Jesus told a story about a man who wanted to build a tower. Before he poured the foundation, he sat down and figured out whether he could finish. Then Jesus told another about a king with ten thousand soldiers who sat down to ask whether he could win against twenty thousand (Luke 14:28–33).
Both men sat down first. That is what I want you to do before you step into bi-vocational ministry. The cost of bi-vocational ministry is not a secret, but most people only learn it after they’re already paying it.
The point of those parables is not “only do what is safe.” The tower builder who starts without enough is not brave. He is foolish. The king who marches without counting is not bold. He is reckless. Counting the cost is an act of wisdom and faith. It is how you enter well.
Here are the five costs I have paid over twenty-five years, and what I would tell you to do about each one.
1. Your time
You will have less discretionary time than almost anyone you know. The hours between your two commitments are not empty. They are full.
In my life, the early morning belongs to God and the church. Lunch belongs to the messages I couldn’t answer at 5 AM. Evenings belong to ministry. Weekends are a mix of worship, rest, and whatever didn’t fit anywhere else.
Your friends will have evenings and weekends that feel free. Yours won’t, and you will feel it most at the moments you most want it to be different: a child’s game, a dinner invitation, a lazy Saturday afternoon.
What to do: Before you start, list the three or four things on your calendar that must not be touched. Then decide what you are willing to give up to protect them.
2. Your career
You will probably not climb the corporate ladder. Not because you can’t, but because the ladder requires a kind of focused ambition and availability that bi-vocational ministry won’t allow.
You’ll need work that is flexible, that doesn’t demand the overflow hours that belong to the church, and that you can do excellently without making it your identity. Peers will be promoted past you. That is a real loss.
What to do: Name the promotion or title you are likely giving up. Say it out loud. Grieve it if you need to. Then choose this road clearly, not by drift.
3. Your family
Your family will sometimes get the short end of the stick. Not always, and not inevitably. But there will be seasons when the day job and the church both demand more at the same time, and those seasons take something from the people who love you most.
Your spouse will carry household burdens that would otherwise be shared. Your kids may have a parent who is in the room but not really there.
This is not a reason to say no. It is a reason to count it honestly and to enter into it with your spouse, not alone.
What to do: Sit down with your spouse and ask, “Which parts of our home life will you end up carrying?” Then listen to the answer without defending yourself.
4. Your body
You will be tired. Not occasionally. Structurally.
For me, the 4 AM alarm isn’t a season. It’s the rhythm. Six hours of sleep is often the ceiling. The pace that felt exhilarating at thirty-five is genuinely taxing at fifty-five. Your body will tell you the truth about the cost in ways your enthusiasm can’t override.
What to do: Be honest about your health now. Build in sleep and Sabbath from the start, not as a reward you’ll earn later. A pace you can’t keep at sixty is not faithfulness at thirty-five. It’s borrowing.
5. Your heart
Ministry relationships are complicated. People you pour into will leave: the church, sometimes the faith, sometimes their friendship with you. It will feel like failure even when it isn’t. You will carry things in confidence with no one to set them down with. And you’ll be lonely in a way that most people around you won’t fully understand.
What to do: Start building friendships now with people who don’t need you to be their pastor. You will need them far more than you think.
The other side of the ledger
I have just told you five hard things. Let me tell you one more.
I would do it again. All of it. The 4 AM alarms, the missed promotions, the tired seasons, the lonely road. What has been built at Living Faith Church (a congregation full of people who were far from God and now follow Jesus, a ministry that has served hundreds of families, a community of people who love each other and their neighbors) is worth everything it cost.
But I want you to know the price before you say yes. The yes you say knowing the cost is worth far more than the yes you say in ignorance. And it holds up far better when the cost becomes real.
Count it together
Here’s a simple exercise for this week. You and your spouse each take a sheet of paper. Write down the one cost from this list that worries you most. Don’t compare notes first. Then trade papers over coffee.
If you wrote the same thing, good. If you didn’t, even better. You just found the conversation you need to have.
Then ask the hardest question: having named the costs honestly, can we both still say yes? If not, what needs to change before we can?
I wrote Second Fiddle to help couples have that conversation before they commit, and there are discussion questions for couples in the back of the book. The free discussion guide for couples sets those questions out as thirteen conversations you can have over coffee.
Know what you’re signing up for. Then sign up fully.