Dr. Crowder shared the following in a letter to future Living Waters Region Clergy on Thursday, Jan. 29.
Beloved Colleagues,
For the first twenty years of my ministry, I believed leadership meant doing it alone. I mistook busyness for faithfulness and isolation for strength. I avoided clergy community—not because it lacked value, but because I lacked vulnerability. I didn’t want to admit I didn’t have all the answers or sit in spaces where I wasn’t the one leading.
So I ran.
What I didn’t understand then was that isolation doesn’t make us strong—it makes us brittle. God had placed around me colleagues who understood the weight of ministry, the loneliness of leadership, and the quiet doubts that surface when the work feels endless. I was running from the very gift meant to sustain me.
Over the last fifteen years, that has changed. Through ecumenical relationships in Chicago and within the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), I learned not just to survive, but to thrive in community.
These relationships did not weaken my ministry—they saved it. In community, I discovered I was not alone in burnout, doubt, or fatigue. Naming those truths deepened our faith rather than diminishing it. We prayed together. We challenged one another. We laughed. And sometimes we simply sat together when words failed.
Community taught me humility. It reminded me that God’s work is larger than my pulpit or my calendar. I learned to listen more, perform less, and trust that collaboration is not a threat to leadership but a mark of maturity. Most importantly, community re-humanized me. I learned that rest is not laziness, asking for help is not failure, and even pastors need pastoring.
If I could speak to pastors just beginning their journey—or to pastors who are too busy—I would say this: do not wait twenty years to learn what community can teach you in one honest conversation. Find your people. Show up. Stay at the table. Ministry was never meant to be a solo act.
So I offer this challenge: if you are not in community, get in one. If you don’t have one, start one. Community doesn’t require a budget or a title—only presence, honesty, and a willingness to walk together. The work before us is too important, and the road too long, to walk alone.
I hope to see you in community across Michigan, Illinois, and Wisconsin—not as competitors, but as companions, bound by a shared calling and sustained by a faithful God.
