Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Well, last week we put out a piece of content that talked about the average compensation of pastors all over the United States, and we got hundreds of comments on that. And to my surprise, the vast majority of those comments insisted that pastors were overpaid. I couldn't disagree more. And in this conversation, we're gonna unpack nine reasons why your pastor is actually underpaid. Let's do this. You are listening to the Reach right podcast, the show dedicated to helping your church reach more people and grow.
Speaker 0 00:00:34 Well, hey guys, I'm Thomas. I'm Ian. And today we're talking about nine reasons why your pastor is actually underpaid. Oh, yeah. I think it should be a good conversation. Um, it comes from a recent video that we did where we took some of the stats from lifeway Research. Uh, we'll link to that video here in the show notes, so you should be able to see that up here. And then also down below if you're watching on YouTube. Um, that was really an interesting conversation. I was surprised by, uh, actually how much it seemed like pastors were being paid. I I cuz I, you know, kind of hear the, the reputation, but I was really surprised when we released that video and some of the other shorts that we made around that video about some of the feedback that we get. And one in particular on Facebook, uh, just went viral for us.
Speaker 0 00:01:26 Hundreds of thousands of people viewed it and hundreds of people commented on it. And, uh, the comments were pretty mixed all over the place. But I would say they were definitely, uh, on the side of pastors make too much money. That's what the comments mostly said, or, uh, let me just read some of them. I, we, we pulled out a sampling of some of the most common ones that we got here. So, um, number one, here's a, just a comment. Pastors shouldn't get paid. That's all they said. Pastors shouldn't be paid. Oh, nice. Uh, how about the fact that no pastor or any person with a position in a church should be paid? This is exactly what God's word talks about when it says heap to themselves. Teachers with itching ears. So I'm not exactly sure we did a Yeah. A, a podcast episode talking about you should always quote where in the Bible it says something, it'd be, uh, right, right.
Speaker 0 00:02:17 Uh, better for you. So, uh, another one, no pastor should ever get paid. Uh, here's this one says mine, speaking of their pastor, mine takes a vow of poverty. Um, someone who probably isn't a Christian says that's a lot of money for storytelling. Um, <laugh>. Then there's, uh, and that's money that doesn't go to help the poor, all that money. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, we broke it down what it was, this next person says, our pastor gets $25 a week. That's what that pastor makes there. So, oh, wow. That's, uh, and then, uh, good luck here. He says, this one was interesting. I thought when Christianity, and he went from Jerusalem to Rome, it was a movement. When it went from Rome to England, it became a religion and it went from England to America. It became a business. Um, totally kind of commenting on that person's thoughts on, you know, just the finances and even talking about it.
Speaker 0 00:03:02 So, yeah. Uh, so you and I come from a ministry background, Ian, I've pastored for, um, 18 years of my life. And yeah. Um, I, I come at this as someone who has never been a full-time pastor. Um, I've always been bi-vocational. Um, so I have not experienced, I've never made a lot of money, uh, from churches and I'll be pretty open about it. So the most I ever was paid at a church, I believe was $36,000 a year. Uh, so by American standards, that's a, uh, pretty low, um, low wage. Um, it was, yeah, technically for full-time work, but they allowed me to do other work. On top of that. Everybody knows that if you're in pastoral ministry, even if we call it part-time, like, it's not like the job requirements go down just because it's part-time. Right. If you're leading a church, um, and you're the lead pastor there, like, you just need to do what needs to happen with things there.
Speaker 0 00:03:57 So all lead pastor assignments are full time. It's just sometimes you can do other work on the side of that there. So, so here's what was interesting though, in that study. Um, it broke down and we, there was all kinds of numbers. We did a deep dive again, so you should go watch it. Uh, we broke it down based on education level and years of experience and size of the church. But the number that was surprising to people is that the total compensation package for the average pastor, and that doesn't mean median pastor, but the average. So it has some very highly paid pastors in there too. But the average compensation for a lead pastor role, uh, including benefits, housing, all that stuff, was $90,000 a year. And I'll admit that sounded like that was higher than I expected. Um, this is a reputable study from lifeway that seemed really high, but I was surprised by all the pushback that people felt like that that was too much to be getting paid.
Speaker 0 00:04:54 And pastors should be paid. Like this person here says $25 a week. Those kinds of numbers were just nuts to me. So anyway, we wanted to take a, uh, do a whole episode just dedicated to why we think pastors in most cases are actually underpaid. I feel like $90,000 a year sounds actually pretty good. Like, that sounds like that's a fair compensation, and the numbers seem to bear that out, that that's kind of the average for people. But for all those people that are saying that's way too much, that's insane. Pastors should make $25 a week. They shouldn't be paid at all. We wanna take a second to talk about why we think that, uh, if you are in that camp you are, why you're wrong, uh, and why we think you should be actually paying your pastors more. So, does that sound anything to add before we dig into
Speaker 2 00:05:39 Sounds right. No, I think we should dig in because I think we have some really good meat here to, to point out as to, to why they should be paid. Yeah. Uh, so yeah,
Speaker 0 00:05:47 Why don't you kick us off then You can go ahead and do the first one. Yeah,
Speaker 2 00:05:49 I will. Well, first of all, pastors have a wide range of responsibilities. Uh, that comment that you just read about getting paid just for telling stories. Yeah. They do a lot more than that. Uh, pastors are not just up there once a week on Sunday just giving a message that they wrote on Friday. Uh, I mean, my goodness and I, let me just take a step back. You know, I've worked with thousands of pastors literally for well over a decade, and the average pastor that I speak to is doing more than just preaching every Sunday. Yeah. I mean, they, they have all, they have pastoral care counseling often. They are always just, you know, flying by the seat of their pants for, uh, lack of a better word. They, they handle administration, uh, as well. Um, so they are doing a lot more, uh, they have different skill sets and doing a lot more than just preaching or telling stories on a Sunday.
Speaker 0 00:06:45 Yeah. I mean, it's like you, there's so many responsibilities that someone asked to do. Yeah. That, it's funny you mentioned that. Like, so my, when I was a kid, I told my parents when I was like eight years old, that was my eight year old understanding of it that I wanted to be a pastor when I grew up. Cause I only have to work one day a week. That was kind of the joke on things there, <laugh>. That's right. Um, so like, you only, like, that's your, that's your time where youre on, on display, I guess. But yeah, it's a, uh, it, it is, you have to have so many different, um, there's so many different responsibilities. You're running an organization if you're a lead pastor Yeah. And you're, uh, responsible to a council or a board on top of that. Right. And you have to, yeah. You have to bring emotional support and grief counseling and all these, it's just not even numerous meetings
Speaker 2 00:07:29 Of service meeting so much. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 0 00:07:30 Absolutely. Yeah. So, so many responsibilities that most jobs out there, um, that you would have a much narrower, uh, focus, um, that your job is to do one specific thing or a few things very well. It's such a different, uh, variety of different responsibilities. Yeah. So that's one. Second one is work hours. Uh, pastors have very, uh, can be very challenging work hours at times. Yeah. Uh, so, um, you know, let alone you never get Sundays off <laugh> unless you're Seventh Day Adventist. Uh, which maybe you do get Sundays off, but yeah. There, uh, you don't get your, uh, your day of worship off, generally speaking. You have to take midweek worship times. And, uh, I find that you are on call just about twenty four seven. Um, I, you know, people usually are respectful enough to not be calling you at three in the morning, but some of these small town pastors that you're the person that people call when, uh, there's a deep crisis or need and there's nights where you're gonna get called in. And I think wise pastors will set boundaries on this. Uh, but especially pastors of smaller churches, it's gonna fall on you. Yeah. And your work hours are not gonna be something you have full control over. So that on call, um, part of it, I think that's worth, uh, some compensation for that.
Speaker 2 00:08:43 Absolutely. I feel like a lot of the pastors I consult with are working too much, you know? Yeah. They, they need that, uh, day off or that sabbath day of rest or a couple of days off, you know, to be effective. A lot of them are flying by the seat of their pants, like I said, and, and, uh, and they're, uh, they're stretched past 5:00 PM you know. Oh, yeah. When they, matter of fact might be, uh, doing more after that hour as people need counsel or help after work hours. And so Yeah. They, they definitely, and working, definitely that's, yeah.
Speaker 0 00:09:13 Yeah. I think you're working with pastors like, I, I think that there's a lot of them that struggle to have a sabbath, like that's something that is Yeah, of course. Yeah. If you took a survey of pastors, uh, I'd say, uh, just a, a very narrow percentage of them would have a dedicated day of rest where Yeah. Um, even those days, like where they have a day off, it's not really a day of rest like we should be having. Yeah. They're often trying to make everything else in their life happen and come together. So, yeah. Um, yep. Good. Pastoring is a lot of work. So get the next one for us Ian.
Speaker 2 00:09:43 Education requirements. I mean, a lot of times people think that, you know, pastors didn't go to school or they, they just kind of, uh, they just, they're, they're good at the gift of gab and speaking, and that's, that's what got them into it. No, I mean, a lot of 'em have advanced degrees in divinity or, uh, theology and, and a lot of, you know, they've, they've gone to Bible college, they've, they've gone even past that and, and getting masters like degrees and, and that's cost them money as well. Um, so a lot of pastors have very high education levels, so they've put in that time and work just like many doctors or lawyers do. And so they, they deserve to be paid for that.
Speaker 0 00:10:21 Yeah. I, I think so too. So some churches require, it's kind of a, a funny like thing you, there's a, a meme going around, or a handful of memes that I'm seeing online of just these, uh, churches that have these ridiculously lofty requirements for their future pastor. They're asking for a, uh, man who has, uh, you know, uh, who's in his, uh, early thirties and has a doctorate degree in this and, um, has a wife who's willing to work full time with him and not get paid for it. Uh, and like, just, there's people that don't really exist. Right. There's just this Yeah. And the pay is gonna be like, you know, $25 an hour or something like that is the pay. Yeah. So, um, yes. Your education requirements, not every church is gonna have this. Um, I think that most would like to see a pastor that has a minimum of a bachelor's degree in some kind of a theological area. Many are starting to require master's degree in some cases, doctorates. We did do a breakdown and found that pastors that have that level of education are in general paid more. Uh, but it costs a lot of money to go to school. It costs years of your life. Yeah. And there's an opportunity cost. Um, I invested five years and about $55,000, uh, in my pastoral education 20 years ago. And
Speaker 2 00:11:36 That's 20, yeah. 20 years ago.
Speaker 0 00:11:37 Yeah. To go to the same school that I went to, um, it would probably cost you, if you were able to do it in four years, you would probably invest $120,000 now. Yeah. And that's a very affordable Bible school to be going to. So, um, there is huge cost. I'm hearing more and more pastors that are going into the ministry and they're being offered first time, uh, wages of, uh, $30,000 a year and they're already saddled with $50,000 in student debt. And it's just all kinds of challenges that come with that. So, yeah. Uh, yeah. Education requirements are part of it. Uh, next one is cost of living. Um, yeah. I find that churches a lot of times have not given their pastors raises in the last couple of years where, where, uh, the actual cost of goods over the last few years of this high inflation environment we've been in have been up over 20% in total.
Speaker 0 00:12:28 Uh, so it's almost like you were had a pay reduction of 20%, if you think about it that way. Yeah. So, um, the cost of living, uh, is going up. Especially, I live in Hawaii, and so our cost of living is the highest in the country here in Hawaii. Uh, from housing to food to really, everything is expensive here. And so when you're faced with that, um, a lot of churches I know it's just a real struggle at churches because, uh, they're, it's not like the incomes are that much higher here in Hawaii, and therefore the church revenues aren't that high. And so meeting cost of living expectations are really challenging, but the point here is that cost of living is going up. Uh, and pastors pay should be going up at the same time. Yeah. You probably ought to pay your pastor more due to cost of living concerns.
Speaker 2 00:13:14 Yeah. That's the nothing to add there. That is what it is. I think that that should make sense to many. And the next one is it's emotionally taxing, uh, the emotional labor, uh, that a pastor, uh, goes through. I mean, we, I, I, when we talked, when I read this one earlier in prepping for this, I, I was like, yeah, it made me think of, um, police officers and firefighters, you know, how that's one of, those are one of the highest stress jobs they're seeing, obviously, horrible, uh, things happening to people on a daily basis or dealing with violence and those things. Now, wait, while a pastor may not get shot at as much or, or deal, I hope not, with running into a burning, uh, house, they're dealing with so many people that have so many, um, just horrible things going on in their life, you know, depression, um, just, uh, you know, of course, um, they're dealing with divorces, people on the verge of divorce. They're dealing with, you know, kids that have run Aw, you know, all of the things they, people gotta remember that pastors, again, they're not just telling stories on Sunday. They're counseling people throughout a week and they're, they're taking on the problems of the people that they're ministering to. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:14:22 Yeah. To certain degree. I tell it, it, it is emotional work. And I, um, I, when I used to preach, there was times in my life where I would preach four sermons and a weekend I went to a four, I was a pastoring at a four service church. And so yeah, that was emotionally draining. It might Right. Like the four sermons might have taken a total of two hours of actual preaching. Yeah. But it felt like I was hit by a truck by the end of that. Right. It was just something that you're just exhausted from doing it. And preaching this weekend, I did one service, and then I did one pre-recording, so I preached it to, uh, to this very camera, I guess, when we did it. But that alone is exhausting. That's just going through that, that kind of emotional work is hard not to mention all the stuff you're talking about of how many times have I encountered stories of adultery and divorce and of, uh, uh, abuse and all these things that you hear
Speaker 2 00:15:12 Suicide. Suicide,
Speaker 0 00:15:13 Really suicide calls and this, it's, it, it's very, very taxing on someone. And I would argue that people we aren't paying our pastors enough for Yeah. The kind of issues that they have to deal with all the, the time there. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:15:25 That's good.
Speaker 0 00:15:26 Yeah. Uh, next one is, uh, just kind of a general lack of benefits. Uh, pastors are famous for having unfunded retirement accounts. Yeah. And I'm not taking all the blame off pastors that's on us, I think, to be funding our own retirement accounts and make wise decisions, but Sure. Generally speaking, smaller churches especially do not have the, uh, the ability to pull off all of the benefits that working at a Fortune 500 company that someone might get. So, um, you know, we hear these stories of some of these tech companies nowadays where, uh, not only do they get benefits like, uh, healthcare and mental healthcare and commuting benefits and retirement accounts funded and vacation days, but on top of that, they have massages that are on site and free lunch every day. And I'm not saying that churches need to have masseuses on staff for their pastors, right, right.
Speaker 0 00:16:20 But I'm just saying that we need to recognize that a church of, uh, the average size church, we call it 60 or 70 people in the United States, we're not gonna be able to have all of the infrastructure to do. Right. In many cases, do health insurance the right way or have Roth four ohk or 4 0 3 B for churches have those kinds of retirement accounts set up. And so you need to think about that if you can execute benefits and do those well, and it makes sense financially do it for your pastors. Yeah. But if not, if you're not giving them any benefits, you can't compare, uh, someone down the street that's making $40,000 a year and has $25,000 in benefits with your pastor who's making $40,000 a year and has no benefits. Uh, so just kind of bear that in mind as you do it. Uh, but yeah, we need to take the benefits into consideration.
Speaker 2 00:17:10 Agreed. And I think that's a good segue for this next one is that a lot of pastors have a lack of job security, so not just benefits. I mean, things can be very unstable within, uh, church, uh mm-hmm. <affirmative> with, with church or with that organization or that, uh, market, if you want to call it. Um, because, you know, there's not always steady revenue, and I know that's a business term, but churches giving can just drastically drop and, and, you know, financial help for churches can, and that's just one reason. But there's so many different Yeah. You know, there's leadership changes, there's so many factors that, uh, really where it's, it's not just, you know, pastor's gonna be good for 30 years at a given church something. Yeah. There's so many variables and volatility, you know, things that can happen. So
Speaker 0 00:17:56 Yeah, this can really vary based on your denominational setting and some of those kind of things. Some churches, uh, or some denominations, like they intentionally will intentionally will move pastors every two years. Right. So you're a two year commitment at each place, and then you go off to the next one. I've, we've worked with pastors like this. Yeah. My heart breaks for them. That seems like such a, yeah. I, I don't know. I'm outside of those kinds of things. Yeah. Maybe there's some good reasons for it. I tend to not be able to see those very well. Yeah. Um, I love being able to be in community and no place, and it'd be so hard for, um, right. A family to have to move around that often. So, um, so you know, that that alone is worth extra compensation, I would say. But Yep. There are also some denominations where you are annually voted on whether or not your <laugh> your, you still have a job or not. They'll vote on it each year, and then you'll find out that day if you're gonna work next year or not. So there, um, there are some challenges that come with that. But yeah, I think in general, uh, many churches don't have the same kind of job security that, uh, other more stable, uh, larger companies might provide for someone.
Speaker 2 00:18:59 Yeah. That's good. Yep. Don't you crack the next one
Speaker 0 00:19:01 There. Yep. Next one is the level of personal sacrifice, uh, that pastors have to make. Uh, there are lots of things, um, that, uh, I think one of the ones that I've experienced is youth sports. Um, that, uh, I, I had a daughter, I have a daughter still, but she no longer is in youth sports. She just graduated from high school. And so she's moved out of her youth sports days and she was very good, uh, at soccer. Uh, and yes, she was, she was on a travel team for years and years. And, uh, I was unable to go to any of those. Uh, occasionally I was able to pull it off, but you, you know, there's a whole, uh, conversation, maybe a podcast episode about youth sports and how churches should deal with it. Uh, oh, boy, that's, that's another conversation. But in our family, yes, mom was able to go with, uh, our daughter.
Speaker 0 00:19:46 Yeah. And she would travel about eight weeks, uh, out of the year, eight weekends to go to regional tournaments and all across the country. And that was challenging for us. Yeah. And it was sad for me. I had to, it was a real personal sacrifice for me, remember, be able to see my daughter play as much, and, you know, there were sad things about that. I know you have kids in youth sports, you can relate to that, Ian. So, um, yeah, absolutely. That's just the, that's just the beginning of it. There's so much personal sacrifice that, that comes with being a pastor. And so, um, we need to count that cost when we're talking about compensation. Yeah. I
Speaker 2 00:20:16 Know, especially in this day and age where there's, I think everyone's just compared to years past, so much more busy than they have ever been before and so much more going on. So, yeah. Well, last, uh, well, I guess last, last but not least, yeah. Skillset, versatility. Um, so meaning, you know, pastors, again, we've, we kind of covered this, uh, before that they wear a lot of hats again. Yeah. They're not just preaching, uh, once a Sunday. And you, you indicated some of them preach four times a Sunday, and that's, that, that is emotionally draining. But there's a lot, they're doing counseling. They're, you know, they're doing a lot of other, other admin stuff. They're, they're usually really leading other people a lot too. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> and meeting with other leaders. It's not just they show up and preach and everyone else is volunteering. Um, so they have to be versatile. Yeah. Um, they have to, they have to be well-rounded is another way to put it. And, uh, they, if you're well-rounded and you're doing more than just one thing, uh, you deserve to be paid for it. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:21:15 Yeah. I mean, it's, um, you know, it's running a business in a lot of ways. Um, so it's, you know, we don't wanna make it too business minded. That's some of the complaints that people had about, about, uh, pastors, I guess. But it is, yeah. In a lot of ways you have to do a lot of, uh, business stuff. There's legal requirements that you have to look into and, uh, legal protections you have to consider. There's accounting that most pastors, maybe it's probably not healthy that you're doing all the accounting. You probably want someone to help you with that, but you need to be responsible for budgets and reporting on that and figuring out those kinds of things. And you need to be, um, the job of a fundraiser in a lot of ways. Uh, you're inviting people to give and you're making sure that the ministry is financed and you're an evangelist to basically a sales role where you're in crew inviting new people to commit their lives to a huge calling right there with you. So there's so many different skills that are involved in pastoring a church. And I think, like you were saying, yeah, pastors need to be paid accordingly for that. So that's, uh, that's good. That's good stuff. Anything to add as we wrap up? Ian
Speaker 2 00:22:14 Pastors, we're on your side. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:22:17 Share this with your, uh, council, uh, when it comes time for your review, I, I think I'll, I'll, I'll share this at the end, uh, is that the, there is that reputation, and I think we are so cautious in the church about people not thinking that we're money hungry. We don't, we want to avoid that at all costs. And there are those few horror stories of pastors, uh, that are flying on private jets and are making 7 million a year. And, you know, those kinds of crazy things. And I know for a fact that, that there are just, there's very, very few. There's, there's a, a dozen of those in the world maybe that are in that kind of life situation there. And the vast majority of pastors, uh, based on the comments that, uh, people that have said, I don't make anywhere near that much.
Speaker 0 00:23:04 Yeah. Uh, the vast majority of pastors are not in that same kind of a boat. And I would argue again, the, our main point here is that, uh, you should pay your pastor more. They're worth it. Yeah. Uh, they, um, you know, they, they're, it's, it's not to say that other jobs aren't important. They obviously are, there are many important jobs out there, uh, but we believe that pastors for the most part are underpaid because of what they're called to do. So yeah. We wanna know what you think though. Let us know in the comments. Yeah. If you still disagree, yeah. Please do drop us a note as to why maybe you have a biblical reason why they need to be paid less. I, I'll disagree with you, but go ahead and put that in there. Yeah. We'll see what we get.
Speaker 2 00:23:41 Uh, maybe, maybe we've, uh, angered a lot of church board members
Speaker 0 00:23:44 And trustees and that's maybe Okay. Maybe that's okay. I'm all right with that. Maybe that's okay. So we're on team pastor here at Reach, right? That's right. So that's right. Um, if this, uh, has been helpful to you, or if it hasn't and you want to see more of our content to get mad at, uh, subscribe, uh, hit that button down below. Um, that'll help the algorithm and let other people know. And it'll let you know when we put out new content, we do this, uh, twice a week or so. We put out new pieces of content. So, uh, new long form. We also have all kinds of other content we do out there. So thanks guys for being a part of the Reach Right family, and we hope to catch you next week. See ya.
