Pastoral Burnout & The Communion Season

The liberal soul shall be made fat: and he that watereth shall be watered also himself.
Proverbs 11:25

Burnout

For some time now, the church has grappled with the issue of pastoral burnout. The ministry can be terribly depleting physically, emotionally, and spiritually. In addition, ministers who are “over the target” will find themselves under assault from the evil one. The nature of the ministry is a dying to self in the service of Christ. Ministers must constantly seek the grace of God. It cannot be done in the flesh.

As some of my readers are aware, I recently took a call to Zion Presbyterian Church, a Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) church plant in the Commonwealth of Virginia. For me, this past year has been wearying on my flesh. The path to ministry here was arduous. First, I had to wrap up ministry in Dallas. Since then, nonstop activity in the past eight months. Relocating the family. Two weeks in Scotland to be received by our General Assembly. A trip to Singapore to speak at a family conference. Ministry trips to Canada, Alabama, and New Jersey. Presbytery meetings, organizing the hosting of a meeting of Presbytery, along with the regular heartbeat of ministry – preaching three times a week, pastoral visitation with a new flock, counseling sessions, and open air preaching.

All of these matters have, purely by the grace of God, been blessed. He has showered great blessings upon the ministry here. His power is truly perfected in my weakness and his grace is sufficient.

But I have been told what I need is a vacation to keep me from pastoral burnout. However, I have found that what has helped me most of all is the Communion Season. I believe that such Seasons are a great help to ministers to be invigorated for the weight of the ministry.

Note — in this article, I am in no way prescribing a “one size fits all” solution to the problem of burnout, but rather, I wish to convey something that has helped men run their race with vigor by an intense use of the means of grace administered by another minister. So, with that said, for those who are unfamiliar with the pattern of Communion Seasons, let me give a brief explanation.

Seasons

In the Scottish Presbyterian tradition, the Communion Season has several preparatory services, typically from Thursday to Saturday, to prepare the congregation for the Lord’s Supper on the Lord’s Day — with a Thanksgiving service on Monday. Not all communion seasons have all of those services, for instance, Zion Presbyterian did not have a Monday service. But what is important concerning pastoral burnout is this — these services are typically conducted by guest ministers and the host minister of the congregation gets to sit under his ministry that week. I will return to that idea later.

These Communion Seasons not only apply the Biblical requirement for preparation to profit from the Lord’s Supper (see Westminster Larger Catechism Q. 171), but they also model the great gathering and rich fellowship of God’s people in the Old Testament feasts. If this spirit is maintained, the Communion Season is a time of great spiritual feasting on the Lord and with each other.

“The children of Israel… kept the feast of unleavened bread seven days with great gladness… and the whole assembly took counsel to keep other seven days: and they kept other seven days with gladness… So there was great joy in Jerusalem: for since the time of Solomon the son of David king of Israel there was not the like in Jerusalem… and their voice was heard, and their prayer came up to his holy dwelling place, even unto heaven.”
2 Chronicles 30:21-27

Such seasons are times of tremendous spiritual activity and godly fellowship. Many travel to such Seasons to partake of the Supper with their brethren and the people will fellowship in each others’ homes. The culmination of all of this preparatory worship is to come around the Lord’s Table to share in the Cup, and the Bread and to feast on Christ spiritually on the Lord’s Day. When the Spirit comes down from heaven to bring us Christ, these seasons are as days of heaven on the earth for those who are spiritually exercised to profit from them.

If you would like more information on the theology and practice of the Communion Seasons, I preached a short series on the need to Prepare for the Lord’s Supper, which builds up to a sermon on Communion Seasons. You can find the series here: https://www.sermonaudio.com/series/195781.

Heritage

Now, while many might believe that the Communion Season was constrained to the Scottish Presbyterian tradition, one should consider that the American Presbyterians embraced these Seasons as well. In Holy Fairs, Leigh Schmidt relays the experience of William Tennent:

In 1744, when the evangelist William Tennent, Jr., visited “a new erected Congregation in the Towns of Maidenhead and Hopewell” in New Jersey, one of his first aims was to celebrate the Lord’s Supper. The congregation, being without a settled pastor, happily embraced this opportunity. “The Sacramental Season,” Tennent rejoiced, “was blessed to the refreshing of the LORD’s dear People there, as well as to others of them which came from other Places. So that some who had been much distressed with Doubts about their State, received Soul-satisfying Sealings of GOD’s everlasting Love Others were supported and quickened, so that they returned Home rejoicing and glorifying GOD.” The communion season, though far removed from Ulster or Scotland, invigorated this newly gathered congregation in. this distant patch of New Jersey.”

-Leigh Eric Schmidt, Holy Fairs (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2001), 54

As recently as the 1916 Constitution of the PCUSA, one finds Communion Seasons commended:

As it has been customary, in some parts of our Church, to observe a fast before the Lord’s Supper; to have a sermon on Saturday and Monday; and to invite two or three ministers on such occasions; and as these seasons have been blessed to many souls, and may tend to keep up a stricter union of ministers and congregations; we think it not improper that they who choose it may continue in this practice

-Presbyterian Board of Publication and Sabbath School Work, The Constitution of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America (Philadelphia: Presbyterian Board of Publication and Sabbath-School Work, 1916), 449

Note that the PCUSA even admitted that such seasons have blessed many souls and has helped keep a union between ministers and congregations. That has been the experience of this Presbyterian minister as well.

All that said, Presbyterians, especially in times of Revival, found many of heaven’s blessings poured out in a Communion Season when God’s people were gathered around the Table.

Refreshment

So, having that understanding, let us return to the problem of pastoral burnout. In the Season, not only having a different minister preach is a blessing to the congregation, it also allows the host minister to receive spiritual refreshment for his own soul as he sits under the ministry.

Last week, during the Communion Season at Zion Presbyterian Church, it was a blessing to sit under the preaching of Rev. Trace Turner from Thursday to the Lord’s Day. There were five services of worship in which I was ministered to under the ordinary means of grace which culminated in the administration of the Lord’s Supper around the Table with my congregation as we shared in the cup and the bread feasting on Christ.

In addition, this season was a time where I was able to fellowship with a godly minister and talk about the challenges of our ministries. We were also able to get out and explore the works of God in Creation and Providence in Virginia and meditate on the Lord’s works. We explored places like Colonial Williamsburg, the Bible Museum in Washington DC, and observe the natural beauty of the State of Virginia. We were able to pray with each other. But best of all, we would conclude each day in a diet of public worship, as Rev. Turner preached to us. At the end of this week together with my brother minister and the people of God, my soul was full, and I felt spiritually reinvigorated.

This was far better than a vacation, as the grace of God was being poured out each day in the services and I was watered for the next “season” of ministry. Our visiting minister was also encouraged in our fellowship and observing the effects of his ministry in a different congregation.

It is also a glorious thing that this spiritual refreshment was granted by the ordinary means of grace. We found refreshment not in broken cisterns, but rather, in the very place the Holy Spirit has promised to give us Christ — in his ordinances of preaching, prayer, singing psalms, and in the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper as the people of God gathered together.

Is this the only way to address the issue of “pastoral burnout”? No. But it is a great help and it does use the means God has ordained. But sadly, it seems that one reason the Communion Season has vanished in historic Presbyterian denominations is men have lost the heart and principles that lie beneath them. When that happened, Communion Seasons became a rote burden, rather than a rich blessing.

But if God’s ministers and God’s people can remember the joy found in such rich times of communion and fellowship, perhaps, we will find greater spiritual revival in our souls through these ordinary means. One visitor to our communion season took the week off from work to travel and have his soul under the means of grace and to enjoy the blessings of communion with God’s people.

1 How amiable are thy tabernacles, O LORD of hosts! 2 My soul longeth, yea, even fainteth for the courts of the LORD: My heart and my flesh crieth out for the living God. 3 Yea, the sparrow hath found an house, And the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young, Even thine altars, O LORD of hosts, my King, and my God. 4 Blessed are they that dwell in thy house: They will be still praising thee. Selah. 5 Blessed is the man whose strength is in thee; In whose heart are the ways of them. 6 Who passing through the valley of Baca make it a well; The rain also filleth the pools. 7 They go from strength to strength, Every one of them in Zion appeareth before God.

Psalm 84:1-7

After all, is such a season not a foretaste of heaven itself? Indeed it is, for the nature of experimental religion is to help us taste and see that God is good.

In all of this, I am immensely thankful for our recent communion season and pray that the blessings experienced in the services, at the Table, and in the communion of the saints will continue with us and linger for a long while.

For ministers who are always about the Master’s business, this certainly helps give spiritual fuel to run the race well, and to spend and be spent by the grace of God, for Jesus Christ.

Bearing

On a final and very sincere note — if you are a minister that is feeling burned out, feel free to reach out to me. Press on, dear brothers, may Christ’s power be perfected in our weaknesses as we strive for the prize: Christ Jesus. May he have the preeminence in our ministries as we run to gain that crown that we will cast at his own feet.