Calling or Career? Why It Might Be Both

Being called to ministry is a glorious, wonderful thing. You get to come alongside God’s people and help them walk through the highs and lows of life in ways that bring honor to God and help them draw near to God. 

It’s wonderful, fulfilling work that has an eternal impact. 

However, eternal work is rooted in earthly realities. 

Ministry doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It requires time, energy, training, and accountability. You also need to be able to support yourself and your family.

These are things we normally associate with a career.  

Here’s the somewhat surprising truth: to build a successful ministry, you need both a divine calling and a career mindset.  

In this article, we’ll explore how calling and career intersect in ministry. We’ll look at how they support one another and how the most effective pastors and ministry leaders make space for both in their lives. 

The Biblical Foundation of Calling

First, let’s look at what God’s word has to say about the issue of ministry and calling. 

Ministry Is a Divine Calling

Ministry is not something you enter based on the advice of a guidance counselor or the results of an aptitude test. It’s not a club. It’s not a hobby. It’s not something you do if you have nothing else going on. 

Ministry is a calling. From God. 

It’s a glorious opportunity to play a part in building God’s kingdom.  

Scripture makes it clear that the work of the church is something Christ Himself ordains and empowers.

“So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up…” (Ephesians 4:11–12, NIV)

These roles weren’t created by a committee or the result of a particularly good brainstorming session.

They were given by Christ for a purpose: to build up the body of believers.

In 1 Timothy 3, Paul lays out qualifications for overseers and deacons. These qualifications show that spiritual leadership is both sacred and serious. It’s nothing to be played at or entered on a whim.

God doesn’t call people at random. 

He calls and equips those who are faithful and willing to serve with integrity.

Throughout Scripture, we see many examples of people called into ministry.

Moses in the wilderness. Isaiah from the temple. Paul on the road to Damascus. 

These people didn’t wake up one morning and think, You know, I think going into ministry might be a good step for my personal development.

They didn’t seek their calling as a career move or path of personal advancement. In fact, their callings would often lead them into painful situations that stretched them to their breaking points. 

They responded to God’s summons to ministry.

Calling Brings Purpose and Direction

It’s essential to never forget that ministry is a calling from the Lord. 

It can give you the strength to persevere when ministry gets tough. Which is pretty often.  

It’s what keeps you coming back to the pulpit week after week, even when you’re exhausted. It’s what motivates youth leaders to show up for students when attendance is low, and worship leaders to keep serving even when the spotlight fades.

Calling roots you in something sacred and eternal. It gives you a foundation on which every part of your ministry is built. 

It reminds you that you’re more than just an event planner or motivational speaker, or coach. 

You’re participating in God’s redemptive plan. The plan devised in eternity past to redeem God’s people and create an everlasting kingdom ruled by God where joy lasts forever. 

The Practical Realities of a Career in Ministry

Calling ministry a “career” can make things confusing. Career calls to mind things like fighting to climb the corporate ladder, always looking for a better position, and positioning yourself higher than others. 

In that sense, ministry is not a career. Ministry is a commitment to do God’s work wherever He calls you. It’s a mission to serve God and others even when it leads you to difficult places. To prioritize the good of others over your own. 

However, if you think of ministry as your entire life’s work done for the glory of God, it can be considered a career (or part of one). God may call you to spend your entire career in ministry, or He may assign you to ministry for a time, and then call you to other occupations. 

And there are certain realities that come with a career in ministry. 

Ministry Requires Professional Skills and Training

Yes, ministry is spiritual in nature. But it’s also deeply practical. 

Ministry skills don’t appear out of nowhere. Even if you are naturally gifted in some areas, like public speaking or leadership, those gifts still need to be honed for ministry. 

Preaching, counseling, leadership, and administration all require skill, practice, and growth. A good sermon doesn’t appear out of thin air. It comes from hours of study, prayer, and preparation.

Unless you’re part of a church with large pastoral team, you probably have to juggle multiple roles as a pastor. One day you’re teaching, the next you’re doing marriage counseling. On a given weekend you might prepare a sermon, lead a discipleship group, and organize a youth event. 

Each of these roles and responsibilities requires time and training. God does indeed call you to ministry, but that doesn’t mean all the skills and abilities you need are fully formed at the time of your call. 

To minister with excellence, you need ongoing training and development. Without these things, your ministry will stagnate. 

Some of the learning can happen formally, like through a seminary. But you should also seek out other avenues of training, like conferences, coaching, or courses.  

Investing in ministry education doesn’t make you less spiritual somehow. It makes you a better steward of the gifts and opportunities God has given you.

Ministry Is Work, And Work Has Value

It’s also not unspiritual to receive compensation for ministry work. Scripture puts it this way:

“The worker deserves his wages.” — 1 Timothy 5:18

Unfortunately, being in ministry doesn’t exempt you from life expenses, like bills, braces, and that pair of shoes your teenager has to have. 

This verse reminds the church that those who labor for the Gospel should be supported by those who benefit from it. Ministry is demanding, to say the least. It’s emotional, and often all-consuming work. 

Usually, the only way for pastors and leaders to fully give themselves to the work is if they’re compensated for it. If they’re not compensated well, their attention is divided between ministry and the work they must do to pay the bills. 

When churches fairly compensate their leaders, they’re not paying for sermons or Sunday services. They’re investing in the long-term health of their ministry and the people leading it.

Fair pay allows pastors to focus on shepherding instead of survival. It allows staff to serve from abundance, not exhaustion. 

Balancing Calling and Career Responsibilities

Occasionally, you’ll hear someone say in a joking, but not totally joking, way, “Pastors only work one day a week!” 

If you’ve spent more than seven minutes in ministry, you know how laughable this idea is. 

Ministry doesn’t end when the service does. The phone rings at night. Counseling sessions pile up. The unread emails notification on your phone is constantly climbing. 

That’s why viewing ministry as both a calling and a career helps maintain healthy boundaries.

Calling reminds you why you serve. Because you were called. For the glory of God and the spread of His kingdom.

Career reminds you how to serve for the long haul. 

Setting office hours, taking days off, and planning sabbaticals aren’t signs of weakness or lack of faith. They’re practical ways to ensure longevity. Accountability structures, like performance reviews or elder oversight, aren’t corporate intrusions. They’re safeguards for integrity and health.

Without these things in place, you’ll almost certainly burn out. Burned-out pastors don’t serve effectively. 

Your calling to ministry didn’t come with Samson-like strength. Boundaries help you maintain your strength over time. 

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Why It’s Not Either/Or

Both a calling and a career mindset are needed if you want to build a successful ministry that doesn’t crash and burn. 

Calling Gives Ministry Meaning

Calling infuses your ministry with purpose. 

There will be times when you find yourself asking, Why am I doing this, anyway? 

When challenges arise, like falling attendance or harsh criticism, it’s easy to become discouraged and wonder if you’re time wouldn’t be better spent doing some other job. 

Your calling is the anchor that reminds you, “I’m doing this for God.”

Without calling, your ministry becomes a checklist. Tasks to complete instead of lives to serve. 

When you keep your calling before you, it reminds you that success isn’t about size, but faithfulness. It’s about obedience to what God has placed before you.

Career Provides Sustainability

If calling is the foundation of the ministry “house”, career is the walls that keep it standing. 

Career frameworks, like fair pay, clear roles, and defined expectations, create the stability ministry needs to thrive. They ensure you can serve effectively without sacrificing your family, health, or passion for ministry.

It’s not about chasing status or money. It’s about having the mindset that ministry is valuable work and should be done with excellence. Thinking about ministry from a career perspective gives you clarity on how you can achieve and maintain that level of excellence.  

Calling and Career Build Healthy Churches

Churches that honor both calling and career tend to be healthier overall. Leaders feel valued. Teams communicate clearly. Ministries operate with both passion and structure.

When the pendulum swings too far in one direction, problems arise:

• Overemphasizing calling: Leaders may feel guilty about needing rest or financial support
  
• Overemphasizing career: Ministry can become mechanical and joyless
  

Healthy churches affirm both the sacredness of the work and the systems that sustain it. 

Empowering Churches with Practical Tools

Tools and technology aren’t the heart of ministry.

But they can make ministry much more sustainable. There are a thousand administrative tasks that must be done to keep things running smoothly. There are messages to send, donations to manage, volunteers to track, and new people to follow up with. 

Tithely’s suite of tools helps churches effectively manage the systems, structures, and organization that make up the career side of ministry. This allows leaders to focus more on their calling: shepherding people, preaching the Gospel, etc.

Tithely apps and tools are designed for one thing: to free pastors and teams to focus on what matters most, ministry.

God is honored when churches and pastors thrive. Our goal is to come alongside them and provide the support needed to make that possible. 

Final Thoughts: Embracing Both Sides of Ministry

Your calling is the why behind your ministry. 

Your career is the how.

You can’t ignore either one. Without the why, ministry is meaningless. Without the how, ministry is disorganized and ineffective. 

To build a ministry that lasts, calling and career must be brought together. 

If you’re not exactly sure of the best way to do this in your context, ask God to guide you and give you wisdom. Ask Him to give you clarity on what structures and systems you need to implement in order to serve in the most effective, God-glorifying way possible. 

He’ll answer that prayer. 

He wants you to thrive in ministry even more than you do. 

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