One of my best friends here in town is Pastor Jeff Louden, my Lutheran colleague. When I was appointed here in July of 2003 (more than 3 years ago, can you believe it?), Jeff was at the door after the service to greet me and welcome me to town, stopping here before going to serve his own congregation that morning. Since then we have met together often for coffee or for chili at the Mid Mountain Restaurant at Park City Mountain Resort during the ski season, just to share our joys and struggles in life and ministry. Everyone should have a friend like this with whom they can be brutally honest (and who is not afraid to tell you when you are, well, full of it!).
Jeff is also an instructor for the National Outdoor Leadership School and spends a few weeks each summer leading young adults and training them in wilderness travel and ethics in the Wind River Range of Wyoming. After returning from this summer’s trip, he shared with me a piece that was written by another instructor a few years back that he reads at the end of every course. It’s a little essay titled, “Why I Do What I Do.”
The writer describes the various reasons why he loves his job—from learning to live simply, to physical health, to relationships, to his understanding of life being shaped by time in the wilderness. In a world where so many people tend to gripe about their jobs, this little essay speaks volumes about the joy that one can find when they feel like they are fulfilling their calling.
Jeff and I met for coffee at Starbuck’s one morning and were talking this over. We got to thinking that it would be a great exercise for us to think about jotting down our own list of “Why I Do What I Do” items as a celebration of what it means to be in ministry. I started working this out during my morning devotional time and while I’m far from finished, there were a few things that leapt to mind:
1. I believe that I’m fulfilling my calling more than doing a job. As one of my seminary professors once put it, “When God calls you to ministry, he’s not doing you a favor.” Sometimes, that feels true—just ask the biblical prophets who often got skewered by people to whom they were trying to bring good news. The flip side of that, though, is that when God calls you, God also equips you. When you are called, tasks choose you rather than you choosing the task and everything from preaching on Sunday to emptying the garbage cans after Wonderful Wednesday has meaning and value because it is part of the larger picture. I believe that I’m called to be here and to serve in ministry. I rely every day on God to equip me to do that well.
2. I have the privilege of being involved in the significant moments of peoples’ lives.
I was recently officiating at a wedding for one of my former youth group kids. We are close to her family, she babysat our kids, and we have been on mission trips and in Bible studies together. To be present and facilitate her marriage wonderful young man was a real gift to me. Every time I baptize an infant, work with a family through grief, and even greet people on Sunday I am reminded that my ordination and presence is designed to be representative of God in those important, life-altering moments. There are times when I don’t represent God as well as I should due to my humanness getting in the way, but somehow God’s grace gets through anyway in spite of me. It is a special privilege to be with people when it matters.
3. I get to bring God’s Word to a congregation each week. Much of my week is spent thinking—thinking about scriptural texts and what they mean, thinking about what God has to say to our world, thinking about how to convey God’s truth in a new and life-giving way. Unlike a guest speaker or religious pundit, I get to bring what God is showing me to the same congregation every week where we can all wrestle with these words, be convicted by them, receive grace through them, and have our lives changed by them in relationship with each other over time. As I look out at your faces every Sunday I am reminded that God’s Word is not something that can be peddled, as Paul once said, but something shared within a community of faith. For me, Sunday morning is where God’s Spirit and Word and our listening ears meet together. I love that whole process and I am always amazed that God can use me to bring his Word. Sometimes I don’t know how God does it, but I do know that God’s Word, as it says in Isaiah 55:11, shall never return to him empty!
Well, those are just three that I thought of and I know that there are more. Writing out “Why I Do What I Do” is a great exercise for shifting the focus off of ourselves and our desire to do “something better” in the future and instead look to the joy and satisfaction of being right where we are. I encourage you to try it: take an afternoon or an evening with a good pen and a clean sheet of paper and write down all the reasons and benefits of doing what you do, be it your profession, your parenting, or something else that gives you joy. Perhaps you’ll begin to see things differently!
