I am currently in the middle of year four, and have spent the last year working 4 days a week, while church planting officially for 2 days, with one day to make up the difference (I call that a Sabbath). This has allowed me to re-evaluate how i spent my time in the first 2 years as a full time church planter and the last year as a part time planter. These are by no means to be negatives, but observations and if you are a planter I would love to hear (or challenge you to write on your own blog) your top 5 bad habits as well.

So without further adieu here are the top 5 bad habits I have gained (or realized about myself) due to my life as a church planter.

5. a mis-understanding of time.

As a full-time planter I had all the time in the world. But I don’t think I embraced that time as a gift and instead I made time irrelevant. I ended up having too much free time and essentially I acted as if time didn’t exist. I now look back and realize how blessed I was when some sort of organized scheduled activity was instituted to me by my denomination, and how much freedom I had in the structure. A lot of people would say that I am a disciplined person who is great at time management, and to some degree that is true, but without a good structure in place as a church planter you can ignore its significance and become extremely lazy without even knowing it. And it is my sentiment that there are a lot of lazy church planters out there, who complain about being tired, having too much to do and have no idea of the concept of time.

4. i’m not as good at multi-tasking as i may have thought.

This of course could relate to #5 as my now tight schedule has made me realize that i can’t do all that i did when i was full time. But the truth is i either have to be working, or be pastoring and if i try to do both at the same time i do neither very well. Switching from pastoring to working is not a simple switch. It’s like moving from one side of the brain to the other (in the case of my work as a risk management consultant). The bi-vocational life (in its purest form) is dependent on a true multi-tasking brain. I now realize how important it is to help those in my community make the transition. It is my hope that all of life could be more holistic and less about changing over, but the truth is that there is a transition from working life to the spiritual life in terms of activity.

3. Accountability (mentorship) is necessary.

I was given incredible freedom as a full-time planter and believe that it was the freedom that led to some really exciting personal discoveries and church planting discoveries, but now as a bi-vocational pastor i realize that with a little more guidance and accountability I could have accomplished so much more. I am starting to think that #5 spurs on all the rest of these habits, but the truth is I don’t think being officially accountable only to yourself (even if you are relatively healthy in your activity) will allow you to grow or be all that you can. A good mentor (weekly) with a goal tracking or action taking system in place would have been amazing. I had mentors that checked in regularly, but it was more loose and because we were trying some new things I am not sure if they knew exactly how to lead me. I don’t blame them, but i think i am in a much better position now to know what i need. To go further (as per #1) I wish that I had a mentor that was a teammate.

2. I am lacking spiritual disciplines.

When you have all day to pray, read your bible, write and visit, counsel, prepare messages, dream about mission and a vision for the future you don’t realize how hard it is to turn that on when your time is not open/ free. I realize more and more that it takes me an hour just to get into the frame of mind to practice any discipline and that is 1 hour I just don’t have any more. I realize more and more that what I hope for my own community (who work just as much, if not more than me) is not as easy as it may seem. I now struggle to practice the disciplines that before was a way of life, most likely because I wasn’t living a realistic way of life. I wish I was more structured in my spiritual disciplines.

1. I was lonely and became a loner in the process.

This is something that I am being very transparent about, but now that I work more and pastor less (time wise), I have never really learned how to rest in friendship. Most of my time was either spent alone, or with people that i was getting to know, or working through church stuff with and I wondered why I would end up retreating by myself and more and more as the time went on. I didn’t think I was an introverted person, but by spending enough time alone or in work/ hanging out circumstances I became introverted and now find myself struggling to find true friendship, and making less and less an effort to do so (especially when you live in a city where the average person leaves after 2 years). I used to find rest in my buds back in Ontario, but since moving to BC I haven’t found that (moments for sure, and even some recent prospects), and I am recommending to all present and future church planters that if you move to a new city to start a church, try and find some good friends or bring some with you. Friends that aren’t necessarily part of your church, and friends that will be a good listening board and will keep you from becoming a loner, which seems to be the path of the church planter from my experience. No wonder we (church planters) tend to start churches over and over and never stay in the same place.

Well there they are. If you do decide to write your own list of bad habits, please let me know and I would love to hear your stories in the comments as well.