If you are new to leadership, you might wonder why you get criticized. The reality is if you are a leader in any capacity, that is the only requirement to get criticized.

If you are a leader and I’m using the word leader to define someone who is out in front of a church or organization, casting a vision for the future, leading people there. If you are at that person, it means you are pushing the status quo; you are most likely making changes of some kind. If you preach on a weekly basis, you are challenging people to kill their idols, pressing on hurt and sin and showing how the gospel transforms those places people don’t like to talk about.

The reality is that by going into leadership of any kind, you are inviting criticism. If you preach, you are attracting even more criticism. Here are a few things God has been teaching me about leadership and criticism:

• Everyone gets criticized. If you are getting criticized, take comfort, every leader in the Bible was criticized. Jesus included. I had a mentor tell me “Criticism is the admission ticket for leadership.”
• Listen to your critics. I think there is a limit to how long you listen to one critic as sometimes critics are just a squeaky wheel (meaning you will have people in your church that will complain about and criticize anything). Is there any truth in the criticism? Anything you can grow from? Anything you need to repent from? Your critics can often point out a blind spot you are unaware of, so don’t dismiss them outright.
• There is a time to stop listening to critics. Every time you respond to a critic, you invite a response. No matter how you end the conversation, email or phone call. Sometimes, you need to react and sometimes you need to let them have “the last word” by not responding. This is difficult to do, mainly because you probably think you are right and your critic is wrong.
• Don’t try to change your critic’s mind. This almost never happens, it is often naive and idealistic. It might happen, pray for it, the Holy Spirit can do it, but this shouldn’t be your goal. Your mission, purpose, what God has called you to is your goal.
• When you respond to critics, you give them a platform. This is often what critics want, not always, but often they want the power they are criticizing. If you publicly acknowledge it, respond to a blog post, article, etc. You legitimize the criticism. Sometimes you need to respond publicly, but often this isn’t advisable.
• Know when you need to shepherd a critic and when you need to protect your church. Most of the critics for a pastor will be in his church; Paul tells us in Acts 20 that divisive people and wolves will come out from the inside the church, not the outside. There is a line that you as a leader will cross with each critic and it is different each time. You need to shepherd a critic, help them to see the idols they are living out of (usually sin drives critics, not always), help them understand the idol and freedom in the gospel. You also need to know when you need to call a critic a wolf and shoot the wolves to protect the flock. This is a fine line.
• Throw out anonymous stuff. If someone doesn’t put their name on it, it is not worth reading or listening to. Period. If someone says, “me and some of my friends” without saying who the friends are, let it go.
• Have safe people to vent to. As a leader, this shouldn’t always be your spouse. You need someone that you can unload on, cry to, rant and rave about what you will never say publicly. This person also needs to have the power in your life to push back and help you see what you are missing.
• Know that your critic will often make your point, you can’t tell them that. Almost every time I have been criticized, the critic has inevitably made my point. I wrote a blog post recently about not following the Bible for a variety of reasons. Someone emailed me to criticize the post and went on to tell me why certain Bible passages don’t apply to them so that they could keep on sinning. I read it and thought, “You are responding to a post about how we excuse ourselves from following the Bible by telling me why you don’t follow the Bible by excusing yourself.”
• Preach Jesus, say what you think the Bible says. Most criticism aimed at a pastor has to do with his preaching. He stands on a stage by himself where everyone can get a good clean shot. That’s what you signed up for. That being the case, get up each week, preach Jesus and say what you think the Bible says. That is the price of preaching. When you preach Jesus, you will take a knife to the idols of the hearts of people in your church. They don’t like this. Many people want to hear a sermon that will motivate them to be better people, mostly to motivate them to keep worshiping their idols, not killing them. As a leader, you will have to stand before God and give an account for how you led, how you preached, what you said. Say what you think the Bible says, be sure.

I often hear pastors say, “I can’t get anyone in my church to serve.” “I can’t get anyone to give or invite their friends or get in a group, or ____________.”

Or someone will say, “I can’t my spouse to do ________.”

The reality is that what we believe and what is important drives how we live.

Our values determine everything in our lives.

If we don’t give and live generous lives, it means we don’t believe the gospel is generous and we don’t understand how our response is to be thankful and be generous to others as God has been generous with us.

We can say all day that we value generosity, but our actions show that we value stuff, greed or stinginess.

If we don’t use our gifts, it is because we don’t believe the way God has wired us is important or that we will be held accountable for those gifts.

We can say that we value seeing our life used for God’s glory or that we value giving of our selves, but our actions tell something different.

If we don’t share the gospel with those we know and love who don’t know Jesus, we are saying the gospel isn’t that great. We are also saying that we don’t believe the Holy Spirit lives in us and can work in our lives.

When we don’t let people into our lives in relationships, we care more about what others believe about us and less about what God thinks of us.

What we believe, what we value drives our commitment to things.

Every time.

To change a person, you must change their values.

To change your marriage, you must change your values.

To change an organization or church, you must change their values.

I heard a leader say that ministry is a series of ungrieved losses.

And that’s true.

At some point in life, ministry, and leadership you will be hurt. Someone will do something to you, say something to you, about you and it will hurt. While many leaders burn out because they don’t handle physical boundaries well and rest, many more burn out because they don’t let go of ministry hurts.

To lead and live healthy and effectively, you must learn to deal with those losses. To grieve them and move forward.

Here are some hurts pastors deal with:

• Being stabbed in the back by someone.
• Being talked about by someone.
• Angry emails about preaching or ministries.
• An associate pastor who is leaving to plant a church without the blessing of the church.
• Counseling sessions that end with people fighting, not taking advice.
• Too many funerals or tragedies in the church.
• A family of origin issues in the pastor’s family that he hasn’t dealt with.
• Marriage hurts that the pastor and his wife aren’t facing or dealing with.
• A child who wants nothing to do with faith.

When we started Revolution, I took everything personally. I still feel very personally invested in Revolution Church, but I don’t take things as personally as I did before. I’ve heard everything about our church: “we don’t use enough Bible, we use too much Bible, I love that you don’t have a women’s ministry, I hate that you don’t have a women’s ministry, why don’t you fund my personal pet project, my last church did __________, I’m going to leave and plant my church as this doesn’t look that hard, God doesn’t want Revolution Church to exist.” The last one is still my favorite one.

I remember a season where it seemed like I had a conversation each week that sent me over the edge. I was stressed out, not sleeping well, we were losing leaders, and the church wasn’t growing at the rate I had hoped. I was miserable. I took it out on those closest to me, I didn’t serve Revolution well and in the end, wore myself out.

Through that, here are a couple of ways to separate yourself from that hurtful email, conversation, leader leaving or counseling session not going well:

Exercise. One of the best ways to deal with stress is exercise. After a long day or meeting, an hour of Crossfit is just what I need. My headphones are blasting, just me and some weights. Perfect. Maybe you like to run or bike or take a walk. Do it. Getting outside and getting fresh air is incredibly helpful to let go.

Take a nap. Go to sleep. You will make a better decision after sleeping anyway. If you are tired and try to make a decision, it will more than likely be the wrong one. I can’t tell you how many times I have saved myself more heartache and pain by deciding after a nap or a good night sleep.

Write an email and delete it. If you are outraged, respond to that person who hurt you and then delete the email. Sometimes it helps to write out what you are thinking and then let it go. Also, naming things helps to take away the power those things hold over us.

Have times when you are unreachable. Turn your phone off, don’t read your email or look at social media. I do this on the weekend’s, vacations, etc. You have to have times that you are unreachable. As a caveat, have one person on your staff that can reach you if there is an emergency.

Signal the end of the day or season. For me, turning my computer off, going to the gym signal the end of thinking about church and ministry. It is how I let go. I avoid evening commitments outside of my small groups or meetings I need to schedule at all costs for this reason. I do pre-marital counseling during the day now. It is hard for me to relax if I have something in the evening going on. Is this harder for some people? Yes. In the end, though, it serves my church and my family better than having evening commitments.

Have a breaker that is not your wife. When we started Revolution, I would unload onto Katie every stressful meeting or conversation or email. That wasn’t fair at all. After I dumped it onto her, I would feel great. The problem was she had nowhere to go with it. I moved on, and she still felt the effects. Now, I have some other guys who are my breakers. When I’m angry, need some truth spoken to me, I talk with them. Katie is often my 2nd or 3rd conversation, and by that time, my anger has waned, my crazy notions of retribution are gone, and I can talk in a more civilized manner.

Don’t share everything with your wife. I used to do this but now see the wisdom in keeping some things about the church from her. This doesn’t mean I hide stuff from Katie but she doesn’t get paid by the church and she doesn’t need to know everything that is going on there or everyone that is mad at me or creating frustrations for the staff or me. I want her to be able to show up at church and talk to people without thinking, “This person just sent a mean email to my husband.”

Have people you have fun with. If you don’t have fun, you live a sad life. Many pastors I know live a tragic life. They have no hobbies and no friends they have fun with. Have people you watch sports with, play games with, go to concerts, movies or art shows with.

Read something that isn’t ministry or sermon focused. I’ve talked about this before, but one of the best ways I let go of a stressful season in ministry is a reading book about spies or assassins. Something unrelated to ministry, that takes my brain off church mode and allows me to rest it. Try it some time.