February 17, 1999
SonScape helping
to rekindle burned-out ministers
___By Cate Terwilliger
___Religion News Service
___WOODLAND PARK, Colo. (RNS)--To Bob and Sandy Sewell, it's a tale as familiar as any Bible story, a saga of sincerity gone sour. They know it firsthand.
___In the early '80s, the couple was heavily involved in a north Dallas megachurch--Bob as a minister of evangelism, Sandy as the senior pastor'sadministrative assistant--when the demands of ministry began to undo them.
BOB & SANDY SEWELL
___"We were teaching in front of people all the time, living the so-called good Christian life," Sandy said. "Yet our personal lives were spiritual con artistry. We were not doing what we professed."
___Their battle with burnout ultimately led the Sewells to form SonScape Re-Creation Ministries, a non-profit organization near Woodland Park, Colo., that ministers to worn-out ministers.
___Larry Magnuson has been there--literally and figuratively. Less than a year after the young pastor left a position at his father's church to begin his own congregation in neighboring Maple Grove, Minn., the elder Magnuson was booted from the ministry for sexually abusing adolescent boys. The 1988 scandal shattered one church and threw a pall over the promise of another.
___"It put us in a very difficult position," the younger Magnuson recalled. "I needed to be a son to my dad and mom, but we were suspect in our denomination: 'Is this pattern going to be passed from father to son? Can we trust Larry?'
___"And then when the lawsuits came, the walls went up. We really didn't know our place. Could we continue in ministry one community away?"
___Those questions eventually brought the Magnusons to SonScape.
___Other pastors come with other issues: addiction, perhaps, or an extramarital affair or sexual identity crisis. For many clergy, the message is muted, seeping into church and home as weariness, loneliness, depression.
___For pastoral couples accustomed to proclaiming what they believe is God's word, organizations like SonScape provide the opportunity to retune the mortal, fallible ear to that still, small voice. They provide a safe haven clergy often can't find within the church they serve.
___"Denominations do not know how to deal with pastors who are struggling with a variety of issues," Magnuson said. "It could be gambling; it could be self-doubt; it could be sexuality. Pastors are afraid to get help because, when they do, it ends up becoming a disciplinary action.
___"Sometimes the church that's supposed to be there with grace and love ...They shoot their wounded."
___There are more than 300 ministries aimed at helping ministers nationwide, about a dozen in Colorado. Most cater to conservative, evangelical Christians who historically have been leery of psychotherapy.
___Such help doesn't come cheap; stays ranging from a week to 12 days can cost $1,000 to $2,500 per person, though discounts for couples and scholarships for financially strapped pastors often are available.
___The Sewells said their crisis began when their egos got caught up--first in feeling called by God, then in being needed by their human flock--to the detriment of their relationship with one another and their two daughters.
___"This sense of egotism justifies your own work, this idea you are so needed by others," Sandy said.
___"I used to love being approached with 'Brother Bob, we know how busy you are, but ...' That was music to my ears," Bob added. "If it's true that the devil fell from heaven, he must have fallen into our DayTimers."
___Increasingly weary, they found themselves at psychiatrist Louis McBurney's Marble Retreat in early 1984.
___Tucked away in the Crystal River Valley west of Aspen, Colo., the interdenominational counseling center provides intensive therapy for ministers and missionaries in crisis.
___"We had come to a place with all of this where we knew we had to change our life and our ministry," Bob said. "We were wrestling with what we were going to do with our lives."
___ McBurney met that question with another: If you could do anything you wanted to do for God and knew you would not fail, what would it be? The answer evolved into SonScape, a ministry that seeks to prevent what McBurney tries to heal.
___"It was more than the formation of a new ministry," Bob said. "It was a reforming of our spirits, our souls."
___In 1987, the Sewells began operating SonScape in western Colorado. Now located on 17 wooded acres with a window on the north face of Pikes Peak, they encourage pastors (the overwhelming majority are men) and spouses to slow down, to rest. And to get back in touch with their own spiritual practice.
___"It never says in Scripture, 'And Jesus was in a hurry,'" Bob Sewell pointed out.
___McBurney, a pioneer in clergy counseling who founded Marble in 1973, said, "It just feels overwhelming at times; the degree of pain is just so intense."
___"Most of the people come now with a real sense of hopelessness and despair, and they're really hurting. ... We need to try to encourage laymen to become more aware of the problems of their clergy and supportive of them."
___That's the idea behind Clergy Appreciation Month, promoted each October by Colorado Springs, Colo.-based Focus on the Family since 1992.
___"When we survey our pastors, they talk about isolation and the fact that the dreams and the hopes and the visions they have for their church and their community are met with a great deal of apathy," said H.B. London Jr., vice president of ministry outreach/pastoral ministries at Focus.
___"It used to be that church/synagogue/parish was the hub around which everything revolved," London said. "Now it's just one of many things that revolve around the busyness of life."
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