On my evolving understanding of vocation
I used to think my understanding of “vocation” was fairly developed. I was certain that “vocation” does not equal “occupation” and “call” does not equal “job.” I was pretty sure what I wanted to do when I grew up. I thought I had vocation all figured out. Until, that is, life brought me to understand that my view of vocation was too narrow, too individualistic, and too, well, simple.
Life complicates things. Or, I suppose, God does. My old understanding of vocation was all about me. Well, that’s not quite true. There were three parties in my old vocation thoughts: me, God, and the people with whom I might vocate. This view was influenced by the Buechner quote, “The place where God calls you is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.” The quote in all its prettiness is really overly simple if you think of it mainly about what one does in one’s job, or how one earns money. Or perhaps it’s thinking about call in terms of “place” that is too specific. Sure, if you’re looking for a job with the quote in mind you might be inspired to meaningful work, but you also might forget about breadth of life. I’ll get back to that in one moment.
A few years ago, when I went before the committee that determines readiness for ordination, several of the clergy members of the committee had a problem with how I described my call to ordained ministry. I told them my faith journey and how I understood my gifts and graces to fit really well with the tasks of a pastor, but that wasn’t enough. One of the members of the committee put it something like this, “Adam, we need to hear from you why you are called to this and nothing else, why this is the only thing you could do to serve God faithfully and fully.”
Well, I caved. I went back to my hotel room and worked on the statement a bit and gave it some stronger language. I’m not sure I should have, though. A candidate is in a horrible position at a point like this. All the power is on the side of the committee and there’s nobody advocating on behalf of the candidate. It’s ten against one and if you want to be a pastor you might as well cave to the ten.
What, with the benefits of a few years of hindsight, I should have said to those picky pastors would have explained a much broader understanding of call than to one office, or to one position which one must do solely. Maybe it’s a generational thing, but my friends and I don’t think of the one job we must do for the rest of our lives, but rather, about the way in which we should live while we do whatever job we happen to have at the time.
In fact, I think it is better never to say “I am called to the office of Minister of Word and Sacrament,” but I am called to the tasks of a minister, “I am called to preach the word and lead the congregation in its worship life including the sacraments.” That latter way of putting it is integral to Presbyterian polity, so I wonder why candidates are pushed to say they’re called to the office instead of called to what one does when holding the office of ministry.
Perhaps this is all too pie-in-the-sky for you. If so, I’m sorry. If you know me well, you’ll probably be able to read between the lines a bit too. But this much is clear to me: the church would do well to stop speaking of vocation in terms of what one does, and move to speaking of how one does.
So now my understanding of vocation now is much more holistic, incorporating my relationship with my wife, a belief that it’s how one lives not just what pays the bills that matters, and a clarity that God is acting in my life beyond the 9 to 5 work week. Vocation, for me, is more than what “I do,” what pays the bills, but — primarily, perhaps — how I live. Vocation is how I live in relationship with my wife, my family, my congregation, my world. Vocation isn’t just what I hope to do one day, but how I live this day.
Some Saturday Sundries
The blog has been a bit quiet lately, for many reasons. First, I suppose, is this little thing called school which continues to go well but certainly keeps me busy. A close second, however, is the amount of time it takes to find a job/call. Friends in last year’s senior class warned me about how all-consuming looking for a job can be, and I guess I believed them, but now that I’m actually doing it I understand. And it’s not just about time, but mental energy as well.
It takes a good few hours to perfect a resume for a particular job, write the cover letter, recall how to make your printer print envelopes, that sort of thing. And it’s not like I’m putting all my eggs in one basket. Eventually, I’ll blog more about the details of next year, but I’m not quite ready for that.
I’ve also been tied up with final preparations for the ING Georgia Half Marathon on Sunday morning. I’m feeling okay about it all, but running 13.1 miles at the break of dawn is still far from normal — both physically and mentally — so I’m hoping it goes well enough. I’m also excited for the course around downtown/midtown Atlanta. I hear it’s really fun and there’s lots of folks out there cheering you on. The organizers are pretty smart and have your name printed on your number bib thingy, so folks can encourage you by name as you run by.
I’ve also spent some time this week caring for Megan who got her wisdom teeth out Wednesday. She’s been a great patient though is plenty ready for the swelling to go down. I, on the other hand, almost fainted in the surgeon’s office which, I think, just goes to show my amazing skills of empathy.
So that’s me at the moment. I’ve got some post ideas for next week but our internet is out at the apartment so I can’t research them so they’ll just have to wait. Continued thoughts for those in North Dakotans and Minnesotans in the flood path. May the sandbags hold.
image by Jade Colley
Links for CTS Lunch and Learn: "Blogging for the Kingdom"
Wednesday, March 25, I’m teaching “Blogging for the Kingdom” at Columbia Seminary, a Lunch and Learn for faculty and staff. Below are some links we’ll be exploring during the session. Comment, if you like, and leave other links to blogs doing ministry. If you are around CTS, feel free to join us (faculty, staff, student, friend, whatever) — and bring a laptop to share if you can — 12:30-1:30 Ellis Room.
Lunch and Learn Instructions:
To the Lunch and Learn participants: explore these blogs — or any other blogs you find — consider how they are doing ministry. Don’t necessarily read in order, or decently, or restrict at all. Go, now, hurry up, click away and don’t freak out, the Holy Spirit has wifi access, I promise.
- CTS Student David Park: Next Gener.Asian Church
- The Christian Century Blog Network, CC Blogs
- My Montreat
- Bruce Reyes-Chow’s Blog, dad, husband, pastor, moderator, geek
- Adam Walker Cleaveland’s blog, Pomomusings
- Fidelia’s Sisters, The Young Women Clergy Project
- Tribal Church
- Tensegrities, a blog by Mary Hess a professor at Luther Seminary
Why "bi-vocational" is a dirty word
In many forward-thinking church circles the term “bi-vocational” is catching on as a descriptor for the future of ordained ministry. Advocates will say thing like, “As churches decline — especially in rural areas — and as society morphs, we need more and more folks called to bi-vocational ministry.” Bi-vocational pastors work a secular job part or full time, and pastor churches on the side. In many ways, I get the term, get the need, get the description. But, when I think about it theologically, “bi-vocational” becomes a nonsense word. “Bi-vocational” should be scratched from our vocabulary. Here’s why.
The mainline church uses “vocation” to mean something like, “one’s calling to serve God in the world.” One might be called to ordained ministry (and before that be called to seminary). One might be called to work in the home without pay. One might be called to be a teacher, or doctor, or whatever. Ok, this is not new, and not too complicated.
Though we often speak of “vocation” in terms on par with “occupation,” the church tries to make a broader claim that vocation is not just what one does but how one does it. Vocation is less about what salary one makes than who one serves by doing so. Ok, so far so good, but when we speak of vocation we don’t say, “That doctor was called to heal that patient, then called separately to care for that person, then called completely unrelatedly to speak to the nurse in that way.” We don’t break up vocation to individual actions; vocational is a holistic term.
That’s the problem with “bi-vocational,” it implies that someone is called to two separate unrelated things. “Bi-vocational” splits a person up. It sets up a problematic western dualism. “Bi-vocation” says you are called to this AND this, but they are separate, and different, and maybe even at odds. Perhaps it even suggests one approaches the two vocations with a different sense of service, obligation, or understanding of God — “in this vocation I serve God, in this one I just serve burgers.” NOooo! The whole understanding of vocation that the church has been working on at least since the reformation is one that says we can serve God as we serve burgers and clean bathrooms and teach kids and stay at home, yadda, yadda. We can be called to an amazing variety of service.
So why do we limit God, split personalities up, and place one vocation over another in our continued use of the term, “bi-vocational?” I’m not certain, but I think it probably is related to a simplistic understanding of vocation in the first place. More on that later, but for now I insist: folks are not called to “bi-vocational ministry” but to serve God with their whole lives in creative, sustaining, life-giving ways that sometimes lead to being paid from multiple sources.
Reading Week Happy Hour!
“Reading Week” at Columbia Seminary can be roughly translated to, “a teaser of a week during which you’ll have even more work than usual.” My final reading week at Columbia was exactly that — with the added teaser of some really beautiful spring weather outside.
That said, in my giddiness of slaying Carlos’ multiple-choice beast, I leave you with my Friday Happy Hour random thoughts:
- I wonder if Dave Letterman is jealous of Leno’s interview with Obama? poor Dave
- why does the good bread at the supermarket always come with the outer bag, and an inner tighter bag as well
- after two fantastic Publix shopping experiences lately I declare: Publix is better than Kroger
- oh for the switching of acronyms, that the PC(USA) might pay like AIG
- my new fancy running shorts make me feel like I’m running naked; I’m not convinced this is a good thing
- as if I need confirmation, I realized I was addicted to coffee when I got back from a run and craved, not water, but TWO cups of my lovely sumatra blend
- why, oh why, Mr. Mizuno did you not make these kicks in size 14? — I’d buy them in a jiffy!
- fyi, winter is officially over
- thinking of those North Dakotans who may be in the path of a really bad flood
- I wonder if it’s possible to measure whether people complaining about the new facebook will increase or decrease people complaining about the church?
Mission Trips These Days
Way back in 1999, I traveled with the Presbytery of Florida on a Partnership Delegation to our sister presbytery, The Presbytery of the Western Cape, in Capetown. I remember then, as a sixteen year-old, having a difficult time explaining to my friends that I, no, was not going on a mission trip, but a “partnership delegation.” Yes, I said, it’s a church trip. But it’s not like that. Sure, the trip was part of our mission to serve others, but it was mostly about getting to know our brothers and sisters in South Africa better, about seeing what God was doing there rather than bringing our hammers and paint brushes or check books or whatever.
So I’m studying for my World Christian final at the moment — well, not at this precise moment — and found an interesting debate buried in my week three notes that brought these memories flooding back. My prof, Carlos Cardoza-Orlandi (great guy, tough grader) made two very pointed points — or jabs, really, at contemporary mission trips in most of our churches. I happen to agree with them, so I’ll put them in my own words.
Mission Trip Point Number One:
Why are you doing a mission trip in the first place? Chances are, it probably smacks of colonialism. If you go in thinking you’re all American and have the answers and the hammers and the check book, well, your heart is not in the right place to receive the gospel. If you go in with that perspective, you might have your eyes opened, or you might just get a bit too excited with your own self and how much you “helped those poor people.”
Why not, then, consider a Partnership Delegation — and future trips back and forth — that focuses on what God is doing in each place, and how we can mutually build up each other in love. Partnership recognizes that we are co-agents in mission, and the roles, often, are not what we expect them to be.
Mission Trip Point Number Two:
Ok, you understand the challenges but you’ve decided to do a more traditional mission trip, but do it well. Let’s work with that. For your congregation, the opportunity for intergenerational fellowship is really compelling, and there’s this great organization that’s got a really good program set up for you that’s not ladened with colonial baggage. Ok, spiffy, but….
Chances are, the trip will really shake up some of those members’ lives. Experiencing the gospel in a foreign land can be a real eye-opening life-changing thing. So, Carlos says — and I’ll second him — as you plan the trip, keep planning things for the group to do after. When you return, your trip is only beginning. Then your call is to help translate your experience to the members of your congregation. One powerpoint presentation is not enough. Work long and hard at it.
Overall, as Carlos would say, the agency of mission is not a one-way street. Sure, there can be a perceived reversal of mission on short term trips, but let’s think more broadly too.
So now, even 10 years later, I’m all the more grateful for that Partnership Delegation to the Presbytery of the Western Cape. As we search for new ways of being missionaries in this changing world, may transformation strike us all.
image by Sara&Joachim
I'm Killing Your Newspaper and I'm Only Partly Remorseful
Looking for a first job/call in the PC(USA) is rather difficult these days (see this post), but I do thank my lucky stars that I’m not job hunting with a masters in journalism. The future does look pretty bleak — and scarily undefined — for print journalism these days.
In part, thanks to bloggers like me, but also thanks to more general changes in technology and availability of screens and instant news, newspapers all over the country are in dire straits. You’ve been under a very big log if you haven’t heard of this by now, which probably means you don’t read any news at all so you don’t care, but I do — both care and read news — and it’s a little tricky what to think about things.
I’m not for propping up businesses with failing business models — as I suggested in the case of Wordsmiths bookstore in Decatur which closed this month, by the way, and anyone who donated funds to them lost the charity creditors. But I am for a hearty healthy press since it does everyone good and keeps us all honest.
That said, a few weeks ago, I received a renewal notice for the print version of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that graces my front step every morning. And I don’t think I’m going to renew. Some of this is just timing: we’re moving at the end of May. But, also, though I read the newspaper every morning I’ve already read much of it in AJC newsfeeds on my feed reader. I’ve already read the national news — and probably of a higher quality — online. And the local story I get from several Decatur blogs.
I do really love the dead paper edition of the news, cause it’s easier to read if nothing else, but I can’t justify the ridiculously high cost of renewing the AJC. I recognize that when I read the print version, I read stories that I wouldn’t read if I was just surfing online. My horizons are further expanded by the print version. But that’s not enough to entice me to write that three-figure check for renewal.
While many bemoan the state of the business, others are making the distinction: print journalism may be dying a quick death, but journalism is still alive and kicking — it’ll be just fine. That makes sense to me. And I’d love to participate in a micropayment scheme to see how that works. Non-profit papers make sense to me as well. After all, I just made my NPR pledge once again.
So what’s a news-buff nice guy supposed to do in this economy? I don’t know. And to complicate matters deliciously there’s always the practice of Marva Dawn, who as a spiritual discipline does not read newspapers. I once heard Dawn say she understands the gospel message to be bigger than the hubbub of newspapers and it’s easier for her to be faithful without the din of the daily headlines.
Until my subscription runs out, I’m happy to read the AJC with my toast and coffee. After that, I just hope I don’t get any peanut butter on my MacBook keys.
image by lusi
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