Does a 55-year-old guy have much to say to cool-dressing, iPod-listening, 20-something student leaders who Twitter, text and watch "Heroes"? Perhaps.

Although, I Twitter and listen to music on iTunes (classical), I definitely don't dress very cool…just ask the 26-year-old creative arts director at our church where I serve as senior pastor.

Thirty years of ministry taught me, though, that I have something in common with youth ministers: I've battled ministry killers. I've served in churches from the land of both kinds of fruit and nuts (California) to the Windy City (Chicago) to the place where bigger is better (Texas) to the home of the country's best grits and fried okra (Atlanta). The churches have ranged in size from four-and-a-half attendees (the one I started with my pregnant wife and our two toddlers) to the one I now serve with more than 1,100. Has it been the satisfying experience I expected? Yes and no. To paraphrase Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities, "It has been the best of times, it has been the worst of times." Most pastors would agree with Dickens. Many church people would, as well.

Here's what I've learned: Ministry killers lurk in every church, waiting to ambush unsuspecting leaders. Unrealized pinholes in your soul will siphon the passion from you and potentially kill your ministry unless you set your trajectory in the right direction. Bill Hybels captured how many of us feel at times when at a conference he quoted the platinum song by the Canadian group Prozzäk (of Simon and Milo fame): Sucks to be you!

That phrase matched my friend who faced many ministry killers, yet still faithfully serves Christ. Read what he told me.

When I attended seminary for the first time in the early '80s, John Bisagno, former pastor of First Baptist Houston, spoke in chapel and told us to look around and take a good look at who was sitting next to us. He told an incredible statistic of how few people who start out in ministry will be left after many years. I contacted him to ask exactly what he said. The statistic he told us was told to him in 1953 by his future father-in-law, who was also a pastor. "One out of 10 who enter the ministry at the age of 21 still will be serving at age 65."

My friend continued to tell me that for 30 years, he followed 105 of his friends who had committed their lives to full-time ministry. To date, almost half no longer serve due to divorce, infidelity, drug use, imprisonment or simply losing their passion and quitting. Other statistics point to rising stress, depression and burnout for pastoral leaders. One leader of an organization that assists ministry leaders in crisis told me that he fields 14,000 calls a year from leaders facing personal and church crises.

I decided to hunt for the reasons behind these statistics. If I could find the birthplace of a ministry's death, maybe I also could develop effective weapons for that area. In short, I went in search of a killer. I found five.