Hello Reader,
I woke up one day this late spring to realize I had become a "busy pastor."
Back at Hope College, I knew God had called me to be a pastor, so I read every book on theology and pastoral ministry I could get my hands on. One particularly influential book for me was The Contemplative Pastor by Eugene Peterson. I have never forgotten a section of the second chapter, "The Unbusy Pastor." Peterson describes his own battle with being too busy and explained there are two main reasons pastors find themselves too busy and overworked: vanity and laziness.
A pastor might be busy because of vanity. It feels good to be doing all the important things and be trusted to do everything. Our culture values those who "grind" and "hustle" and who are always busy doing something important. To be too busy to do the important spiritual work of a pastor can be rooted in our own ego or vanity.
A pastor might be busy because they are lazy. This sounds counter-intuitive -- how can you be lazy if you are always working and always exhausted? The laziness Peterson identifies is an unwillingness to do the hard work of discernment. Of all the good things I could be doing, what is the one thing I should be doing, what is the one thing that God is actually calling me to do. A laziness in the area of discernment between good work and the right work can lead to being too busy.
I read that section when I was probably 19 years old and it has always stuck with me. I have referenced in conversations with theological students and budding pastors. I have included it in my work on growing more rooted in Jesus.
So, having read all the right books early in my pastoral formation, I have been vaccinated against pastoral busyness and so I can proudly say that I regularly live as an "unbusy pastor."
I wish that were true.
Late this spring, I was Busy (capitalization intentional). I was dealing with crisis after crisis on various different boards in different organizations (and different levels). I knew I was doing important work, and that I was adding something valuable to every situation, but I was miserable. I kept thinking that I needed to get out from under one or more of these responsibilities, but it seemed impossible. As I was confessing all of this to my elders and deacons, I experienced their compassion, not judgment. A few days after that initial conversation with my church's leadership, one of the elders sat down in my office and encouraged me to step down from multiple roles.
He echoed a sentiment I had also been hearing from my spiritual director, "Just because this is someone's responsibility, doesn't mean it is your responsibility to fix, Stephen."
In that moment, I remembered Eugene Peterson and the reasons pastors become busy. Was there some vanity in wanting to be needed in all those situations? Possibly. Had I neglected to do some discernment on what was the right thing to do, not just a good thing to do? Absolutely.
I share this story for two reasons.
First, maybe you are feeling Busy right now, just as I was a few months ago. Maybe you wonder how you got there and if it is possible to ever get out. If so, I want to encourage you to go on the same journey I have been on. Take the time to do the hard work of discernment. Deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Jesus. What is God actually calling you to do? Are there things you are doing that keep you busy but are not actually your responsibility? What are you saying "No" to because you keep saying "Yes" to everything else?
There are days and even weeks when I am still too busy. There are still times where I feel like most of the work I am doing is disconnected from my true calling. However, the most important step we can take is the next one.
Second, I share this story because reading good books and understanding deep theology is important, but it is not enough in itself. At Peniel Press, we believe that good theology is good discipleship. Theology should not just puff up our minds but serve our walk as disciples of Jesus Christ. However, I had read all the right books (and even written some decent ones, as you will see below), but I still faced the same challenges and temptations. My theological reading didn't prevent me from facing temptation or trials, but it did help me diagnose what was happening once I woke up to the situation.
In addition to this personal story, in this issue of Theological Footnotes I want to share a section of my book, Rooted, that engages with the same situation I found myself in. It is from chapter 4, "The Land of Forgetfulness," and I hope it blesses you today.
Obedience as Avoidance
Ironically, we can be most forgetful of God when we are most vigilant about obeying him. Like Jonah, we can use the command of the Lord to avoid the presence of the Lord. Commitments in the church can pile up and we can convince ourselves that we are alright, even though we have not prayed in weeks. We use ‘working for the Lord’ as a means of avoiding his presence. On the outside, everything can be clean and in order, but inwardly we continue to run from God.
Just as we cannot avoid sin by running from community into the desert, we also cannot avoid sin simply by following all the external rules. Monks and nuns who have left the world and entered a monastery often nd it was easy to fall prey to spiritual pride and performance. Where everyone is committed to following God as much as possible, even obedience can become a show or a competition. Herman Bavinck says, “It is precisely the history of asceticism that is best calculated to cure us of the error that sin can be overcome by asceticism. People take their hearts with them when they enter a monastery, and from the heart arise all sorts of sins and iniquities.” We cannot outrun our selves and we cannot outrun God.
Obedience to God is good. Faithfulness is good. Service and activity are good. But even these good things can become twisted into means of keeping God at arm’s length. Self-righteousness often masks itself as righteousness. We can try to do all the right things in order to avoid having to slow down and deal with God. Like Israel, we may acknowledge God with our lips, but our hearts are far from him (Isa 29:13; Mt 15:8). Like Jonah, we might be condent that we know exactly what the LORD will say, and want nothing to do with it (Jonah 4:1-3).
Jesus himself warned us that “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’(Mt 7:21-23). Those who enter the kingdom will be those who walk according to the will of the Father. However, Jesus names the possibility that people can do all sorts of good in his name, but never know him.
Jesus has a word for us when faith becomes a performance, and when our obedience transforms from service to God to posturing before others:
Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.
“So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.
-- Matthew 6:1-8
We can turn obedience into a spectacle. We can turn our desires from loving and serving God to being seen by our neighbors. We can survive on this strategy of external obedience until suffering opens up a rift in our hearts. Suddenly, all the strategies we have used to keep ourselves going start sputtering. We begin to resonate with Dante, who opens his Divine Comedy with these lines:
Midway along the journey of our life
I awoke to find myself in a dark wood,
For I had wandered offfrom the straight path.”
We may be comfortable in our home, in sending our kids to a good school, and even by being part of a healthy church, but we nd ourselves in a dark wood because, for all our running and pushing and doing for God, we find ourselves lost. We try to x our restless wandering by doing more. We commit ourselves to a more rigorous devotional routine. We sign up for another Bible study. We start serving meals to others. All good things, but rearranging the externals does not get to the rootlessness in our hearts.
When Pastor Eugene Peterson entered a season of life he came to call “the Badlands,” he awoke to his own forgetfulness of God. “Gradually it dawned on me that the crevasse was not before me but within me. Things were worse than I had supposed; this was requiring more attention that I had planned on.”
A crevasse can open between what we say with our lips or do with our hands and what resides in our heart. Service can abound while prayer languishes. All should be right, but we sense that nothing is quite right and our restless search starts again. We have entered the land of forgetfulness.
 |
CA$9.99
Rooted: Growing in Christ in a Rootless Age
The soil of our society is not particularly well-suited for growing deep roots of character and Christian identity. The... Read more |
 |
$0.00
Consistory Training Manual 2025
You've been elected as an elder or deacon, but now what? How do you live out this important calling in the life of the... Read more |
Writing Updates
I continue to plug away at translating The Body of Doctrine. I made good progress this month, but my audacious goal to get the whole first draft done by the end of 2025 is still theoretically possible, but unlikely. Even as I work to become unbusy and get more connected with this part of my calling, translation is always slower than I think.
Count the Stars will be typeset soon, but my typesetter (my wife) has reminded me that it is difficult to have time to get a lot of computer work done with three kids home from school for the summer. She's right, which may mean we are looking toward a fall book release. I will keep you posted.
Thank You
We appreciate your prayers for the work we are doing in providing theological resources for the church. One of the best ways to support us to buy our books and tell your friends to do the same. However, if you'd like to contribute in other ways, you can always put a few dollars in the tip jar to get me a coffee. If someone shared this issue with you and you would like to receive it in your own inbox, you can sign up by clicking here.
From the desk of
Stephen C. Shaffer
Author, Pastor-Theologian
www.penielpress.com
Click Here to Read on the Web
