Caring for Christian Workers

This article was originally published in High Meadow Retreat's June 2025 newsletter. High Meadow Retreat in southwest England offers counselling, coaching and debriefing to anyone in Christian work in the UK or around the world. If you would like to get access to future editions of the newsletter yourself, sign up through the link at the bottom of this page.

Many of us who are Christians can point to people who played a significant role in our journey of faith; a minister who helped us understand Scripture, a youth leader who encouraged us in our early walk with Christ, a missionary who brought the gospel to our country or translated the Bible into our native language. Without their faithfulness, our spiritual lives might be very different.

These are the people that we are privileged to support at High Meadow Retreat, Christian workers who are serving the Lord by vocation.

We recently completed a four-part series titled "What We Do" which you can find in our blog. In this article, we look at why we do what we do.

Our deepest desire is to see the gospel flourish in and through Christians around the world. For that to happen, we need healthy, well-equipped, and resilient Christian workers committed to the Great Commission (Matthew 28:16–20), where Jesus calls his followers to go and make disciples of all nations.

The Realities of Ministry

Those who serve in vocational ministry face a wide array of pressures. Externally, they may face the expectations of churches, organisations and those they care for to deliver results, adopt certain approaches, or live up to specific ideas of what a Christian leader should be. Given the never-ending task of caring for others, these demands can then generate internal pressures such as feelings of inadequacy, guilt and burnout, often fuelled by a constant sense of needing to do more.

Missionaries, in particular, may carry the added weight of cultural adaptation, language barriers, difficult living conditions, financial strain, and the complex relational dynamics of family, team, and local community life. While the joys of ministry are real, so too are the challenges. It can be lonely work with many pressures and few resources to draw on.

The Cost of Leaving Too Soon

The ReMAP studies (Reducing Missionary Attrition Project), including ReMAP II in 2007, surveyed approximately 600 mission agencies and 40,000 missionaries across 22 countries. The results were sobering:

• Over a 10-year period, the average agency lost nearly half of its workers.
• The majority left for preventable reasons like interpersonal conflict, burnout, or lack of support.

Similarly, in March 2022, the Barna Group reported that 42% of pastors surveyed considered quitting within the past year. This was up from 29% the previous year. The main reasons stated for this were stress, loneliness and political divisions in the church. While these statistics relate to US ministers, the risk of pastoral burnout can be found anywhere.

This kind of attrition takes a deep toll, not just on the individual, but also on families, sending churches, and the global Church as a whole. Many of these departures represent lost relationships, lost investment, and lost potential for ministry.

Our mission at High Meadow Retreat

At High Meadow Retreat, we exist to support and strengthen Christian workers so they can serve sustainably and effectively. Whatever circumstances bring them to us, our goals are to:

• Help those who are struggling in ministry find healing and restoration so they can continue and thrive.
• Support those considering stepping away from ministry to find the resources they need to stay.
• Strengthen marriages so that ministry doesn’t come at the cost of relationship.
• Prevent burnout and mental health struggles before they take root.
• Walk with those finishing their time in ministry, helping them process and prepare for the next chapter.

Our contribution at High Meadow Retreat is just a drop in the bucket of what’s needed to care well for Christian workers, but we trust that God will use this ministry to be a part of strengthening and growing the Church around the world.

We’re grateful for your prayers and your encouragement. Thank you for partnering with us as we seek to care for those who care for others.

Upcoming events

• Care for Christian Workers: An Introduction to Member Care
  A Global Connections event on June 26th, 10–11 AM GMT, with Jennifer and two others from the Member Care core group. Free and open to all. Click here for more info and to sign up.
• Mental Health and the Church
  Our next online High Meadow Retreat event will be a 90-minute webinar in September (date tbc). This session will also be free and open to all. More details to follow.