Am I suffering from burnout?

I hear that question fairly regularly in youth worker chat groups. It comes after a student pastor lays out how they're feeling, and things often feel dark and hopeless. Normally, pretty much every answer to them is 'Yes. Sounds like you're burnt out. Nothing wrong with stepping back, at least for a while.' Sometimes that may be the right answer, but I think that sometimes we're trying to give answers without asking the right questions.

If you think you need to leave because you are spiritually, emotionally, physically, mentally, socially exhausted, then please ask yourself these questions. In fact, preferably, ask yourself these questions before you get to the position of feeling you need to throw in the towel.

1. Is youth ministry your full-time role?

Is it actually youth ministry that's wearing you down, or is it other things? Is it actually the 40-hours a week you're working in another workplace that isn't bringing you joy?

2. How many hours a week are you working?

Are you working too many hours? Are you paid for 20 and working for 40, and you're getting frustrated or bitter about that? Are you paid for 40 hours and working 70?

3. What sort of ministry season have you had recently? Tough?

Don't decide you're burnt out the week after camp, or the week after Christmas, or when a colleague is off sick. Instead, take some time off in lieu if you've worked a really long week. Don't apologise for it. Don't slip in any work because it needs to be done. You may look at things differently when you return.

Perhaps you've lost some key members in your team. Without thinking about it, you've taken on their responsibilities. You were doing one talk a month, now you're doing one a week and you're wondering why you feel under pressure. If you end up writing six talks in seven days as I did recently, you'll probably be exhausted. Try to plan your time better than I did. You're leading training or you've got camp coming up? Try to find another speaker for youth that week, even if you need to go outside your team.

You may not be able to solve the leadership problem quickly, but at least you'll see why you're feeling pressurised, and drawing new people onto the team (I appreciate that's not always easy), or asking other staff or even youth to teach/lead a game in the meantime will help.

4. Is your youth ministry growing?

It might not be that you've had a tough time, instead you may have had an incredible time with real growth. Praise God! But suddenly, you're pastoring twice as many people. Or you've added in a mid-week Bible study alongside your regular mid-week group and your Sunday group. That's two hours of prep and one hour of group, probably half an hour each side to set up and tidy away - that's half a day! Perhaps you've got more young people struggling with their mental health. You're not burnt out, you've just got more to do. Can you ask other leaders or staff or older members of the congregation to meet with people? [Obviously while making sure safeguarding guidelines are in operation]. Can you cut down on something else?

5. What do you do to relax?

What do you do when you stop work? Choose to do something that energises you, and that probably isn't scrolling on your phone, staying up late gaming, watching a whole boxset or mindlessly eating junk food. You may be different, but those things generally leave me more frustrated than anything. Instead, if it's having people for dinner, ask someone round; if it's mountain biking, get yourself outside; if it's sewing, then pick up the quilt again. Paul reminds us to fix our minds on good things:

"Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things." (Philippians 4.8)

For me, that means I need to stop coming in after an emotionally exhausting evening's youth ministry and turning on the TV. Otherwise two hours later I'll head to bed after finishing a very poor quality action movie, or something about traffic police in New Zealand or antique collectors in the American South. I'll now waste half the next morning too. Instead, I should listen to some music, walk round the block, read a book, pray and then go to bed.

Think carefully about your sleep patterns. How are you winding down to sleep? If you're drinking lots of energy drinks at youth, then coming home and finding you can't sleep, that's only to be expected. Write a journal if you need to, in order to get some of the thoughts of the day out of your mind and onto paper, then rest unburdened.

6. When did you last have a holiday?

It's fairly obvious, but rather than leaving, do you instead need a holiday? When you take a holiday, try not to work. If youth ministry books will only make you think about your work, then don't read them. There are some times if we have the privilege of being full-time that we may even need a longer time away - a sabbatical. You can find out more about sabbaticals in an article on my website here. I appreciate not everyone may be able to have one, but if your church can give you a longer time away from work, say, every seven years, this will help you switch off from ministry and may mean you can go on in ministry longer. It also means that the ministry will become less dependent on you.

7. What's your relationship like with your Senior Pastor and/or board?

The problems can be deeper. Maybe you're tired and frustrated because you feel like you're fighting your SP or your board all the time. If so, have you had a conversation about that? It might be around resources, facilities, our pay and conditions, how young people are valued, etc. I had a great conversation like this with my Senior Pastor recently. He couldn't solve all the problems but I felt heard, and that, in itself, was very important.

Often we need to keep Matthew 18.15ff in mind. If we feel that someone has sinned against us, or against the young people we care for, we should pray then go and see them, just us and them. If we feel we don't get anywhere, then try to find someone else to go with. In the Anglican Church in the UK, it might be churchwardens. It might be someone from your board. It is very unlikely that things will improve without a conversation.

Often Senior Pastors don't have a lot of training (if any) in managing people. Why not ask them to read the page on my website about supporting paid staff (most of it is still true if you're not paid). You can find that here. Use that as a starting point to talk about how she or he can support you better.

You may have had all those discussions and nothing has changed. You need to then decide if you can continue to serve joyfully under those conditions.

8. How are your quiet times?

Not the time when you spend preparing talks or Bible studies, your own time with your heavenly Father. Think of those times as filling your tanks for ministry.

"Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the LORD, and who meditates on his law day and night. That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither— whatever they do prospers." (Psalm 1.1-3)

If you're not spending quality time in prayer and Bible reading, you will feel like you're running on empty. Do what needs to be done. If you struggle to do this on your own, find a friend, or an older member of the congregation to read and pray with. Often older Christians feel they can't do much with the youth (they can't sit on the floor any more!), but they would love to minister to you by praying with you.

9. Is there hidden sin in your life?

We probably all preferred to say we needed more sleep or exercise, but what is going on deep down? Is there some rubbish in our lives that we're hiding away, knowing we should be dealing with it, but not daring to? If there is, we should not be surprised that ministry is becoming a bit joyless. Of course it is! We're exhausted trying to live a double life. Instead, confess your sins! Find a trusted confidant (probably not a peer who struggles with the same issues) and ask them to hold you accountable.

"Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective." (James 5.16)

You may find that you have a weight lifted from your mind and experience more joy again.

10. How's your mental health generally?

Are your feelings of burnout part of a bigger picture? If so, get help. Yes - exercise, food, sleep, spending time with people will all help, but you may also need to see a healthcare professional.

11. Are you in the right place?

Youth ministry is often hard. If you want to keep going long-term, you need to be passionate about seeing young people come to know Jesus and grow in Him. You also need to be gifted to be in the role you're in. I'd suggest at least teaching and leadership are important gifts to have to be a youth worker. You'll often find you're gifted in helping and encouraging too.

Think about whether you are passionate and gifted, but tired, or whether you're actually not passionate about young people and you're not gifted in these sort of ways. It's rare someone hits youth ministry aged 22 with a strong gift of leadership already in place, but are you growing in teaching and leadership? Even if you've got these gifts, if you're not passionate about youth, you probably won't stay the course, nor should you.

And if you're passionate and gifted, but still feel you need to leave your current church, then the answer isn't to become a refuse collector. You are in the right role but in the wrong church. Don't let frustrations take you out of ministry, instead find a better fit for you and make sure from the start you put good support in place so that you can stay the course.

12. Who are your biggest encouragers? And are you seeing these people enough?

There are people who exhaust us. Sometimes we have to spend time with these people. But let's also make sure we're finding our encouragers, which may be young people, or leaders, or parents, or our Senior Pastor, or an old person in the church who used to lead in youth ministry. And when we find them, let's spend time with them. Let's look them out after church services and let them minister to us with their interest and care.

13. Who do you chat to who 'gets' it, who is outside of your church?

We don't want to be baring our soul to everyone, but we do need people outside our local area who understand us and our ministry, that we can go to for help. It's not always appropriate to talk about what we're experiencing to people in our church, or even in our area, but we should find people, probably youth pastors or ex-youth pastors who understand what we're facing and can speak life into us and help us carry on through hard times. I've got a group like that. I hope you have too.

"Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ." (Galatians 6.2)

14. Do you have a mentor?

I meet up with an older (and wiser) youth worker. The longer we continue in ministry, the greater the danger of gathering people around us who will say what our 'itching ears want to hear' (2 Timothy 4.3)? Let's meet with a mentor regularly, maybe monthly or termly: someone who speaks the truth in love and will sometimes disagree with us. They can tell us how it really is and will often also encourage us.

Scott Rushby, Youth Pastor at Testwood Baptist Church in the UK writes:

"When training our volunteers, I pitch it like this: Who is your Paul, your Timothy and your Barnabas? Your mentor (Paul) who’s investing in you; your mentee (Timothy) whom you're investing in; and your Barnabas (son of encouragement) - the one who just encourages you and cheers you on always! If you don’t have those three roles filled in your ministry life, get them!!"

15. Are you praying to grow in compassion for your team and your youth?

If you're starting to get frustrated about your team or the youth you serve, then pray regularly and fervently for compassion. But beware! You may find yourself crying more often! Ask that God breaks your heart for the youth you're serving. When he does that, you may find your energy restored as your love grows. Little things won't be as frustrating when your heart is warm towards them and you see them more as God sees them. Remember Ephesians 4.2:

"Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love."

It may be time for you to move on when you feel burnt out, but remember when Jesus saw the crowds after a busy time of ministry, he didn't walk away. This is what Matthew wrote in 9.36:

"When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd."

Jesus tells the disciples to pray for more help, then he sends them out to minister in His name. When you are beyond yourself, pray and try to delegate to others (and I do know the latter is often easier said than done in churches). Don't leave the youth in your care 'harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.'.

16. Who asks you these sort of questions regularly?

If the answer is noone, find that person. It may be a mentor (see 14 above). Even tell them the questions they need to ask you. Try to give them the list when you're feeling close to God, not when you're miles away.

Final thoughts

Having said all that, it might be time to leave, but I'd want you to think through your answers to these questions before making the decision. And read 1 Kings 19. We may find that, when we think we are the only one left and we're really under pressure, God is working behind the scenes to continue to use us to build His kingdom. Stay as long as you can if you're passionate and gifted.

Head in hands photo by Markus Kammermann, feet on beach photo by Myriams-Fotos, both from Pixabay.

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If you want to think more about this, read the chapters 'Raising the Bar: My own life' and 'Staying fresh' in my book, 'Raising the Bar: Nearly Everything You Need to Know about Christian Youth Ministry' which you can buy here. In fact, just read the whole book. It can be very hard, but God and the young people you serve need you to keep going as long as you can. You do (generally!) get better! The book's nearly 400 pages. In it, you'll find other ideas about finding, training and growing leaders in your groups. You can find out here what other youth leaders think about the book.