FCLP 13 | How to Lead Easter Well: Pacing the Event, Your Team, and Yourself

In this timely leadership episode of the Female Church Leaders Podcast, Kadi Cole shares a healthier way to approach one of the most intense seasons in church life: Easter. Instead of treating major ministry moments like a sprint, she explains why leaders should think of them more like a marathon relay.

You’ll learn three simple pacing strategies that help leaders navigate big ministry seasons with greater clarity and sustainability: pacing the event, pacing your team, and pacing yourself. These small leadership adjustments can protect your energy, strengthen your team, and help you fully experience the beauty of what God is doing during meaningful moments like Easter.

TIMESTAMPS

02:15 - Why Easter season feels so intense 

03:45 - What Research says about Easter and leader fatigue

07:30 - Three ways to pace easter well

08:00 - Pace the event: Think in seasons, not days 

12:00 - Pace your team: Leading with healthy rhythms

13:30 - Why appreciation should be planned early

Resources mentioned:

Theological Cheat Sheet -  kadicole.com/theological

Next Steps and Resources:

• Take the Quiz: Identify your growth gap with our Sticky Floor Quiz at femalechurchleaders.com.
• Join a Cohort: Be part of our next Closing the Leadership Gap cohort for guided coaching and monthly Q&A with Kadi. Visit closingtheleadershipgap.com to learn more.
• Stay Connected: Follow us on Instagram @femalechurchleaders for daily encouragement and leadership tools.
• Spread the Word: If you found this episode helpful, please follow, rate, and share the podcast to help us reach more female church leaders.

Tune in and get ready to lead with clarity, strength, and joy. Your calling matters, and we're here to support you every step of the way!

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Welcome to the Female Church Leaders Podcast, a weekly resource for women who love God, love the church, and are called to lead. I'm your host, Katie Cole, Church Leader, Autor, and Executive Coach. After more than 30 years in full-time ministry, Open as the only woman at the table, I understand how meaningful yet challenging your calling can be. That's why I created this podcast to remind you that you're not leading alone. Each week, I'll share practical tools, biblical insights, and honest encouragement for the real challenges female leaders face in ministry. So you can grow your skills, strengthen your faith, and lead with more confidence and joy without burning out or striving to prove yourself. We drop a new episode every Monday because Sunday is coming and you are going to be ready for it. There are certain seasons in ministry that carry a different kind of intensity. Easter, Christmas, major conferences or retreats, big outreach events. Not every ministry department goes into full systems-engaged mode for Easter, but many do. And if your role touches weekend services, guest experience, volunteers, or communications, you probably feel the momentum building weeks before the holiday even arrives. And that is a beautiful thing. Easter is one of the most meaningful moments in the life of the church. And when we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, it's when many people who don't normally attend church are willing to walk through the doors. In fact, research from Barna consistently shows that Easter remains one of the most likely Sundays of the year for people who don't regularly attend church to show up. Many guests who might not attend any other time during the year are willing to visit a church during Holy Week, which means church leaders often feel a deep sense of responsibility for that moment. We want the message to be clear. We want the environment to be welcoming. We want people to encounter the hope of the gospel. It's an important opportunity. But it also creates a lot of intensity in the weeks leading up to Easter. And interestingly, Barna has also found that many church leaders report significant fatigue following major ministry seasons like Easter and Christmas. Not because the work wasn't meaningful, but because the emotional, spiritual, and logistical energy required to lead those moments is so high. And honestly, that makes sense. When you pour yourself into something that deeply, it's going to take something out of you too. Early in my ministry career, I learned this lesson the hard way. I planned a lot of big events, conferences, major weekends, special services, the kind of things that take months of preparation and coordination. And for a long time, I planned those events like a sprinter preparing for a race. Everything focused on the starting line and the finish line, the planning meetings, the volunteer coordination, the logistics, the order of service, and then the event itself. But what I hadn't accounted for were the weeks after the cleanup, the follow-up, the thank you notes, the volunteer care, the guest connections, the administrative wrap-up, and honestly, the personal exhaustion. I remember some of my early events where the week afterward I was completely depleted. A few times I even got sick, but the work wasn't finished yet, which meant I was trying to complete the final pieces when I had the least energy and the least motivation. And eventually I realized something important. I had been planning like a sprinter. But ministry events, especially something like Easter, are actually much closer to a marathon relay race. You don't sprint one leg and collapse. You prepare carefully, you run your portion faithfully, you hand the baton to others on the team, you recover, and then you keep moving forward together. Once that realization clicked for me, everything about how I planned events began to change. Because I stopped planning for one day and started planning for the entire season. And that shift didn't make ministry feel heavier. It actually made it more sustainable. So today I want to talk with you about three ways to pace yourself well as you lead toward Easter. Three types of pacing that healthy ministry leaders practice during big seasons: pacing the event, pacing your team, and pacing yourself. These are simple leadership adjustments, but they can make a huge difference in how you experience intense seasons like Easter. They help you protect your energy, care for your team, and actually enjoy the work God has invited you into. So let's start with the first one. Number one, pace the event. Let's start with the event itself. One of the biggest mindset shifts for me came when I realized that the event wasn't a single day. For something like Easter, especially when we were hosting multiple services for thousands of people, the event actually lasted two to three weeks. There was the buildup, there was Easter weekend itself, and then there was the follow-up. Once I acknowledged that reality, everything changed. Because instead of pacing myself and my teams for one big day, we paced ourselves for the full season. That meant also planning for follow-up systems, volunteer appreciation, guest connections, administrative wrap-up, and even planning time for celebration, rest, and recovery. Just acknowledging that timeline gave me more energy because I walked into Easter weekend knowing what the full journey actually required. It also helped me lead more strategically. In one of my early ministry roles, I oversaw all of our first impressions teams. This was the name of the department that included anyone who created a first experience for a guest on our weekend services. So parking teams, greeters, ushers, the coffee bar volunteers, next step tables, prayer partners, guest follow-up teams. And early on, I made a mistake many leaders make. I felt pressure to stack Easter weekend with as many volunteers as possible, more greeters, more presents, more everything. But when I realized later was that some of our most important ministry work actually happened after Easter Sunday. It was the follow-up calls, the emails, helping guests get connected into a group, entering people's information into our systems. And if every volunteer served all Easter weekend, no one had time or energy left for the follow-up. So we changed the pacing. If someone was serving on the guest follow-up team the week after Easter, I didn't expect them to also serve five services over Easter weekend. Could they if they wanted to? Of course, but they didn't need to, because following up with a new guest was just as important as greeting them at the door. And pacing the event that way made the entire ministry stronger and more effective. Number two, pace your team. The second piece of healthy leadership is pacing your team. Most volunteers and staff members are willing to work incredibly hard during big seasons. They will go the extra mile. They will stretch their schedule. They will show up early and stay late. But people burn out when leaders ask them to go the extra mile all the time. Healthy teams operate with rhythms. There are seasons where we lean in and work harder, and there are seasons where we pull back and recover. When leaders communicate that rhythm clearly, people feel safe giving their best. They know the intensity has a purpose and they know it's not permanent. That's one of the quiet ways leaders protect the long-term health of their teams. Another practical thing that helps pace in your team is planning celebration and appreciation ahead of time. After big seasons like Easter, you're going to want to thank all the people who helped. Volunteers who served multiple services, staff who carried extra responsibility, leaders who helped hold everything together. But if appreciation is an afterthought, it often gets rushed or even forgotten. So think about it now. Could you prepare thank you cards ahead of time? Could you schedule a volunteer celebration dinner? Could you send personal notes to key leaders? When appreciation is planned, it's much easier to follow through. And your team will remember it long after the event is over. And number three, pace yourself. Now let's talk about the third piece, pacing yourself, which is often the hardest to do because leaders often do a great job caring for their teams, but they forget to care for themselves. And there are two areas female leaders often sacrificed first in busy seasons, their physical health and their family. And unfortunately, those are the two areas that usually cost us the most over time. So before Easter arrives, ask yourself a couple simple questions. What does my body need during this season? You may not be able to maintain every normal routine, but what are the non-negotiables? For me, I eventually realized I could sacrifice some regular workouts during big ministry weeks, but I still needed movement. So I started walking during the day. Sometimes I'd just take 10 minutes, a couple times a day, to walk around the church building, and it would make such a big difference. I also learned something important about food, especially as I got older. The food available during long ministry days, well, let's just say my body didn't always feel the best after eating it, especially multiple times in a row. So I started bringing my own healthier options, even for big weekends like Easter, where we had food for volunteers all day long. But that one small adjustment helped my energy tremendously. And it helped me recover faster afterward, too, which was really helpful. Small moves like that can make a big difference over time. Another thing I started doing, especially on really long days, was planning in a quick 20-minute power nap in the afternoons. There's actually a lot of research around this, but it was a midday reset that I still practice regularly today, especially during intense seasons. Okay, once you've thought through your physical body, then ask yourself the other question. What does my family need in this season? Every family is different, and every person in your family is probably different. Some families want more time beforehand. Others are okay with busy schedule as long as they get your full attention afterward. The key is to think about it and even ask them about it ahead of time so that you can set yourself up to win both at church and at home. Leadership isn't just about managing ministry responsibilities, it's about stewarding the whole life God has entrusted to you. And let me tell you, if you take time to ask your family what they'd like most from you during this busy season, I can guarantee that you will be surprised by at least a couple of their answers. There's one more encouragement I want to offer before we close. In big ministry seasons, it's very easy to slip into adrenaline mode. You're solving problems, answering questions, moving quickly from one responsibility to the next, and sometimes the whole event can pass by in a blur. But Easter is one of the most sacred moments in the life of the church. People are hearing the gospel. We are celebrating Jesus' love together. Guests are walking through the doors who may have never attended before. Lives are being changed. So in the middle of all the logistics and the volunteers and the planning, please slow down long enough to notice what God is doing. Pray for the people you see walking through the doors. Thank God for your team. Take a moment to notice the joy on someone's face during worship. Yes, there will be stressful moments, but there will also be beautiful ones. Don't let fatigue or self-imposed pressure rob you of enjoying the fruit of what God is doing through your leadership. In Galatians 6.9, Paul writes, Let us not grow weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Healthy leadership isn't about avoiding effort. It's about learning how to pace ourselves so we can stay faithful for the long haul. So here's your action step for this week. Take just 15 minutes and plan your post-Easter week right now. Put it on your calendar. What follow-up needs to happen? Who needs appreciation? What recovery time do you need to schedule? Plan it before the big day, not after you're exhausted. Because planning and pacing create margin. And margin is what helps you handle the surprises that always come in big ministry moments, but you can handle them with ease, clarity, and joy. If this has been helpful for you and has made you start to think about how you can better navigate these leadership rhythms, it can also be helpful to understand how authority and responsibility function in your church, especially as a female leader. Different churches operate from different theological perspectives on women in leadership. Our highlighted resource for this month is the theological cheat sheet, which walks you through the seven major viewpoints so you can better understand the environment you're leading in and navigate it with wisdom and confidence. You can download that resource in the show notes or go to www.katiecole.com forward slash theological. You are doing important work, work that deserves planning and pacing so you can bring your best. And we are here to cheer you on. I'm so glad we got to spend this time together on the Female Church Leaders Podcast. I hope you're walking away encouraged, equipped, and reminded that your calling truly matters. To keep growing, join us for our next Closing the Leadership Gap cohort at ClosingThe Leadership Gap.com. It's a guided coaching experience, including live QA with me, designed to accelerate your leadership journey. If this podcast has been helpful to you, would you please take a moment to follow, rate, and share it? Your engagement helps the algorithms suggest our resources to female church leaders we haven't had a chance to meet yet. And don't forget to follow at female church leaders on Instagram for encouragement and leadership tools designed just for you. You can also follow my personal feed at Katie Cole, spelled K A D I C O L E. Keep leading faithfully, keep growing your leadership gifts, and I'll see you next Monday because Sunday is coming and you are going to be ready for it.