not like you, and pastors and Christians that barely know you. (This one is a given! Unless you are a people pleaser or in the room with those doing the criticising. Any ministry that is progressing or moving forward is fair game. I have heard people really slate pastors in this city and expect me to join in. I don’t. Ever. If I don’t know a man or his ministry then I have nothing to say. Full stop. If he is a(n) heretical clown – then schmack down time! Otherwise, shut it, repent and pray for your brothers and sisters).
4. You will think about quitting yearly or monthly, if not weekly or even daily. (Yup. Nuff said).
3. You will be persecuted for preaching the truth, mostly from your brothers and sisters in the pews. (Not true for me this one. I have a great little gospel church and I am immensely thankful for them. Most who would disagree with my ‘in your face’ approach know not to waste their breath by now anyway).
2. You will feel very lonely on a consistent basis, feeling like no one truly knows you or cares how you feel, because you do not want to burden your family, and trust-worthy peers are few and far in-between. Because of the “super-Christian” myth accredited to pastors literally, you will find it extremely difficult to disclose your deep thoughts and feelings to others. Thus, you will struggle with loneliness. (This is a tough one because it can be so true at times. Many hurtful things I keep from my wife because it is just not helpful to her and would not aid her spiritual growth. I am currently in the process of developing a mentor system for my life to deal with this issue. The build up pressure can be a dangerous thing in ministry and we need to find suitable and mature outlets that will listen, encourage and whoop our self-pitying butts when we need it).
1. You will probably pastor a church that is barely growing (if at all), is opposed to change, doesn’t pay well, has seen pastors come and go, doesn’t respect the position as biblically as they should, doesn’t understand what the Bible says a pastor’s or a church’s jobs are, and will only follow you when they agree with you (thus, they’ll really only follow themselves). (Again, I love my little congregation. We will never be a mega church. Not for lack of faith but because to qualify I would need all the 8000 residents of our community to be saved. Maybe it is a lack of faith, and they will be? Anyway, I suspect our church will remain small in size, given our demographics (75-100+) but boy do we punch above our weight when it comes to financial giving and ministry outreach. They trust me, generally, as a leader, and our elders, even if sometimes they do not fully understand everything that is going on. They manage to keep the vision, enthusiasm and support for what we do even though sometimes it feels like we kill one ministry and start two new ones on a weekly basis! If you are ever fortunate (blessed) to find a church like mine, cherish her. If you don’t and God calls you to one as described here then – ne ne ne ne ne – keep plugging away, preach Christ, pray for your people and, in the words of CJ Mahaney, keep looking out for signs of grace even in the midst of great darkness and indifference amongst your people).