"No" is a complete sentence

Like most people, at times I have found myself overwhelmed with things to do. I allowed myself to be overcommitted because I found it difficult to tell people no. Especially as a younger pastor, I seldom refused any request from anyone. I didn't want to disappoint people, and perhaps I had a fear of what is today known as the "fear of missing out (FOMO)." I didn't want to miss an opportunity to experience something new. Unfortunately, staying overcommitted is a sure ticket to burnout, stress, and a host of other problems.

I had to learn to set priorities for my life because if I didn't others would put their priorities on me. When that happens we are living their lives, not our own. We are helping them achieve their dreams and not fulfilling our own. That is not healthy.

One of the dangers today is that we tend to see too many things as priorities. When the word priority first came into English usage it was singular. It wasn't until 500 years after the word first appeared that we began to think about multiple priorities. The problem is when too many things become priorities, nothing is a priority. Perhaps today it's unreasonable to think we can only have one priority for our lives, but we must be very careful to not see too many things as priorities or we become unable to focus on the truly important things we need to accomplish.

I also had to learn to say no to people. In reality, often the things that people ask me to do I'm not the best person to do them anyway. There would be other people far better equipped to do them than me. Not only did I need to learn how to say no, I had to learn that I didn't always need to justify the reason for my declining their request. Sometimes I probably need to offer a reason for saying no, but not always. No is a complete sentence. It states everything that needs to be said in many instances.

Saying no is an important part of setting boundaries for your life. Those incapable of ever saying no to a request have no boundaries. This is a dangerous thing for someone in leadership. As a young pastor I was becoming overwhelmed with all the responsibilities I was feeling in our small church. I spoke to our denominational representative about it, and he explained that I had become the church. I was allowing everyone to dump their responsibilities on me. He further explained that this was not only harmful to me, but it was harmful to the congregation because I wasn't allowing them to be the church God had called them to be. The next Sunday I told the church I would no longer let others give me their responsibilities. If they had accepted a responsibility in the church I would not cover for them when they didn't fulfil that responsibility. If someone asked why something wasn't done I would invite them to ask the person who was supposed to have done it. If I could assist someone or resource someone in their area of responsibility I would do it, but I would no longer do it for them. From that day forward I became more comfortable saying no, and it helped our church and it helped reduce the stress in my life.

Some of you may need to practice saying no. Just stand in front of a mirror and keep repeating no until it becomes easy to form your mouth to say the word. You'll find it doesn't hurt to say the word, and very often it will make you feel much better! It will also allow you the opportunity to focus on the things God has called you to do.