I am a college graduate. That's right! I graduated from North Central University in Mnpls, MN. with a bachelors degree in Pastoral Studies. It took me almost 15 years, but I did it! Despite that fact, I feel completely unqualified for most of what I do as a pastor. College was great at providing classes like, "Bible Study Methods", "Eschatology" and even "Church History". Those things aren't useless, but here are some classes that would have been more helpful:

-How to recruit, train and inspire volunteers

-How to care for the people in your church without burning out

-How to cast BIG vision on a regular basis without seeing repetitive or unrealistic

-How to set and manage a church budget

-How to preach A+ messages every Sunday, or at least every other Sunday

-How to have tough conversations with good people

-How to manage the expectations of what a pastor is and is not (small churches tend to treat their pastor like a slave, while large churches tend to treat their pastor like a king... neither is healthy!)

You get the point. It's impossible to do it all. I've had to learn how to be comfortable with two things:

1) Building a healthy church requires lots of people. Romans 12:4-8 refers to the church as a body that needs all the other parts to properly function.

2) The church is messy. Controlling it is God's job and not mine.