Nine emails, that is how many emails I answer per hour somedays - an email every 6.66 minutes. They are about this set of songs, those sermons, that building team, this project, that meeting, this committee, etc, etc. I wonder how God perceives this endless never-completed task we call work? There are several interesting overlaps between Communism and Christianity that I have discovered in life. And one of the main ideas that we share a kinship for is the idea that work is, in and of itself, virtuous.
When we lived in Russia, you would see these huge (everything was done on a grand scale in Russia) banners and marquees on factories, filled with propaganda about how the workers rule and are the most valuable people in society, etc, etc. And in the church it seems that we value nothing, as much as we value hard work, effort, and lets burn-out for Jesus and all that jazz. But burnout by definition means depleting yourself . We think people in “caring professions” experience burnout to a far higher degree than do other professions, because such people are idealists, and that makes us prone to disillusionment. I could easily be the master of disillusionment. But what I just stated is not accurate, the caring professions do not burn out more than other professions - - they just have been studied much more in relationship to burnout, than have other professions. I read one statistic today that states that lawyers in New York City leave their firms at the rate of 36% per year! (The assumption being that most of them don’t go to any other firm)
The problem is that work and home have crossed over one another so much in ministry that there are no boundaries any longer. Perhaps there never were. Schaufeli uses this phrase work-home interference to describe the phenomena of work and home crossing over into one another’s spheres and blurring the lines, and boundaries of life. It’s that aspect of ministry when you get a call during your family dinner, or people drop over for counseling when you are having your bedtime story with your children, or in our case having your work place and home being one and the same place.
Granted the whole idea of a 40 hour work week, and probably the concept of family time as well, is strictly a recent Western idea that can show no scripture and verse for support. And if you get outside of Western zip-codes, finding modern day sweat shops is an easy thing to do. Hey where unemployment exceeds 40%, if you don’t like the hours - then fine go home because there are six more people just waiting to take your place; e.g. the worker doesn’t have a chance.
I just wonder if our work days, work pace, work commitment, work attitude, work mentality and workaholism bring honor and glory to God? And if it doesn’t then why do we continue? And if does, why don’t we work more? This is a tough subject and one that is becoming more of an issue for me as I get older . . . it is much more taxing to keep up those same hours now, than it was when I was 20 years younger. I guess the real question is, does He want me too? Another person defined burnout as “when we wake up one morning and realize that what we’re doing has appalling little value” and when that happens in the church it is far more than burnout, it is a crisis in faith.
I might need to disconnect for a while and take a break.
When we lived in Russia, you would see these huge (everything was done on a grand scale in Russia) banners and marquees on factories, filled with propaganda about how the workers rule and are the most valuable people in society, etc, etc. And in the church it seems that we value nothing, as much as we value hard work, effort, and lets burn-out for Jesus and all that jazz. But burnout by definition means depleting yourself . We think people in “caring professions” experience burnout to a far higher degree than do other professions, because such people are idealists, and that makes us prone to disillusionment. I could easily be the master of disillusionment. But what I just stated is not accurate, the caring professions do not burn out more than other professions - - they just have been studied much more in relationship to burnout, than have other professions. I read one statistic today that states that lawyers in New York City leave their firms at the rate of 36% per year! (The assumption being that most of them don’t go to any other firm)
The problem is that work and home have crossed over one another so much in ministry that there are no boundaries any longer. Perhaps there never were. Schaufeli uses this phrase work-home interference to describe the phenomena of work and home crossing over into one another’s spheres and blurring the lines, and boundaries of life. It’s that aspect of ministry when you get a call during your family dinner, or people drop over for counseling when you are having your bedtime story with your children, or in our case having your work place and home being one and the same place.
Granted the whole idea of a 40 hour work week, and probably the concept of family time as well, is strictly a recent Western idea that can show no scripture and verse for support. And if you get outside of Western zip-codes, finding modern day sweat shops is an easy thing to do. Hey where unemployment exceeds 40%, if you don’t like the hours - then fine go home because there are six more people just waiting to take your place; e.g. the worker doesn’t have a chance.
I just wonder if our work days, work pace, work commitment, work attitude, work mentality and workaholism bring honor and glory to God? And if it doesn’t then why do we continue? And if does, why don’t we work more? This is a tough subject and one that is becoming more of an issue for me as I get older . . . it is much more taxing to keep up those same hours now, than it was when I was 20 years younger. I guess the real question is, does He want me too? Another person defined burnout as “when we wake up one morning and realize that what we’re doing has appalling little value” and when that happens in the church it is far more than burnout, it is a crisis in faith.
I might need to disconnect for a while and take a break.
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