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Ouch…good ouch

Oct 31, 2005 Print This Post

//MOOD: Hmmm

//ITUNES: Holy Hold from the album “Pray Naked” by The Seventy Sevens

From scott… diagonally parked in a parallel universe: (via Monday Morning Insight)

ministers love to brag about how overworked they are.

it has been difficult for me to start this blog inasmuch as, of all the confessions i have made in this series, this one hits the closest to home. i have been grossly negligent in this area. for 20 years of ministry i have used this crutch to excuse all manner of laziness, poor scheduling, inadequate preparation and relational aloofness. and i’m not alone.

everything is work time. including blogging. and coffee with friends. and shopping and driving and phone calls and reading and praying and talking and writing and visiting and planning and napping and thinking and answering emails and surfing the net and going to the bank and reading the paper. many of you have full time jobs that you come home from in order to make it to the church on time for any number of reasons. i usually had a nice nap before the meeting because i would be putting in extra time.

on many levels it is an amazing life. you are your own boss. you can literally blow off weeks, even months, without anyone really knowing. all you need to do is be unavailable, look a little haggard and constantly whine about how busy you are and no one will know. trust me, i’ve tried it.

pastors love to point out how busy we are. we NEVER say that things are slack. pastors realize that people don’t think they work much and there is something ingrained in their psychie that must justify their existence. it is frustrating to have people constantly make fun of you for working “one hour a week”.

it is not as though some pastors do not get their hours in. many work chaotic shifts and are barraged by demands and complaints for which there is no obvious solutions. pastors complain that they are always working, which is an exaggeration, but even if that is true – they may be working but not always working hard. and frankly, a ton of pastors i know are just lazy. there is said it. i could give you lots of names.

my name would sometimes be on that list as well.

many pastors would react to reading this words. some are justified. others simply do not know or remember what it is like to have a real job. they live in a bubble of pseudo-activity and flexible scheduling. no one yells at them everyday at work. they don’t have to drive 2 hours to get to the job site. they don’t have to get up early, or pack a lunch, or listen to complaints all day. they can shut off their phone and not be fired. they don’t get disciplined for being 10 minutes late to work. they can deduct their mortgage from their taxible income. they can write off any activity or expense. they are the only one paid to be at a funeral.

this is a very one-sided blog but i have, on many occasions, bemoaned the struggles of the pastor’s life. it can be a very difficult vocation. very few people have, however, discussed the other side of the equation – the incredible perks, the lack of tangible accountability, the accolades, the tax breaks.

and right now i’m not even getting paid to blog.

I have actually been thinking about this a lot lately. How hard do I work? How hard do pastors in general work? There are a lot of things we do that can turn from good things into laziness.

For instance, hanging out with someone I am discipling is work. But when those meetings get longer and longer and we are just hanging out all the time…is that still work?

Sure, reading the latest book is work…but I would be reading that book whether I had this job or not.

Etc etc etc.

Once a year or so, I track my hours for a month or so and it is always an eye opening experience. I am blown away with the amount of time I spend doing certain things. I am in one of those seasons right now. And I am doing two things to guarantee accurate and honest appraisals of my time.

1) I am using Timebox to track my hours instead of writing them down myself, where it can be tempting to fudge them slightly.

2) I am giving them to Dan and Mark so they can give me feedback.

I know of a church that requires all of their pastoral staff to keep timecards. It’s tempting to me.