And on the seventh day

A while back, I offered a few brief thoughts on work, rest and Christian ministry. Jason Goroncy is up to the ninth part of an excellent series exploring this whole topic in much greater detail. The series is titled "On the cost and grace of parish ministry". His most recent post on Sabbath is a highlight in a series of strong pieces (it also has links to the first eight posts). Here is a taste:

"Sabbath is not about taking a ‘day-off’ – what Eugene Peterson calls ‘a bastard Sabbath’ (in Working the Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity, p. 66); rather it is a conscious effort of entering into, and responding to, the rhythms and actions of Spirit at work in creation. It is realising that God is not waiting for us to wake up to begin working each day, but that God is working already and inviting us, when we awake, firstly to listen, and only then to join in."

Work, rest and ministry: how many hours should a Christian pastor work?

A few years ago, I completed a B.D. at MTC. Most of my classmates are now serving around Sydney (and various other bits of the world) leading congregations as full-time paid ministers of the word (some are translating the Scriptures in other lands, some are teaching in schools, some are being full-time parents, some are doing other excellent things here and there).

We keep up with each other through an email list whose discussions have at times been very amusing, very useful (as people share resources and ideas and struggles) and occasionally very contentious. Over three or four years studying together, we developed a healthy mutual respect and learned to rely on each other's insights.

A day or two ago, a new debate started (or restarted, as it has been discussed a number of times before) concerning the appropriate number of working hours for those serving as pastors of Christian congregations (which includes the majority of the group). A number of excellent points have been raised and discussed and a number of models suggested. I thought I would post my contribution to the discussion (slightly edited to remove references to specific names).

Dear all,

Coming from a bunch of girls and guys who only work on a Sunday, I don't know what the issue is!

But then again, I'm approaching my 31st birthday and have spent the grand total of 11 months in full-time employment, so I don't know why anyone would listen to me on this matter. Thus, everything said here ought to come with a sodium warning for the amount of NaCl with which it must be taken.

And so, more seriously, thanks to M for raising what I think is up there as possibly the #1 long-term danger for pastors, presbyters, priests and paid-ministry-of-the-word staff (does that cover everyone? Hmm, "PhD students" also starts with 'p'...). And thanks M for your honesty about your struggles with this issue. It is not easy, and the fact that the kinds of roles that many of you fill do not have obvious distinctions between work and non-work only makes it harder. Furthermore, it is easy to seek quick answers through adopting a one-size-fits all approach, as well as easy to repudiate such an approach as legalistic and believing that my situation/character/marriage/church is unique.

And even if we don't set ourselves up as superior to our classmates and colleagues (able to handle constant pressures that others need a break from), perhaps we sometimes (consciously or unconsciously) set up our work as more important than the work done by our congregation members. If I am serving God's church and proclaiming his good news for the poor and teaching his word and ministering his holy sacraments and so on, then how can I stop for anything other than death (and its foretastes in hunger and tiredness)?

However, even leaving aside the highly problematic (and self-serving!) division of "gospel" work over against "secular" work, this question fails to note an even more important distinction: between work and rest (as P has so eloquently reminded us). In the beginning, the culmination and high point and goal of creation is not humanity, but Sabbath. And in the second creation account, the 'adam was created and placed in the garden to work and serve the ground, but also to enjoy the trees. We are made to smell the roses, not just put manure on them. We are first recipients of all God's good gifts (beginning with the breath of life and culminating in the holy Breath) before we are co-workers with him. We are first his children before being his servants. We are first those whose feet are washed by Christ before those who will die with him. In these ways, passivity is more fundamental to our creaturely (and Christian) existence than activity. And being presbyters, priests or PhD students doesn't change that. Christian leaders are Christians before being leaders.

Taking a slightly different tack, as someone who struggles more with laziness than workaholism, I wonder whether both sometimes arise from a similar source: the desire to please others (as M as suggested), otherwise known as status anxiety. While the workaholic may (as well as having wonderful and godly motives) fear the disapproval of others and so keep working, the lazy freeloader like myself may fear the discovery that even trying as hard as I could I would still not please others and so hangs back from trying too hard in order to avoid having to face this reality. Both the workaholic and the bum are (partially) motivated by a good desire (the desire for love and approval) that has been misplaced. It is good to be loved by others and to delight in being delighted in. But we are the delight of God.

"YHWH your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing.”

- Zephaniah 3.17*
*Yes, this is said to Israel, but onto this tree we have been grafted.

And so being loved (or hated, or - worst of all - simply ignored) by others can take its secondary place. Held in God's embrace, we are freed from constant anxiety and constant activity, freed to enjoy, to receive, to be. Our work is good and rightly takes time and care, effort and attention. But our rest is better.

While writing this post, my message on the list received this reply:

And yet, the Sabbath which is the high point of God's creative project is one in which he continues to work (cf. John 5.17) and is the (temporal?) context in which he invites humankind to join him in that work. Is it rest as passivity or rest as shalom, toil-less, peaceful labour which has the prior claim on our agendas? After all, the first command is to fill, not contemplate, creation; and although the trees of the garden are aesthetically pleasing before bodily nourishing, 'adam is placed there to work and not to watch, but watch over.

Here is my reply:

It was neither passivity per se nor (self-serving!) contemplation that I had in mind, but rest as receptivity that I was particularly arguing for. That, although it is more blessed to give than to receive, we can only give if and because we have first received (and continue to receive) everything from God. I am quite suspicious of turning "rest" into "doing more work" (even "gospel" work) because it sounds like the addict justifying her habit through special pleading. My point is that unless we acknowledge and dwell in the fact that we are creatures whose every breath comes as a free gift, then our frenetic activity can quickly become self-justification.

Before the first command came the first blessing. And that is what I am saying. Being blessed comes before obedience.

Ecclesial dirt and reputational purity

I have had a number of conversations in the last year or so with new or aspiring Anglican clergy that have revolved around the question of which parish to work in. This in itself is quite unsurprising. I studied at Moore College for four years and so spent much of my time with men and women preparing for a lifetime of service in various Protestant churches, mainly Anglican. At the end of a degree, the question of future ministry looms large: where will I serve God and his people? To talk with one's colleagues and friends while discerning an answer is common sense. Even for those who have decided not to pursue service further afield, the sheer number of churches in Sydney makes for a bewildering variety of options. A range of factors could be taken into account in determining an outcome: the ability to use one's particular gifts in the job description, existing relational ties to a congregation or significant individual, the chance to receive further training, the needs and opportunities of the local area, proximity to family, cultural familiarity, respect for the senior minister, confluence of ministry approach and personality, and many others.

What concerned, irritated and ultimately alarmed me was the extent to which one particular aspect seemed to dominate or feature prominently amongst the selection criteria in more than a few discussions. It wasn't "how much will I be paid?" or "will I get a comfortable house?" If such considerations were functioning consciously or unconsciously, they were rarely admitted. No, the criteria in question was: "will serving at this church damage my reputation and make it more difficult for me to get another position in future?"

The thinking, as best as I can reconstruct it, goes something like this. Some parishes in Sydney are seen by the dominant mindset as "tainted" in various ways. They might be a little more charismatic in worship and tone, a little higher in churchmanship (e.g. they might still celebrate Communion regularly), a little broader in the role of women in ministry, a little more open to certain thinkers (such as He Who Must Not Be Named (let the reader understand)), a little more into eating babies and Satan worship. OK, so maybe not the last one. In any case, and more seriously, such parishes depart from what is perceived to be "Sydney orthodoxy" in one or more respects. For those contemplating future employment opportunities, they represent a dangerous possibility of guilt by association. If I accept a position as catechist (student minister) or assistant there, I will gain a reputation for being charismatic/high church/liberal/soft - better to keep my head down and my name pure.

This is, of course, a caricature, but only just. Such reasoning disturbs me for at least three reasons.

(a) It assumes the world can be divided fairly neatly into white hats and black hats. The former are teachers or churches who are solid, reliable, trustworthy, orthodox, "gospel-centred". The latter are teachers or churches that are dangerously wrong, beyond the pale and from whom nothing ought to be learned lest I endanger my soul (not to mention my future ministry opportunities). Of course, everyone is actually a shade of grey: there is none so pure that I can safely accept her every word; there is none so wicked that in God's grace I have nothing to learn from him. We are all always doubly vulnerable: to sin and to grace.

(b) It assumes that I am passive in the interaction, that I will be infected by their "contagion", rather than their being infected by my "holiness". Jesus was contagiously holy; he touched lepers and made them clean instead of himself becoming unclean (Mark 1.40-42). If I think a certain parish is heading in the wrong direction, might not my presence – my prayer, listening, teaching, sharing, love – in God's grace exert some positive influence?

(c) It is based on fear. This fear is not simply that I might lose my way spiritually or theologically by falling under an unwise influence (a concern which may have some small place in healthy thinking), but a fear that others will think less of me, that I will lose honour by associating with the "dishonourable". And each individual who acts based on this fear feeds it in others by implicitly affirming it as a real fear. Although some interlocutors have claimed that they are "simply being realistic", I can't help feeling there are some parallels to a situation in which a man is being beaten by a small group of thugs and a large crowd watches, each individually using the "realistic" reasoning: "if I were the first to go to the victim's assistance, they would turn on me." What each doesn't realise is that all are waiting for someone to initiate action so they can join in.

I'm not saying that such differences between parishes in theology and practice are irrelevant. But the service of God, his people and his world is too important for us to be distracted by anxiety over reputation.
Fifteen points for each of the buildings.

Character planner

A Christian minister is like a financial planner for character. Rather than asking "what do you want to be doing in ten years' time?", she asks "in ten years' time, who do you want to be?"

And what can you start doing now to end up there?

O'Donovan on the church's role in society

An effective church with an effective ministry, in holding out the word of life, than which there is no other human good within the world or outside it, will render assistance to the political functions in societry by forwarding the social good which they exist to defend. But that is to take the very longest view of the relationship. In holding out the word of life, an effective church with an effective ministry issues the call "Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand!" And so in the short, the medium, and even the penultimate term the presence of the church in political society can be a disturbing factor, as those who first thought Christianity worth persecuting understood quite well. It presents a counter-political moment in social existence; it restrains the thirst for judgment; it points beyond the boundaries of political identity; it undermines received traditions of representation; it utters truths that question unchallenged public doctrines. It does all these things because it represents God's kingdom, before which the authorities and powers of this world must cast down their crowns, never to pick them up again.

- Oliver O'Donovan, Ways of Judgment, 292.