I Hate It Here…The Story Of A Pastors Kid

I watched the new-ish Karate Kid movie recently with Jaden Smith and Jackie Chan (new to me because I remember the original with Mr. Miyagi). There’s a pivotal scene in the movie where Jaden is yelling at his mom after being taken to a new place with no friends, people he doesn’t understand, a culture that he doesn’t fit into, and a longing for something different. He looks at his mom and says, “I hate it here! I want to go home!”. As a pastor’s kid, this statement resonated with me on two levels. The first one is very surface-level and kind of funny. I remember all those Sundays waiting after church for my dad to turn off the lights and for my mom to finish cleaning up. I remember leaning against the wall knowing everyone else was at the restaurant eating lunch already. I’d been at church two hours before it started, and I was still here one hour after it was all done and all I could think about was, “I hate it here! I just want to go home

It’s funny because every church kid knows what it feels like to be ready to leave and mom is still talking to one of the ladies in the lobby. For the record, this is one of the biggest reasons I have always aimed to create a culture in our church that kids want to be part of. Then there is the second way I heard the statement from the movie that was a bit more in line with how the boy meant it. He was saying, “I hate this place. I don’t understand it. I don’t like it. It’s something you wanted, but I never asked for this. It’s something you agreed to, but I never agreed to it. I was brought here against my will, without any friends or any help. We are here so my dad can pastor a church full of people who will likely take from him more than they give to him, hurt him more than they will help him, and isolate our family more than they will encourage our family. Moreover, they’ll do it under the name of “God” so it makes the abuse we will endure “okay”, cause it’s all for the Kingdom of God, right? I know that sounds cynical, and some of those things weren’t what I was thinking in the beginning, but many of them are what I was thinking by 10 years old. Not 16, not 20, not 25…10 years old is when I thought to myself, “This sucks and I want nothing to do with it”. That was the moment I said, “I hate it here! I want to go home”.

My dad had taken over a church in Florida in 1993 after being raised for the first six years of my life in Florence, KY. That was what I knew, it was where I belonged. It was where I went to school, it was where my friends were, and it was home. Then, we ended up in Florida, and we started over. It was a great opportunity on the surface, but it quickly became hell. The church’s demon board, I mean the deacon board (lol), exposed their hearts and motives and many of them tried to destroy my family. I wanted nothing to do with church, ministry, Christians, and for a season, God. I don’t intend for this blog to be about church hurt. I want to give you a glimpse into the way it shaped me, and how things ended up changing in the process. Though the church hurt was very real, I want you to pay attention to the rest of the story.

A Blessing In Disguise

Over the next few years, we would go on a journey as a family of pain, reflection, and shaping. For myself, it was the most developing season of my life. From 10 years old to 17 years old, I developed a bitterness from watching my superhero (my dad) navigate the realities of a life destroyed by people who were supposed to have our back, and instead stabbed us in the back. He was superman to me, and yet in this season he was broken. I watched, I grew up, I grew cold, I grew angry. I remember the day I said to the random pastor our family was meeting with, “I’ll never let anyone do to me what they did to him”. I put on armor in my heart and anger in my spirit. Along with what was happening inside, I grew to well over 6 foot tall and 235 lbs. Strong as an ox. I was hoping the day would come when those men would say something to my dad in front of me. I was emotionally prepared to go to jail for just one shot at hitting one of those men in the face. To be transparent, I fantasized about it. I would get lost in the rage-filled day dreams about using my fists to set things right, as if that was truly possible. I didn’t care though, I just wanted a chance to try.

Time went by and that day never came, but the anger stayed. The bitterness stuck around. The pain that shaped me, made me, molded me… Those things I lived with every day. The pain that I used as preparation to defend my dad, ending up putting a wall between me and my dad. We weren’t in a good place as father and son. I was rebellious, arrogant, and had no interest in following my father’s rules. We fought a lot, and at the height of my rebellion in my teen years, me and my dad didn’t say a word to each other. 

On September 2, 2004, we got hit by an absolute monster of a storm, Hurricane Ivan. This devastating hurricane destroyed our city as people lost their homes, their jobs, and in many cases, their lives. Me, my dad, and my brother, were part of the rescue efforts in our city. We drove from house to house, and street to street, getting trees off of houses and out of roads. We brought food to people who had nothing and warped roofs that were leaking. We cried, we laughed, and we gave everything we had. I saw the true physical and psychological suffering that comes from a natural disaster for the first time.

During that time, something happened in my heart. God fused our hearts together over those three weeks following the hurricane and we were never the same again. We developed a bond of trust, love, and honor. With no internet, no TV, and little to do, we talked every night. We let our walls down and we listened to each other. That season changed everything. To this day, we honor each other to the best of our abilities. We truly try to walk out Romans 12:10 by outdoing one another in honor. We don’t take what we have together for granted, because we know what it feels like to not have the relationship we do now. 

It Took A Storm

It took the storm to bring us together. Yes, I’m talking about the hurricane, but I’m also talking about something more than that. When my dad was pastoring the church, we came second to the church in almost every way. If there was a meeting, he was missing family dinner. If there was a funeral or wedding, we were canceling our family vacation. If there was a family that needed financial assistance, our birthdays could be minimized. Don’t get me wrong, my parents took great care of us and we never went without. But emotionally, and in some cases, tangibly, we were missing our father. When the “storm” of ministry hit, though it took some time to set in, it drove us together. Each person in our family processed the pain differently, and each person in the family took a different time frame to get healed. In some cases, my sister and I would probably say we’re still not done in that department. However, following the storm of ministry, my father became more aware of his absence that impacted the first 10 years of my life, and 14 years of my sister's life. When we were “stuck” together because he wasn’t in ministry anymore, and he had ample time to be at our games and show up to family dinner, we didn’t know what to say to each other. He knew who we were, but he didn’t know us. Slowly that all changed the same way it did in the weeks following the hurricane. Though it was a bumpy road through our teen years, my father became present in every way. He became the father we always needed, and the father he always wanted to be and believed he was. He just couldn’t see past the ministry to realize he wasn’t quite getting there. The “storm” had cleared the air and he could see exactly who he wanted to be in our lives. Evenmore, he was being that man to others, that husband to my mom, and that father to us. My parents adopted my brother and other sister by this time. Together we went on a journey together of healing and hope. It took a storm to get us there. 

Celebration Of The Destination

Fast forward to 2024, and I now pastor the church that my father started. My sister loves Jesus, and is speaking life into women on a regular basis. My other sister runs our campus excellence teams at our church, and my brother runs our entire parking team at one of our campuses. Every one of my siblings loves Jesus and attends church. That is a miracle for many pastors to be able to say. My father, and my mother (who is an absolute treasure) can say it.

33% of pastor’s kids don’t even believe in Jesus by the time they turn 18. When you add in traumatic church hurt, that number more than doubles to 70%. By the grace of God, my siblings and I are the rare ones who still remain. I know it is also because of the changes my father made throughout the ministry storm to become a father that put his family first. It’s not always an easy road to get where God is taking us, but if we get specific about what we want our life to look like, then get out a map to get there, we can have the life God wants for our family. We celebrate where we are as a family now. Despite the pain and hurts, with the help of some counselors and healing, and God’s mercy, we’re in a great place. The greatest area that I rejoice in is when I look at my nieces, my father’s granddaughters. All of them are active in our church throughout students and serving on teams across our campuses. They are future staff members, interns, and world changers. What’s amazing is that I never hear them say, “I hate it here! I want to go home!” For them, when they walk into the church, they are home! And that is one of the greatest victories we can have. 

I’ll be writing a followup blog to this one that will give you practical steps on how to establish boundaries and clarity in your ministry life to ensure you don’t fall prey to the same traps that other pastors have.

In the meantime, if you’re a pastor and your family is hurting, don’t suffer alone. If you’re a pastor and you need help being a better father and husband, there is a pathway of getting there. If you’re a pastor and you’re seeing church become a burden to your family more than it is a blessing, there are changes you need to make. If you’re a pastor and everything is currently great but you want to speak with someone about red flags you can look out for to make sure it stays that way, that's great! Whichever area you find yourself in, Pastor to Pastor can help. Reach out to us and let us be part of ensuring that you start well and finish strong, but also that your family does too. We’re here to help make sure you never have to hear those words, “I hate it here! I want to go home!”