Right from the beginning I have to confess that I am not a big fan of retirement. I've retired from two different jobs, and I'm still working at least part time. My wife tells me retirement just doesn't seem to stick with me. Frankly, I would probably go back to full-time work tomorrow if I found the right job. However, at some point, if we live long enough, retirement will come into the picture and it's important that we are financially prepared.
The church I pastored had never paid into a pastor's retirement fund. Their average pastoral tenure before me was 12 months as they had a succession of seminary students serve as pastor. I stayed there 20 years. After being there for several years I asked the finance committee if they would consider enrolling me in our denomination's retirement plan instead of giving me a raise that year. They agreed and made that part of their budget proposal.
This led to the first major conflict in the church since I had been the pastor. Since the church had never done this before a handful didn't want to do it now. At the time, to enroll in that program required the church to pay 16 percent of the pastor's salary into the fund. Some argued that was too big of a raise. There was a lot of "intense fellowship" around the topic, but in the end the church voted to enroll me in our retirement fund. The good news is that we lost no one over this issue, and despite the stated concerns of some, it did not lead to the church suffering any kind of financial stress.
Over the years I have met a number of pastors who have nothing going into retirement. Some have opted out of social security but are not putting anything towards retirement. Like many Americans ministers are not taking seriously the need to financially prepare for retirement.
According to one study, one out of three Americans have less than $5,000 saved for retirement. One out of five have nothing set aside for retirement. One third of Baby Boomers, those now approaching retirement age, have between $0-25,000 in retirement funds. Obviously, preparing for the future takes a back seat to immediate gratification for many people.
No doubt there are many reasons why some pastors are not setting money aside for retirement. Many enter the ministry with a huge amount of student debt that must be paid. Starting and raising a family can make it hard for anyone to put money into a retirement fund that won't be needed for 30-40 years. Many ministers are not well paid, and there just isn't enough money left over to put into retirement. Another problem is that if a church is not part of a denomination there is not a denominational retirement fund into which a church can pay towards the minister's retirement. Of course, even if such a fund is available to a church that doesn't mean they want to pay into it. Smaller churches, especially, may use their size to argue that they cannot afford to pay anything towards the pastor's retirement.
A few years ago I talked with a minister in his 50s who had nothing set aside for retirement. He was serving in a nondenominational church and was understandably concerned about the future. Not too many years before that the retirement fund for the denomination in which I serve had opened up their services to ministers in any denomination. I explained this to the minister and gave him the phone number of our area's representative. Long story short...he is now enrolled in a retirement fund. He won't have as much money in his account as he would have if he had done this when he was 30, but at least he'll have something to draw from in retirement.
If your church is not paying anything towards your eventual retirement, this is a conversation you need to have with your leadership. As in yesterday's post which addressed continuing education, you may need to ask someone to lead this conversation for you. From personal experience I can vouch for the difficulty you may have in asking your church to pay towards your retirement. It was not an easy conversation I had with our church when it was first raised, but it was an important conversation. It was important not only to me but for future ministers in that church who would not have to fight that battle.
Scripture makes it very clear that we have an obligation to provide for our families. That also includes after we retire. One of the things I pointed out to those opposed to the church paying into my retirement was that every one of them had a pension plan where they worked. I then asked why they were opposed to me having the same opportunity to have one. Make sure you can retire with dignity and that your family will be financially secure when you are no longer able to earn a paycheck.
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