Church Self-Care

March Mental Health Moment

by Kendra Bradford

From the time I was an infant until I departed from my hometown to attend college, I attended the same church.  My home church was a small church comprised of multiple families.  One lesson I learned very early in my development from observing my church members and the adults in my family was working for God is essential to prove your loyalty to your faith and to your church. 

There were times in my childhood I had to stay after church for hours because work around the church had to be done before we could leave.  The few times I voiced my displeasure resulted in me receiving lectures and physical reprimands.  The message became very clear… church work MUST come before everything else.

Self-care is a buzz word that has become quite popular recently.  Simply put, self-care means being focused on meeting your own needs so you can put yourself in a better position to support the people you care about.  There are some people that have adopted the mindset self-care is selfish.  I challenge that mindset. Selfishness excludes others.  Enacting self-care enables a person to do what they need to do for themselves, so they are better able to show up for others. 

Many of us that are devoted to our faith work in our churches.  Some of us serve on multiple committees and in multiple compacities within the church.  Sometimes as we are working in the church, the plans we made with spouses are put on hold.  The outing our children and grandchildren have been looking forward to attending with us is rescheduled because something came up at the church.  The evening we were looking forward to doing nothing becomes the evening we now are tasked with doing something we originally did not plan to do.  Church work becomes our top priority while the other loves in our lives are left to ponder how many more times their wants and needs will go unmet by you all under the guise of you doing the Lord’s work.

What would happen if we considered putting our own needs before the needs of the church?  Will the church totally fall apart if our family obligations came first at times?  Will God stop loving us if we did not do something for the church? What thoughts and mindsets lead us to often say yes at times we honestly want to say no? 

As I have journeyed through my young adult years, I have discovered my devotion to God and the foundation of our relationship is not contingent upon how much work I do in the church.  I have discovered there are times when I need to do things for myself and decline opportunities to serve in the church.  I have also discovered other believers will attempt to guilt-trip people to do things at church if they say no.  I have greatly benefited from meeting my own needs so I could be better suited to meet the needs of others and my church. 

I have created a reverse poem about church self-care.  When the poem is read the normal way, from top to bottom, the message supports ignoring church self-care and continuing to put the needs of the church first.  When the poem is read from the bottom to the top by starting with the last line and ending with the first line, the message supports implementing church self-care.  My hope is that reversing the mindset that church self-care is selfish leads people to make taking care of their needs a priority. 

Church self-care is selfish and too hard to implement 

I will not say

I am ready to stop sacrificing a lot of my time to do work at the church 

I am fully aware this may be alarming but

Saying no at times can be helpful 

Is a boldface lie

I should always do everything that is expected of me

The more I do increases my value

I’d be wrong if I believed

I should take things off my plate

I’m right 

When I keep pushing myself to the limit

No matter what anyone says

It is not helpful 

To take needed breaks and vacations 

It would be wise 

Regardless of what I believe 

To accept life is life

I should agree

I am in control of what I allow myself to think 

In spite of what others say

I am convinced that 

Ignoring signals screaming I need to tend to myself and my family more than I work at the church is the answer

It would be unwise to believe that 

Implementing self-care will be beneficial

All of this will be true unless we reverse it.

I challenge you to take an introspective look at your personal relationship with church work and self-care.  Be open to what you discover.  Then, decide when you will make changes to benefit you.

To learn more about St. John ‘A’, click here.