Belonging in the Rapids (a personal reflection)

I’ve been sitting with an assignment from my coach, and it’s led me to think again about what makes leading in the church so difficult. Some of it has to do with the challenges facing the Church itself, but much of it, I believe, comes back to the condition of pastoral leadership.

Working with pastors, I see it so often—mental and spiritual weariness, sometimes masked by busyness, sometimes by humor, but always there. When pastors don’t feel well in their own souls—when they are mentally fragile or spiritually thin—leading through challenge becomes nearly impossible. You can’t face the deep waters of change when your own spirit feels like it’s running dry.

We don’t need to build more resistance; we need to cultivate resilience.

I’ve had my own seasons when ministry pressed hard on my mental and spiritual health—seasons that left me questioning not only my calling but my capacity. Yet those times have also been my teachers. They’ve shown me the terrain of ministry in a way books never could. And now, I try to use what I’ve learned to walk alongside others—because when you’re traveling through difficult country, it helps to have someone who knows where the pitfalls are and where the ground is steady.

Lately, as I’ve been reflecting on the kind of support pastors truly need, I’ve come to a deeper understanding of myself and of the Church. So much of pastoral life today feels like managing the churn—ever-shifting waters that refuse to calm. For generations, our systems trained pastors to be managers more than leaders. The institution rewarded order, measurable results, and predictability. But in a world that no longer stands still, management can feel like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

That’s when the disconnection sets in—first from relationships, then from calling, and eventually from the church itself. And that disconnection breeds what I’ve come to call crowded loneliness.

Pastors are constantly surrounded by people, but rarely known by them. Week after week, we stand in crowded sanctuaries, shake countless hands, and listen deeply to others’ stories—yet we ourselves can feel unseen. It’s the paradox of being immersed in community while aching for connection.

I remember the first time I went back to church in my twenties. The sanctuary was crowded, people were laughing and hugging during the greeting time, and yet not a single person spoke to me. I never went back. I think of that moment often, because in many ways, pastors live in that same tension. We’re present in the crowd, but profoundly lonely within it.

And belonging matters. It’s one of the most basic human needs. I keep thinking of that line from the Psalms: Be still, and know that I am God. Be and know. That’s what belonging really is—the space where being and knowing meet.

But we pastors often trade being for doing, and knowing for thinking. We strive. And striving is a poor substitute for belonging.

We long to be and know that we belong to God. But we also ache to be and know that we belong to one another. In our tradition, that’s why we have clergy orders and covenant communities. Yet even those can feel more like professional associations than true places of belonging. You can’t really be known through reports and rosters.

Maybe that’s part of why I’m drawn so deeply to my parents and to the farm. That land has been in my family for 119 years. There’s history there—both in the soil and in the souls who’ve tended it. My parents are not just parents but mentors for my wife and me. The draw isn’t nostalgia—it’s relationship. It’s belonging to people, to place, to purpose.

Because when we lose our sense of belonging, we lose our bearings. We start to act out of character. We cope in ways that wound. We strive again—seeking approval, control, or escape. And sometimes, those coping patterns turn dark: burnout, broken relationships, addiction, despair.

Loneliness is a killer. It kills connection, families, churches, and even souls.

And so I keep coming back to this: perhaps the most faithful thing I can do as a leader is not to strive harder, but to belong deeper—to God, to others, and to the place where I am planted. Maybe resilience begins not in strength, but in belonging.