Pastors Should Be Poor

Let me begin by saying that I was a pastor for 21 years and for most of those years I was poor. And, just so we’re clear, my family and I were in the 0% tax bracket. And that’s not because we were playing games with taxes; that’s because we were poor.

And let me also say that the “richest” I was, the time when I was paid the most, was in the first couple years of my ministry. My salary shrunk over time and that was mostly due to my voluntary pay cuts.

The reason I mention this is because I am fully aware of the common assumption that what I personally did is the best and only way to do things. Since I was a poor pastor, therefore, any pastor who wants to be spiritual like me should also be poor.

That probably plays into my opinion some, but I like to think Scripture plays into it more.

The time in my career when I was paid the most was also the time when I was preaching what people wanted to hear. I mostly did this because I didn’t know what else to say. I was preaching the party line, which is pretty much the only line I knew. People were happy and the church grew and I got paid more.

I began to feel terrible about this. The fact I was getting paid a lot, while honestly having no idea what I was talking about, ate at my soul.

To remedy this I began reading the Bible consistently. Over my 21 years of pastoral ministry I read the Bible over 40 times, again, not saying this to sound uber-spiritual, just pointing out what I did to remedy my lack of knowledge.

As I began reading the Bible I began to see that the party line I was taught was not biblical. Being a person with the Holy Spirit, an awareness of my responsibility and accountability before God, and a measure of self-respect, I had to preach what I was learning.

People did not like this. People want their pastors to be sure of themselves, not shifting or changing beliefs. In other words: people don’t want their pastors to grow.

I also noticed how often money was an issue in the Bible. 1 Timothy 6 is pretty much the only passage you’d need to see how dangerous money is to spiritual health, but there are many more.

1 Timothy 6 is in what we call “the Pastoral Epistles.” I imagine there’s a reason for this. Money is dangerous to spiritual health. Going after and getting money leads to spiritual shipwreck. That’s not me; read 1 Timothy 6.

Pastors should be poor for several reasons:

1) The Bible

The Book is pretty clear. You can’t serve two masters, you cannot serve God and mammon (money and all it can get you). This idea was not taught in a corner; it’s all over the place in the Bible once you see it.

2) The Church

The pastor will affect the church. A pastor who is rich, or desires to be rich, will teach false doctrine. To attract people, which is how you get paid more, you will teach what keeps people coming, and you primarily need rich people coming. One of the miraculous signs of the Messiah is not only healing people and raising the dead, but that He would preach to the poor (Matthew 11:5). It’s that astounding and acted as a unique sign. Preaching to the poor doesn’t pay well. Rich pastors don’t bother with such wastes of time.

3) The Judgment

Pastors will give an account for what they said and did in front of a church. You lead by example, whether you want to or not. People will follow. If the pastor has money, people will assume it’s ok. The rich pastor will not preach on the multitude of Scriptures that say money is dangerous. Having money will make your stand before the Lord potentially terrible. Ezekiel 34 is a huge warning to the spiritual leaders of Israel who did their shepherding for their own gain. There is a warning here for New Testament shepherds as well. OT shepherds have already gotten judgment dropped on them, what do you think similar shepherds in the NT will get?

4) The Pastoral Office

Pastoral ministry has an eternal component to it, a spiritual burden if you will. If pastoral jobs pay well, it will attract people who want money rather than those with a spiritual burden to serve. It will be harder to tell who really has spiritual priorities if the pay is good. Benefit packages should not be why a pastor wants a job.

5) The Pastor

The Bible is clear that money has the potential to destroy your soul. It will choke out fruitfulness. As a pastor gets paid more, spiritual vigor will decline and focus on material things will increase. Good soldiers of Jesus Christ endure hardness. Rich people get soft. You’ll lose more battles. Your soul is at stake.

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I’m not saying churches should slash pastoral salaries tomorrow. I’m not praising churches that underpay their pastors out of their own stinginess, or to “teach him a lesson in trusting God.”

What I’d prefer, what I’d recommend, is that all pastors consider this very carefully. Decide between you and the Lord how much money you actually need. If necessary, take a pay cut. Not out of arrogance or to be seen, but out of a faithful accountability to God. Pastors should be people who don’t mind being poor and prefer it to be so. That’s the point.

Money is a huge issue in the Bible. It doesn’t get taken seriously in our affluent age. Luckily for us, our affluent age is about to take a hit, whether you choose it or not! This will work out just fine for everyone who already knows money is a sham anyway. Lead the way, pastors!

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If you’d like to hear more of my accumulated pastoral “wisdom” that shrunk my church, I wrote a book. CLICK HERE to get a copy of it. There are 9 tips for how to not grow your church for only $3.50! And, in a consistent effort to remain poor even while not a pastor anymore, I only get $1 of profit from each book sold!