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In this episode, Pastor Wayne Walker, CEO of OurCalling, interviews Lee Jaggers, who shares his journey and insights on the complex emotional and spiritual challenges faced by those in ministry. Lee highlights the importance of counseling for ministry leaders, who often neglect their mental health to maintain an appearance of strength and spiritual sufficiency. He discusses the critical issues of over-identification with pastoral roles, the fear of appearing inadequate, and the risks of burnout. This conversation underscores the necessity of early intervention, continuous personal counseling, and emotional self-care to sustain the well-being and effectiveness of those dedicated to ministry.
https://www.ourcalling.org/
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https://www.ourcalling.org/
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- **Experience of Transitioning into Counseling** (02:36-05:35): Lee Jaggers, initially unfamiliar with counseling basics, unexpectedly started his career in this field and discovered a profound sense of fulfillment from intensely focused sessions, which led him into a long-term career, evolving into completing a PhD in Counseling.
- **Focused on Supporting People in Ministry** (06:03-10:45): Lee emphasizes the therapeutic importance of supporting leaders in ministry due to their potential for widespread influence. These individuals often face challenges such as over-identifying with their pastoral role, leading to neglect in other critical areas of life, including family and personal spirituality.
- **Challenges of Ministry** (07:30-10:45): People in ministry often risk their health by overcommitting to their work identity and projecting a flawless personal image, which can prevent them from seeking emotional support or acknowledging personal struggles.
- **Initiation into Counseling** (10:36-11:59): People in ministry might avoid counseling because they associate it with emotional vulnerability, which contradicts their desire to appear strong and fully reliant on scriptural answers.
- **Perception of Inadequacy and Failure** (12:11-12:36): Ministers might resist counseling due to fear of appearing inadequate. Leaders see their personal failures (in themselves or their relatives) as a disappointment to their spiritual responsibility.
- **Depletion and the Need for Counseling** (18:36-20:37): Lee notes the tendency of ministry leaders to ignore signs of mental and spiritual depletion until they reach a critical stage of burnout, emphasizing early intervention as crucial.
- **Understanding Personal and Ministry Trajectories** (20:45-22:34): Discussing the importance of recognizing one's limitations and the value of continuous personal counseling for professionals in ministry who engage deeply in the emotional and spiritual lives of others.
- **Role of Emotions in Counseling** (25:19-26:00): Lee stresses understanding that emotions signal deeper issues that need attention, much like a car's dashboard lights indicate maintenance needs.
- **Self-care in Ministry** (36:25-43:51): People serving in intense ministry settings need to evaluate unresolved childhood issues and maintain relationships with confidants who provide honest feedback about their life balance and emotional state.
- **View on Rules vs. Love** (43:05-43:34): Illustrating a story where rigid adherence to rules compromised the expression of love, Lee emphasizes the importance of prioritizing compassionate responses over strict protocol.
These insights underline the complex emotional and spiritual challenges faced by those in ministry and underscore the importance of counseling for sustaining their well-being and effectiveness.
Creators & Guests
Host
Wayne Walker
CEO and Pastor Wayne Walker serves as the CEO and Pastor to the homeless at OurCalling. In 2001, Wayne, along with his wife Carolyn, started serving the homeless community in Dallas. They founded OurCalling in 2009. During his youth, Wayneās family actively pursued the scriptural commandment to ālove your neighbor as yourselfā by modeling the life of Jesus to scores of foster children whose own origins represented generations of human brokenness, dysfunction, sexual exploitation, and abuse. Early exposure to these destructive forces set him on a path to recognize the long-term effects of trauma, which often lead to homelessness. While completing his Masterās Degree in Cross-Cultural Ministry from Dallas Theological Seminary, Wayne befriended and ministered to men and women in the homeless community. During that time he began to establish personal, discipleship-oriented relationships with homeless individuals, many in the same urban setting where he and his family continue to work today.
What is OurCalling - Our podcast about homelessness?
A Podcast by OurCallingāthe goal is to be a learner. What can we learn about serving those experiencing homelessness? Even though we have years of experience, can we step back, take a fresh look, and rethink everything we know? OurCalling is a Christian nonprofit (501 c3) serving the homeless community throughout Dallas County in Texas. Our team helps people get to know Jesus and get off the streets every day. Last year, we helped individuals exit homelessness over 1,300 times. We have a facility in downtown Dallas, and our street outreach teams visit over 4,000 locations throughout the county. We serve about 10,000 individuals experiencing homelessness each year. We partner with the most amazing organizations and recognize that we are stronger when we work together.
Welcome. I'm pastor Wayne with Our Calling, and this is our podcast. An opportunity for us to learn, really, and explore how we can better serve those experiencing homelessness and how we can encourage those that are doing the same. On today's episode, I am interviewing a longtime friend of mine, Lee Jaggers, who has a PhD in counseling and has been ministering as a counselor to those who minister. He's been ministering to pastors and ministers for years, for over 40 years, and we're gonna be talking about why those that serve people experiencing homelessness need counseling, why they need support, why they need help, and why sometimes they don't look for it.
Wayne Walker:Who is our calling? What does our calling do to help the homeless? The nonprofit. We care with dignity. Our calling.
Wayne Walker:Can't help but think about the definition of Christian We connect with intentionality. Called our calling To our calling.
Lee Jaggers:We build community with integrity.
Wayne Walker:This is our calling in our podcast, a word on the streets about homelessness. Well, welcome to our podcast. Our callings opportunity to learn and explore more about how we serve and who we serve and how to help those individuals that work beside us serve those that are experiencing homelessness. Today, I wanna talk about counseling. Specifically counseling and care from a mental health care perspective for those that are doing the work.
Wayne Walker:In this space, we often think about those individuals that come to our doors or we meet under bridges that are in crisis that have needs. But as the caretaker, as the minister, as the pastor, as the the person even serving sandwiches under a bridge, you get exposed to things and you have challenges in your own life, and so that you find at some point you need a counselor. Lee, I met you over 20 years ago on the campus of Dallas Theological Seminary. You were a counselor then to students. You counseled me and others of my peers.
Wayne Walker:And, later in life, we were able to cross paths again, and you wear a green shirt. You're here as a chaplain, one of our chaplains to specifically just a chaplain to the staff. You don't work with our homeless neighbors, specifically with our staff. Talk a little bit about kind of your resume and, how you got into counseling.
Lee Jaggers:Well, in in several peculiar ways. Let me go backwards. I I was curious about what was happening over here, so I was retired, and I just came over to hang out and check out what's going on.
Wayne Walker:You and I were just getting coffee.
Lee Jaggers:And you called me into your office and sat me down and said, how would you like to be our chaplain? And you remember what I said? No. I don't know what that is. And you assured me that, what I was doing filled the bill.
Lee Jaggers:So it was a kind of, a wonderful experience of, who I am doing what I like to do fit. And for an old misfit, that was very encouraging. Started that way pretty much with counseling. After I graduated from Dallas Seminary, I was teaching electronics and math at DeVry Institute still. And, a guy What
Wayne Walker:year was that?
Lee Jaggers:1976. 1976. And, a guy called me up and said, we have a counseling center, and we need one more counselor. Your name keeps coming up. Would you be one of our counselors?
Lee Jaggers:And back then, there was no licensure. I had never had any introduction to psychology course, anything. But I said, for some reason, you thought of me. Let's, line up a counselor a counselee and I'll come over and sit down with him and see how it goes. And lo and behold, that night, I I really liked the kind of tired I was.
Lee Jaggers:That was the selling point for me. It was intense. It was focused. I asked a lot of questions because I didn't know what she was talking about half the time. I recorded it, replayed the recordings.
Lee Jaggers:She came back the following week and said, I've never had a man listen to me so intently and so interested in in me personally. I said, wow. That's, that's kinda neat. I could even use my insensitivities and limitations as as an asset. And so, I liked how the total focus on her, the other person, fit with me because I was curious and somewhat analytical, but I just wanted to know.
Lee Jaggers:So long story short, that, developed into building more and more clients, And then I started taking more courses in, counseling, and that turned into a 10 year PhD program at North Texas. And that was because I showed up one day to take another course, and the guy asked me, where's which where's your degree program? And I said, what's that? And eventuated into me saying, sign me up for one of those PhDs. That sounds good.
Lee Jaggers:I had no idea what I was doing.
Wayne Walker:So you've been practicing as a counselor for how many years?
Lee Jaggers:42 years and then I retired 6 years ago.
Wayne Walker:And then we brought you back out of retirement.
Lee Jaggers:Brought me back to retirement. Indeed. Yeah.
Wayne Walker:But what's unique about you as a counselor is you primarily focus, from my understanding, on people in ministry. Yeah. Yeah. Specifically, the practitioners.
Lee Jaggers:Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:Right? I know you travel around the world. You speak at conferences. You work with missionaries who are serving in remote areas, those that are serving in high impact intensive ministries Mhmm. People in the states.
Wayne Walker:And here, specifically, you work with our staff. Yeah. Our staff are exposed to a lot of trauma. I mean, we we serve people that are living through the worst moments of their life. We serve people living through hell.
Wayne Walker:Mhmm. Our we find bodies. We find babies. We find people in absolute horror. We we work with trafficking victims, domestic violence victims, and sometimes at the end of the day, we wanna pull our hair out.
Wayne Walker:We do everything we can to get someone off the street, and it doesn't work for one reason or another. We serve someone that then turns around and relapse relapses. Right? We invest in someone that that that just hits the the self destruct button. Right?
Wayne Walker:Or we serve someone that gets murdered. And we serve people that get assault get assaulted, and we serve people that murder and do the assaulting. Right? So right in the middle of that, we're working with some really challenging individuals, and so much in ministry is focused on those individuals' needs, which are important and are a priority, but the caretaker has to be healthy as well. So talk about what are some of the unique challenges for those people that work in ministry, not just full time, but even those people that are volunteering and, you know, working with individuals like this.
Lee Jaggers:Let me just say just one quick word about my motivation for working with church leaders and those in ministry, and that is because of the multiplication effect. If if I can help a leader be more healthy, then they're gonna be more effective to the, gazillions of people that they minister to. So that's that's satisfying in itself. But there there's some unique things that happen to people in the And and their identity then becomes too much of their life, namely their ministry becomes too much of their life, and they then neglect other very important things that are fundamentally more important than their ministry, their family, their, friends, even their personal devotion to the lord. I found, for example, that a lot of folks that are bible study leaders spend most of the week preparing next week's bible study rather than sitting down quietly focusing on the things of the lord that bring delight to them.
Lee Jaggers:Delight in the lord, and you'll get the desires of your heart. I I think that's so important. And we so be becoming an over involved, over invested in that which becomes our identity, namely my ministry, becomes a unique problem with with people in the ministry. The other thing that happens, I think, is that we tend people in the ministry get over invested in the image that they're projecting, particularly if they're visible a lot. Pastor of a church, would find it very difficult to be vulnerable and share their struggles publicly because they need to they think they need to project the adequacy of the Lord in their lives.
Lee Jaggers:I understand that, but that doesn't doesn't work out wrong.
Wayne Walker:Yeah. Their marriage is supposed to be perfect. Yeah.
Lee Jaggers:Oh, yeah. Their kids
Wayne Walker:are supposed to be perfect, and there's a whole pastor's kid thing. Right?
Lee Jaggers:And I've I've tried to go to my own pastors, in several different churches with some of my own struggles. And what I get back is, well, we haven't particularly, experienced that in our own family, but, I'll pray for you. Mhmm. Oh, thanks a lot. First of all, my struggles are unique to me.
Lee Jaggers:They're not unique to a highly spiritual person. And you're gonna pray for me, that's good, but I was hoping for more.
Wayne Walker:Love what you said about how our identity is kinda wrapped in and what the work that we do. And so, you know, this guy is specifically in this space working with the homeless community, this guy is leading a shelter. This guy is a pastor on the streets. This guy runs a street church. This guy is the sandwich guy or this woman is the woman that shows up every Friday night and delivers all that food under that bridge.
Wayne Walker:That identity gets so wrapped up into what they do. I love that. Where often it it it it that identity kinda takes over.
Lee Jaggers:Yeah. And and another way it takes over is an an overemphasized emphasis on the outcome rather than the process. We need to have a church of so many people. We need to have a street ministry of so many salvations, and then the numbers become too more important than they ought to be. And, so there there's all sorts of dangers that come when when we overemphasize the I I think if we focus on the integrity of the process, the Lord will take care of the product.
Wayne Walker:You know, that's so important. I love the way you say that, because I think there's a certain kind of spiritual trauma that happens to people in this space, especially, you know, people that are focused on, you know, their their faith while they serve in this community. It it kind of takes this, identity that, you know what? If you were a better pastor, they'd turn out better.
Lee Jaggers:Yes.
Wayne Walker:Right? You invested in that guy, and then he relapsed.
Lee Jaggers:Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:You invested in that individual and she committed suicide. Mhmm. Right? If you were doing a better job, they would turn out better. And so your identity is almost wrapped up into their success.
Lee Jaggers:Exactly.
Wayne Walker:And then your identity is destroyed when there's a failure. And in this community, there's a lot of hurt and a lot of pain.
Lee Jaggers:Too much of life is tied up in winning. I gotta get the w, and the outcome has to be marvelous and attractive to everybody around me. I I can't struggle. I can't have I have no patience with failure because there's no room for failure in the work of the Lord. And, well, I'm not sure that's the case.
Lee Jaggers:I think some of our greatest gains come from our greatest growth comes from when we have failed at something and we learn how to climb back up on the horse.
Wayne Walker:Why do you think so many people in ministry don't go to counseling?
Lee Jaggers:That's a long list. But, the big thing that I have heard feedback from many of them is they don't want to deal with emotions or anything subjective, particularly in my conservative branch of Christendom, the word of God is enough for me. And, so they're they don't want anything subjective. One guy even said to me at the beginning, the first of our sessions is, I won't go into any details, but he said, emotions will fool you and they will make a fool out of you. So we're just gonna follow the Word of God here in our counseling and we're not gonna get into any emotions.
Lee Jaggers:So I concluded on day 1 that we would see the routine three sessions and call it quits. Yeah. Because that's not a good start. But that's that's a big part of the, of the resistance. A lot of other reasons too.
Lee Jaggers:Counseling can be expensive, and that's legitimate. A lot of counseling is expensive, for good reasons and not so good reasons.
Wayne Walker:And it can go from a $100 to $250 an hour. Yeah. It's much more than even seeing a regular doctor often.
Lee Jaggers:Oh, yes. Absolutely. Yeah. And, also, there are a lot of counselors that don't treat it like a ministry or a profession. They might be part time.
Lee Jaggers:They they wanna come maybe 3 half days a week, and then and they learn one technique and they apply that one technique to everybody. And techniques don't heal anybody. People heal. The Lord heals. And so, a lot of folks rightly pick up on that and say, I don't want to be techniqued.
Wayne Walker:Mhmm.
Lee Jaggers:I want to have a relationship of a wise person who can connect with me and understand me.
Wayne Walker:You know, I've had numerous counselors over the years, highly respect and I love them dearly. And I think they're super wise counsel and some that I question, why are you in counseling? You know, you do the same technique. I don't I'm not getting anything out of this. You're not getting anything out of this.
Wayne Walker:I think it's kind of just wasting time. But I love what you're talking about, the focus on the combination of faith and the function of counseling. Right? And, you know, we can discuss an aesthetic counseling, but, you know, for me, the psychology of how the in the biology of how the human brain works and trauma we are exposed to as a child. I have a lot of childhood trauma in my story and unpacking that Yeah.
Wayne Walker:And learning how my family of origin and, you know, all these other things impact who we are.
Lee Jaggers:Yeah. Well, you just triggered something major in in my mind, and that is unpacked traumas from childhood. And they they don't have to be capital t traumas. They can small t traumas. My mother was a worrywart and that traumatized me because I I never developed the sense she trusted me with anything.
Lee Jaggers:She would always worry about me. And so I I grew up then with a hyper reactivity to anybody who worries about anything. Well, I quickly learned that that's not gonna do me or anybody else any good. But, yeah, unpacked traumas from childhood can either leave us hypersensitive to certain trigger issues.
Wayne Walker:Mhmm.
Lee Jaggers:Or if that package from childhood gets scabbed over, calloused over, it can lead to insensitivity to certain issues. And I see that a lot of times with people who have overcome certain problems, whether it's addictions or what have you. And then they go into ministry themselves and they have no patience for people who have still struggled with addictions or drug, what have you. And the sense is, listen, if I can overcome this, anybody can, you can, so you're just derelict and they pretty soon they're yeah. Grow up.
Lee Jaggers:Get get with the program. I can do it so you can do it. Well, it's not quite that easy.
Wayne Walker:You know, I am thinking of someone in particular right now that overcame some significant life challenges earlier on in life and later told me, I can't stand to be around homeless people. And they told me that because they see this as, look. This is a problem. You this is you. This is your problem.
Wayne Walker:You should be able to get over it.
Lee Jaggers:Yep. Yep.
Wayne Walker:And you're just unwilling or an an an, you know, you're not gonna go with the program. You're not gonna put in the effort and, you know, pull up your bootstraps and go.
Lee Jaggers:And somebody asked me one time when I was talking to him about the homeless, situation, why don't more of these people just get a job? Why don't they take advantage of the You eradicates hope. It wears it away. If I've been disappointed 5 times, I can recover and try again. 50 times, 500 times, same offer, same promise that's broken, I'm not gonna trust anybody anymore.
Lee Jaggers:So it's that vaporization of hope that comes from repeated disappointments that we don't really appreciate the power of.
Wayne Walker:I wonder if there's a connection in that disappointment with people in ministry that don't open up more to counselors. Because they've done that in the past.
Lee Jaggers:Yes.
Wayne Walker:And then when they've been vulnerable, someone has used that against them. Exactly. Someone has laughed at them. Someone has said, well, just get over it or read your Bible more. Right?
Lee Jaggers:Yeah. Are you a pastor struggling with that?
Wayne Walker:Oh. I was talking to a pastor one time. He came into my office, and as soon as the door closed, I said, man, how can I pray for you? And he just started bawling, just falling down, couldn't hold his body up. He his family was going through chaos, and it was because his grown child has gone off the end.
Wayne Walker:Right? The prodigal child. Mhmm. And when his elder board found out, half of the elders wanna come beside him and prop him up and hold him and love him and care for him and his wife through this challenge.
Lee Jaggers:Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:The other half said, hey, buddy. If you can't control your own family, you have no right being the pastor.
Lee Jaggers:That's right.
Wayne Walker:And his kid was in his twenties. You know, kids go off and, you know, you train up a child in the way they should go, and then they grow up and do whatever it is they want to. Right? Mhmm. There's so many people in ministry, I feel, that have taken that vulnerable step to share that have been burned.
Wayne Walker:Like you said, like, it's like someone who's experiencing homelessness. Someone says, hey, man. I wanna help you get into housing. Great. You're like the 40th person who's promised me to get me into housing or help me get into recovery, and I've been let down so many times.
Wayne Walker:So now when someone shows up at our facility and we're like, hey, man. We'd love to help you get off the street. They say, no. I'm good.
Lee Jaggers:Yeah.
Wayne Walker:And so I hear that that same phrase from people in ministry when I say, man, I really think you should talk to a counselor. They go, no. I'm good. I'm good. Yeah.
Lee Jaggers:I've got this. Yeah. Yeah.
Wayne Walker:So there there's this trauma of history that Good point. Often, I think, keeps some people out of it. I'm I'm a huge fan of it Mhmm. Of counseling.
Lee Jaggers:I see that.
Wayne Walker:You know? I'm I see a psychiatrist.
Lee Jaggers:Yeah.
Wayne Walker:And I see a counselor. And, if I want a happy marriage, I see a psychiatrist.
Lee Jaggers:I see a counselor. And you listen to your wife.
Wayne Walker:And I listen to my wife. Yeah. I mean, you know, I I think all of us need that, it's like your car. Every once in a while, you you need the oil changed. Right?
Wayne Walker:Every once in a while, you need parts replaced and fixed, and I think counseling, gives us an opportunity to figure out how to communicate better and process things. But for me, psychiatry also is because of just blood chemistry and
Lee Jaggers:Yeah. And I I have this philosophy that the more you're involved with people and changes in their life that are deep rooted, the more you yourself need to have counseling that is at least as long term as the people you're dealing with. And so, I look at my own history and I've lost track of probably 6, 7 years plus of counseling. Everything from psychoanalysis 4 times a week to primal scream therapy in Houston. And, I mean, why not?
Lee Jaggers:I didn't wanna miss anything. But, namely, I had a lot of angles that I needed to realize. If I'm gonna work with people, I need to be as clean as I can be, not perfect, but clean. And, I've recommended that to 100 of counselors to be. Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:And
Lee Jaggers:I don't know that 5% of them have taken me up on on the challenge. So they because I wanna get into doing the ministry and helping people and so on and so forth, assuming that, they're good enough.
Wayne Walker:Yeah. It's kind of like, you know, physician heal thyself.
Lee Jaggers:Yeah. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Yeah.
Wayne Walker:And even doctors get sick.
Lee Jaggers:Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:And having that, because my counselor sees a counselor. Right? And and I I know other professional counselors that are friends and colleagues. I know most of them are seeing counselors, and to me, that's a healthy space. Yeah.
Wayne Walker:And when you're like a pastor, and I don't mean like a full time senior pastor. I mean, you're pastoring other people. You're shepherding people. You're ministering to other people. You know, you're caring for individuals.
Wayne Walker:You need care too. You need shepherding too.
Lee Jaggers:You need pastor that's what makes you unique. Because when you see a pastor who is in counseling, you see it as a strength. Most people see it as a weakness as the pastors often do themselves. It's if I need a counselor, that means I'm weak. I mean, if I'm insufficient, then well, we are insufficient.
Lee Jaggers:But to admit that means I'm inadequate. And men particularly struggle with adequacy. And if I'm inadequate Oh,
Wayne Walker:men don't struggle with amputees? What are you talking about? Right. Think for yourself.
Lee Jaggers:Uh-huh. I will. So I think this affects ministers a lot, people in ministry. The other thing is that people have seen the fallout of ministers who have fallen, whether it's with money situations or sexual issues or what have you. And they see the ripple effect of so much, disquiet and so much disappointment in Christianity because this leader of Christianity has failed so egregiously to even suggest that I might fail.
Lee Jaggers:I I don't wanna let down all of Christianity. And so they carry too much of a load on their own back.
Wayne Walker:So the illustration I use is, my glasses. Right?
Lee Jaggers:Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:My eyes, they're just messed up. I was born this way. They got worse. You know, call it whatever you may. I'd love for you to heal me.
Wayne Walker:I've prayed for healing. I've paid people that have prayed for healing over me on lots of things. But so far, the Lord has chosen not to heal my eyes. And so I need glasses. And if I don't wear them, I don't see clearly.
Lee Jaggers:Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:And so for me, I look at psychiatry, for example. If I don't take my meds, I don't think clearly. And even though I may take my meds and think clearly, my glasses still get dirty. I still need to take them off every once in a while. My wife will look at me, Carolyn will look at me and say, you get as much as all over your glasses, you know.
Wayne Walker:And I'm so close to it, I don't see the mess.
Lee Jaggers:That's it.
Wayne Walker:But when I take it off and look at it, or I have someone else look at it like a counselor and say, you've you've got some smudges. You got some mess.
Lee Jaggers:Yeah. Yeah.
Wayne Walker:We're gonna walk through. We're gonna talk through. We're gonna work through. And I really it's I love what you said about emotions earlier because emotions are like the lights on your dashboard.
Lee Jaggers:Mhmm. Right? It just Just indicators.
Wayne Walker:Yeah. It just says, hey. Something's going on here. Your your your oil pressure is too low. Your water temperature is too high.
Wayne Walker:Your battery is not charging well. You You know, too high RPM. Something is going on. And when you see someone getting snippy
Lee Jaggers:Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:They're getting melancholy. They're, you know, knocking people down with humor as a defense mechanism.
Lee Jaggers:Yeah.
Wayne Walker:Right? They're internalizing too much. You know, it's just those emotions are telling us
Lee Jaggers:And that's one of the things, by the way, you can tell if someone has issues that they have not attended to is that they tend to be hyperreactive. They tend to be over defensive and unnecessarily. They tend to take things personally that they ought not and so on and so forth. We had a secretary one time who took her role as protecting we had 3 3 counselors and a psychiatrist on our staff. And if anybody called to, change their appointment, she would read them a riot act.
Lee Jaggers:Mhmm. These people are so important. You've you can't you ought not cancel and so on. And we need to talk to her about that. We it's no big deal.
Lee Jaggers:It's okay. But she couldn't get past it. We finally had to let her go because she was just hyper reactive to this business that somebody should cancel on somebody, cancel a promise.
Wayne Walker:You know, Lee, if our hope my hope is that someone is listening to this, watching this that is really overwhelmed, and they recognize that there are some signs in their life that they probably need someone. I remember years ago, a couple of board members said, hey, Wayne. You need a mentor. And so I I I went to go, try to figure out what that meant and how do I find a mentor. Well, they hooked me up with a guy who was a mentor, and all he does is mentor pastors and and and executives.
Wayne Walker:And I went to see him for breakfast, and I only saw him once, and that was the plan. The intention was to see him once because he was gonna give me some parameters on what I should look for as a mentor. And, warning, I'm about to say a word. But, we we sat down together at breakfast, and he said, Wayne, you need someone in your life. You need someone you can bitch at.
Wayne Walker:Right? Someone you can be totally honest with, someone you can totally unload on that's not a family member that you can vent to and can listen to you and tell you, okay. That's kinda stupid, or that's a real deal, or you just need to grow up, or let's talk about that, and let's work on that. Everybody needs that person that they can be totally vulnerable with. And to me, that's one of the benefits of a counselor Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:As I can, you know, share those those moments. If someone were listening or watching this that that doesn't have that person in their life or they start to recognize those lights are on on their dashboard, what would you tell them? How would they start?
Lee Jaggers:Well, I'm assuming that they want to start, and that's more than halfway there to start. More often, they're they see the lights on and they ignore them. Or they'll say this car isn't running right, or I'm not. And and I'm I'm just feeling exhausted or whatever. And and if they come and talk about how depleted they are and how exhausted they are and impatient they are, that's that's a major step toward burnout.
Lee Jaggers:And my first reaction is you've waited too long. It's it's like somebody working out in the hot sun, and they're sweating, and they feel dizzy. I say, you've waited too you're already dehydrated. You've waited too long before you got some water. And, so let's start with where you are and take some extreme measures to get back on track now.
Lee Jaggers:So usually, what you run into is people who have waited too long. Mhmm. When when they do realize that I've got something that is correctable and, hopefully, there's hope there that's correct, I think the first step is to first assess is what they're talking about an issue of hope. Is there hope in healing that? And if there is, then to reassure them of that hope.
Lee Jaggers:Yes. If it's something I'm familiar with, I've dealt with this many, many times. In fact, one of the in my practice, my bread and butter, if you will, practice was reconciling a marriage after an affair has been discovered. Mhmm. Most people say, that's it.
Lee Jaggers:And I go, no. This is a starting point for probably 70% of my practice. Mhmm. Really? And what's the outcome?
Lee Jaggers:Well, probably 70 or 80% of the people who stick with it have a marriage better than they ever thought they could have. Really? When do we start? And that's that's really a message about the need for hope and the presence of hope, and then we work through delivering on that hope. But, depletion is what we're really talking about here.
Lee Jaggers:Depletion is inevitable for most people. There I I go to every September, I go to Switzerland for a retreat. About 65 missionaries from all over the world and different mission agencies come in for a spiritual retreat. And the 1st day there, the theme is depletion is inevitable, so restoration becomes essential.
Wayne Walker:Mhmm.
Lee Jaggers:And it's all about that, depletion, restoration. And immediately, everybody can relate to it because they're all depleted when they come.
Wayne Walker:Yeah.
Lee Jaggers:And there's hope. And so then we work toward the agenda of the week and how to handle failure, how to and and how to move forward and so on. There's usually about 12 of those counselors providing, afternoon counseling for anybody who wants to sign up, and they're usually always full
Wayne Walker:You know, the first time I heard you say that, you worded it a little bit differently. You used the term deterioration Yeah. Is inevitable. Yeah. So restoration is necessity.
Wayne Walker:Yeah. I have that written on my dry erase board in my office. Yeah. And I look at it every day. I just do because I see that, depletion or the deterioration happens.
Wayne Walker:I think of an old car. Right? After a while, it starts stuff starts to fall apart. Right? Especially the more it's driven.
Wayne Walker:And people that are more driven in serving wherever that is. Right? If they're if they're, you know, working in the nursery at church. Right? Or working with young, you know, a a young woman working with teenage girls and youth.
Wayne Walker:Right? Or a woman who's leading a bible study or a guy that's, you know, doing a men's ministry. Whatever it is, that deterioration, that depletion is is is unavoidable.
Lee Jaggers:It's unavoidable, and it's sneaky. Because when you're working with people, you gotta be focused on them, and you have no idea how draining that is to be constantly attuned to what is it that they're really saying now and so on. And then pretty soon, you're more tired than you realize because it sneaks up on you because it's subtle. That's why when I first started counseling, I really enjoyed the special kinda tired I was at the end of the day. I slept well, and I wasn't agitated and and so on.
Lee Jaggers:So, I think that's a big part of the, caring is about exhaling. But if all we did in a giving was to exhale, pretty soon we're ready to gasp. We gotta get some in. And I think the key is learning how to be regular with exhales and inhales. Give, but then absorb.
Lee Jaggers:Give and absorb.
Wayne Walker:And the pressure of ministry I mean, everybody's got a hard job, and I won't say my job is any harder than anybody else's. But if, you know, if I was a manager at a Home Depot, I'm not staying up at night worried about the nails rusting and the 2 by fours warping. Right?
Lee Jaggers:Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:But in a ministry where you're working with people, you're worried about families. You're working on worrying about individuals that are dying, individuals that are hurt. And so you you take a lot of that home with you. You can't turn it off. And so to me, it just provides this other layer of pressure.
Wayne Walker:For years, I was an elder at a church, and one of the statements that a friend of mine would say is there's a there there's a burden of leadership. You know, there's a burden that comes with leadership when you when you see how the sausage is made and you see how broken people's lives are, there's a burden that you can never unsee.
Lee Jaggers:Yeah. Yeah. There is a burden. And everybody in the ministry, people want to be do an outstanding job. That's that's noteworthy.
Lee Jaggers:But what how do you define an outstanding job? It's it's service and balance and so on.
Wayne Walker:So Dallas Theological Seminary has online chapels. Mhmm. And for years years years, the number one most watched chapel message ever, it may still be, I don't know, but for years it was, was a message by Tommy Nelson where he didn't take his bible and he stood up on the podium and he talked about his personal battle with depression.
Lee Jaggers:There you go. There you go.
Wayne Walker:And he shared to the world people that wanna be pastors, people that are pastors, his personal experience of being in dealing with depression, and just kind of opened it up to vulnerability.
Lee Jaggers:Yeah. Tommy is my example of a guy who does that right. I used to be the, area director for the Christian Association For Psychological Studies, CAPS, here in the Dallas area, around the Dallas. And invited Tommy to come down to speak at one of our meetings. That meeting drew the largest attendance of any meeting we had in 6 years or so.
Wayne Walker:Yeah. The guy was asked to speak, and no one showed up. That's you know?
Lee Jaggers:Yeah. It's just but there's the thing that most pastors, you would never get them to be able to do. Mhmm. Because to to pull the shade back and show the world all that is, takes courage.
Wayne Walker:So as we kinda wrap up here, I wanna ask you about self care. Mhmm. Right? So often, we're busy caring for the world. We don't care for ourselves.
Wayne Walker:At at, you know, at our calling, we focus on, you know, serving our unsheltered neighbors. And, one of the things that Jesus said, you know, when he was asked the 2 most important, you know, gigs is to love the lord with all you got and love your neighbor as yourself. The challenge that I think we have with that in Christian circles is if we actually love neighbors the way we take care of ourself, that would be embarrassing because we don't take care of ourself. Right? So we measure that phrase with, would your mom?
Wayne Walker:Would your mom wanna eat that? Would your mom call that clean? Would your mom wanna be talked to? That way, if not, start over. Right?
Wayne Walker:Because we don't really love ourselves. Yeah. We we wanna love neighbors better than we love ourselves. We abandon ourselves, and all too often, people abandon their family on the altar of ministry. Mhmm.
Wayne Walker:And it's just embarrassing to me, you know, I'm Paul said to love your wife like Christ loves the church, not love your ministry like Christ love the church, not even love your church like church Christ loves the church, but to love your your spouse. Right? And to me, we don't take care of our families very well. We don't take care of ourselves very well because we elevate this ministry or this position or this title so high above that what God ever designed it to be. Exactly.
Wayne Walker:So I ask you, for people that are serving the homeless community, because that's who this is for, how would you recommend that they self care?
Lee Jaggers:Big question. Let me see if I can boil it down to 2 areas. 1 is, asking, are there any unresolved issues, conflicts, traumas, we call them, in my childhood that had never been really unpacked? In in my own case, I have a disdain for fearful people. You know, if you're if you can do something about it, why be afraid of it?
Lee Jaggers:Just do it. And if there's nothing to be afraid of, then don't be afraid. Just just go on. And it's simple. Don't do fear.
Lee Jaggers:Well, that doesn't work with most people. That came from my aversion to fear. I also had an aversion to intimacy, which didn't work out well in my marriage because I married a Latin woman who's very feminine and loves and responds to sharing your struggles. That's what she she could fall in love with, a guy who would share his struggles with me. No.
Lee Jaggers:I don't have struggles. No. I'm a guy. So, yeah. I learned a lot, about the importance of examining those early issues in life that resulted in things to avoid, totally, or things to make sure you do, like win and so on.
Lee Jaggers:But the other the other thing is more looking at, current expenditures of fuel. Am I how am I allocating my money? How am I allocating my time? How am I allocating my energy? Like you were saying to am I giving my family enough time or does my cell phone record how much time I'm really giving to inconsequential things?
Lee Jaggers:So with that, I think it's really important to have a real good, close friend who knows me enough and cares about me enough to tell me when something looks out of whack to them. You know, I've noticed that you're you're praiseworthy. You travel and you give all this to the ministry and blah blah blah. And I'm a little I may be off but I'm a little worried. How much time are you spending with your wife?
Lee Jaggers:And if I were to ask your wife and family how they feel about all these other things you're doing, what would they say? And it made me think years ago, early on my some of my travels, my daughter said to me, strong Christian, but she said, daddy, I don't give a damn where you're traveling to all over the world. My children are growing up not knowing their grandfather. And that sucks.
Wayne Walker:Right there,
Lee Jaggers:man. You're right there.
Wayne Walker:Yeah.
Lee Jaggers:And, of course, the next day, we had lunch, and I made some corrections. Course corrections. But that kind of feedback is is crucial about the ongoing allocation of resources. And, inevitably, we're off because we're always overcompensating.
Wayne Walker:So for self care, you would say have somebody close to you.
Lee Jaggers:Have somebody close, and self examine, check do an assessment of any early childhood issues.
Wayne Walker:Mhmm.
Lee Jaggers:Because a good psychologist, a good counselor can tell Sure. In, you know, half hour what what's going on or what's not going on. And I think, then do I really know what love looks like? Because if I'm well balanced and walking with the lord, I will know what love looks like because it's what Jesus would do. I was visiting another homeless shelter a couple of years ago, another part of the country.
Lee Jaggers:And they told me a story about this, what does love look like, and the brief story is a woman in the dead of winter came to a woman's shelter with an infant in her arms and obviously cold. And they said, no. We we do not admit people from outside this county and you're from another county, so we can't admit you. She she found her way to this homeless shelter. This woman invited her in, gave her a blanket for the child, gave her some food to eat, and attended to all her needs, and then called this other woman.
Lee Jaggers:And she said, I'm so and so from the homeless shelter and I have one question for you. Do you remember so and so who came to your Oh yes, I remember her well. My question to you is what does love look like? You know what rules look like. I don't think you know what love looks like because love sometimes transcends rules, whether it's a rule for the Sabbath or or whatever the rule is.
Lee Jaggers:Rules can get us into trouble if it blocks the flexibility and the adaptability of love.
Wayne Walker:So I'm gonna repeat what you said. Evaluate childhood trauma, find someone really close, and then just kind of evaluate what does love look like in your life.
Lee Jaggers:Yeah. Awesome. Yeah. That'll cover a lot of ground.
Wayne Walker:Well, thanks for your time today. I appreciate it. This has been fascinating to me because you have been such a support to me personally for years and to our staff. Lee is one of 2 chaplains that we have on staff here, and, I really wanted to get this in this recording in because Lee is retiring from our calling permanently and, will eventually take off a green shirt and, and be just a a grandpa. Right?
Lee Jaggers:Just be a grandpa.
Wayne Walker:A grandpa. And a husband and a father Yeah. And really just enjoy life. Yeah. So congratulations, and thank you for your service to the kingdom.
Lee Jaggers:Well, thanks for your kind words, and I've got to say too how much you have meant to me as a leader, which I don't think I am. But what a leader. What an encourager. What a visionary, and what a motivator of people to keep it keep the end purpose, the goals, why are we here. Every time you talk, you talk about the why behind that drives what we do and not just what we do.
Lee Jaggers:And that's what makes the difference. Because the why taps into motive, and you're a motivator. I appreciate that.
Wayne Walker:Well, thank you, Lee. You bet.