#healthypastor - Intellect

  I love to learn. I've always enjoyed school - reading, writing, formulating thoughts and debating ideas. One of the things I appreciate about this vocation is that you can never be done learning. My denomination requires continuing education to be planned and to result in 10 credits every 4 years, the equivalent of 100 hours of learning.
   I hear a lot of pastors grumble about the necessity of continuing education - that it takes up too much time or isn't worth the money, but I have never found that to be the case. There is something about hearing someone else talk about how they got through a situation in their church that you are currently facing that can prompt new ideas. Continuing education lets you hear ideas and adapt them to your context in order to encourage vitality.
  But as important as it is for the local church to have pastors that are continually learning, it is equally as important for pastors to be engaging their brains. To be reading books. To be in group discussions with other pastors. To be asking deep, though provoking questions. Because if we don't engage our brains enough we can get to the dangerous place of thinking that we know all there is to know, which isn't true.
   I have a continuing education plan that balances leadership topics with spiritual formation seminars. I have a four year plan, that often changes, that allows me to address the needs I am feeling as a leader as well as the needs of the congregations I serve. But in addition to taking continuing education classes for credit, I also have topics I read on. A large breadth and depth of topics at my own pace. I try to read a chapter of something about the church every day, so that I can keep my mind wide open and healthy.
   Learning never ceases for pastors. Let us continue to be intellectually engaged and healthy.