Priorities sometimes muddled amid overwhelming schedules; overseeing 24 churches
More than 1,500 Seventh-day Adventist church members in Mexico call Magdiel Garcia “pastor.” The number might not seem remarkable, but those members are scattered among 24 churches in the country’s southern state of Chiapas. Each congregation sees Garcia on a tightly scheduled month-and-a-half rotation.
“There’s not a lot of time to spare,” he says.
Garcia is not alone. Recent burgeoning membership in the Adventist Church’s Inter-America region—now home to more than 3 million members—is stretching the effectiveness of area pastors and cramping their time for family and personal spiritual growth, church leaders say.
Ministry is suffering as a result, says the Adventist Church president for the region, Israel Leito. “Our growth outstrips our ability to produce ministers.”
Thirty-two other ministers in Garcia’s region each pastor an average of 18 to 24 churches—sometimes more. “There isn’t a single pastor [here] who ministers to just one or two churches,” he says.
Garcia joined regional church officials and more than 900 other district pastors and their spouses April 30 to May 3 for Inter-America’s first large-scale Ministerial Association Summit, held in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic.
With a 1 to 1,304 ratio of pastors to church members in the region, church leaders agree solutions are needed. But finding new pastors is not a quick or easy fix, church leaders say.
“We are fighting a losing battle,” Letio says. “Ten years ago we [said] an average load for a pastor should not be more than 600 or 700 members. But we have found that in many instances ... there are pastors who average 2,000 members.”
A survey of ministers’ needs is currently underway in Inter-America. Expected to wrap up within the next four months, the survey will help church leaders better understand pastors’ needs in the region.
Garcia admits he sometimes struggles with time management. His wife, Raquel, is equally overbooked, overseeing Children’s and Women’s ministries, coordinating and training deaconesses and running local Dorcas Societies.
Connecting with every single member attending the couple’s 24 churches is nearly impossible, Garcia says. A second-generation pastor who says he still loves his job, Garcia depends heavily on “a lot of dedicated elders and laypeople.”
“I try to visit three of my church leaders’ homes every time I visit a church. I generally can only visit elders’ homes and depend on them to visit the members who are in need, sick and discouraged,” he says.
Learning to delegate routine aspects of ministry frees time for “the real work a pastor needs to do—being a shepherd to his flock,” says Hector Sanchez, director of the Ministerial Association in Inter-America and summit organizer.
“We can accomplish so much more when we care, train, and inspire our church members to serve others,” Sanchez told summit attendees.
Carl Sterling, a 28-year ministry veteran who pastors seven churches in West Jamaica, agrees learning to delegate tasks gives pastors more time for one-on-one ministry. “We need to go back to ... [having] more of a personal contact with the members’ needs, and study and pray with them,” says Sterling, who visits three of his churches each Sabbath, ministering to members and even squeezing in a board meeting after sundown.
Weekday services, visitations and street outreach campaigns fill the rest of his week. A father of two sons attending university and two school-age daughters, Sterling admits he finds little quality time to spend with his family.
Garcia says he struggles with a similar situation. Family time is rare—it’s usually only once a week that he’s able to set aside time for his wife and two small children.
The seemingly impossible task of juggling church responsibilities and family commitments is a matter of priorities, Sanchez told summit attendees, who learned about marriage enrichment, strengthening families and how not to neglect their children as they lead their congregations.
James A. Cress, secretary for the world church’s Ministerial Association, commended IAD church leaders’ efforts to address the challenges ministers face. “Church leadership can do nothing more important than affirming pastoral leadership in prioritizing ministry to their own families and training their elders and other church leaders to more effectively nurture the members and reach out evangelistically,” he said.
“We want to clearly emphasize to our pastors the correct order of priorities: to put God first, then family, then the church, and all else after that,” Sanchez says.
For more information on the summit and Inter-America’s Ministerial Association, visit www.interamerica.org.