Seminarians deal with a lot of guilt. And almost nobody wants to talk about it.
As I look back at the year-and-a-half I spent in Louisville as a full-time student, I am beginning to realize just how guilty I felt for much of the time.
Now, you may ask: why would a seminary student feel guilty about anything? After all, seminarians have answered the call that God has placed on their lives. Seminary students are training for ministry and missions. Seminarians are hearing good Bible teaching all the time.
Yes, it’s hard to imagine why a seminarian would battle feelings of guilt when we are considering only the seminary education. The guilt doesn’t come from the great education. It comes from life circumstances.
Ministry or No-Ministry Guilt
Seminary students don’t want to just be sponges soaking in teaching without having an outlet to teach and minister to others. So most of us go looking for ministry positions in local churches. We want to serve! Sadly, most of the churches in the immediate area are seminary-saturated. So what does this mean? You probably aren’t going to find a church close-by that will pay you to serve.
This causes one of two problems. Some students decide they want to serve, no matter the cost. But because of family demands, work schedules, and the school work load, the student discovers that serving with no pay winds up costing a lot more than expected. The ministry eats up the last remaining moments of family life. The other problem is that the student turns down good ministry opportunities because his plate is already too full.
So the seminarian deals with guilt on two fronts. We feel guilty because we have said “no” to ministry opportunities in order to not sacrifice our families. Or we feel guilty because we have said “yes” to non-paying ministry opportunities that suck the remaining life out of our already tired bodies. Either way, you’ve got it. Guilt for not serving. Or guilt for serving.
Church-sponsored or No-sponsored Guilt
Another area of guilt comes from church sponsorships. Unfortunately, most Southern Baptist churches do very little in actually helping specific students get through seminary (except through the funding of the Cooperative Program, which thankfully is a big help.) We talk a big talk about “sending people into ministry,” but see little personal investment in preparing people that are going out and away and probably not coming back. So, most seminary students have to seek financial support elsewhere: friends, family, scholarships.
If your church doesn’t sponsor you, you feel guilty because you must not be seen as a good “investment.” If your church does sponsor you, you feel guilty because the demands of seminary life are so taxing that you find it hard to actually enjoy the seminary courses. You are burdened instead of excited. You are worn out instead of refreshed. You are sleeping in class. And even with the sponsorship, you still need more financial help and feel guilty for even thinking about it.
Family Guilt
Your seminary education is not just affecting you. It’s affecting your family. Seminarians feel guilty for spending too much time with family (and not getting a head start on the reading reports for your next class) or too little time with the family (you are too busy to change diapers.)
Students are taking as many classes as possible and are having to work even more in order to pay for them. So the work schedule winds up taking away family time. Or you spend more time with the family, but feel guilty because you could be working and therefore they are having to sacrifice so that you can get through school.
Response to Seminarian Guilt
These are just some of the reasons that seminary students carry an enormous load of guilt. I’m sure there are other reasons, and I’m sure there are more seminary students who identify with what I am saying than will probably admit it publicly. So here are three ways that we usually deal with the guilt.
1. Resentment
We resent the fact that we’re having to “starve” to get spiritually fed. We resent our churches for not doing more to help us. We resent our families for stressing us out after we’re already stressed out about schoolwork. We resent the seminary for loading us up with work that seems to assume we have as much time as a monk in a monastery. It’s always wrong; always sin; always evil, and yet we succumb to the “resentful” attitude time and time again.
2. Retreat
It’s too much for some young families. Some would-be pastors simply can’t juggle all the balls, so they decide to retreat to lay-person status and stop the seminary process altogether. Other families decide they need a break, so the student takes a semester off, which turns into two semesters, three, four, and finally it’s over. Some might say that those who retreat were never really called, and the tough seminary life is the way that we weed out the truly-called from those who were mistaken. Uh uh. I’m convinced that many gifted pastors called to ministry have left seminary because of God told them it was better to have a family than a ministry. Retreat is sometimes the wrong decision. But often, considering the circumstances, it’s the right one.
3. Rejoice
The struggle for me during my time in Louisville was to respond to seminarian guilt with rejoicing. Instead of wallowing in self-pity and despair, I would tell myself, “This is what it means to be a disciple. This is what it means to pick up a cross. This is what it means to suffer for the Name.” And then I would remind myself of all the people I knew in Romania and in other places of the world who would give anything to be able to study in such a fine institution as Southern.
To see the blessing in the sorrow, the spiritual riches admist the financial poverty, the overflowing forgiveness to wash away my guilt – how else can we react except to rejoice? To rejoice that God has considered us worthy to suffer for a little while, trusting that in his hands, we will give him glory.
written by Trevin Wax. © 2007 Kingdom People Blog
