What Happens to the Minister’s Children
By Nancy E. Waldo, MTM Ministry Assistant
One of the most painful questions we hear from ministers and spouses who are going through forced termination is, "Will our children ever recover from the damage?" This is emotional, spiritual and character damage we’re talking about.
Here are some thoughts about that question from my own pilgrimage. I am daughter, granddaughter, great-granddaughter, niece and sister of ministers and missionaries. I remember living through many tense and frightening situations of church conflict. As an adult, I have come to recognize it was only by God’s grace that I encountered witnesses to Christ who counteracted the negative impacts on my life in the parsonage.
It is even more of a miracle that I responded to God’s call into ministry. A great deal of healing, every step of the way, has kept me moving into obedience to God’s direction for my life. I have met many other "preacher’s kids" with similar stories, and you may know some of us. Not all of our stories lead back to God’s love, but I do offer hope.
How can you help your children if you are living through the nightmare of forced termination? How can you help ministers and their families when conflict surfaces?
A concept, extremely helpful to me, is that of the three family systems interwoven in every congregation (from Generation to Generation, by Edwin H. Friedman, Guilford, 1985). The systems are the minister’s family, the families within the church and the family life of the congregation.
Rather than thinking of these as independent units, a more accurate image is that of the mobile hanging over a child’s crib. If we recognize that every event in one of these families can have effects on all of the other families, we can be better prepared to understand the pressures on the minister’s family. This "mobile" image can also help us recognize that all children in a church, but especially those in the minister’s family, can benefit from healthy relationships with many adults who are mature Christians.
If you are a minister or minister’s spouse, this "mobile" image will encourage you to build networks with adult brothers and sisters in the Lord who can be friends to you and to your children.
When pressures increase on the minister, it becomes difficult for him or her to stay focused on being a good parent. Don’t try to do it all alone! While caring for themselves and their families, ministers and their spouses need their church family’s encouragement and support. This church family support has been neglected in many churches and the cost of this neglect is very high.
Encouraging and supporting healthy family life of church leaders also provides a witness and a role model for other families in the church system. It is critical for ministers and their spouses to make sure their marriage partner and their children know they are loved, consistently, day in and day out, no matter what.
I believe most Christian parents pray for their children. Having, in addition, a deep, unshakable knowledge of your love can add strength to a child’s resiliency and trust in you when the going gets tough.
If you strive for balance between your relationships with God, your family, and your work, you will provide a healthier parent for your children, and also, you will be a healthier leader and role model for your church members.
I wish someone had said these things to my parents. I wish I had seen these things modeled. It has been a long hard journey for me to learn these lessons. I bless and praise God for the healing He has provided and the deep and abiding faith He has given me.
I pray that every minister’s child will grow in God’s love. Even though we may bear wounds from the hard things that happen in churches, God can use them to strengthen us and nourish health in the Body of Christ. We may even find ourselves giving thanks for these experiences as we discover how God can use them in growing our faith and fellowship with other Christians —
God is that big!
Remember God’s patience with the Israelites? They were even harder to get through to than wounded PKs! Just keep loving and praying. I will, too!