Five Rules for Life

If I were not a follower of Jesus Christ, I would be glad to have Jonathan Sacks as my rabbi!  Once again, I find myself nodding in agreement, this time with his ‘Five Rules for Life’ as published in the Times (5/1/13). 

Here are the five rules, in speech marks with my own brief comments added.

1.     ‘The first thing to do is dream…. Dreams are where we visit the many lands and landscapes of human possibility and discover the one where we feel at home. The great religious leaders were all dreamers.’

I am currently encouraging my church to dream dreams for ‘Vision 20/21’, based upon John 20:21 (‘As the Father has sent me, I am sending you’).  We are asking what are our dreams for the year 2021?  Why 2021?  Well, it’s not so close that we feel those dreams unattainable, nor so far away that they mean nothing for our generation.  If we aim low, we are likely to hit the mark.  If we dream large, we may not attain it but we are likely to achieve so much more for Jesus!

2.     ‘The second rule is, follow your passion. People who follow their passion tend to lead blessed lives. Happy in what they do, they tend to spread happiness to those whose lives they touch. That is a life worth living.’

Sixteen years as a Baptist minister have taught me that I am a ‘big picture’ person rather than a ‘details’ person.  Where it is possible I am happy to delegate the latter.  Some people may be passionate about the detail, but I am not!  Sixteen years has also taught me to say ‘No’ to things that do not appeal to me.  For example, I had a passion to see the Street Pastors’ Scheme set up in my former city of Peterborough, so I took steps to help it happen.  I turned down the opportunity of store chaplaincy because it did not excite me, important though it may be.

3.     ‘The third rule I learnt from the psychotherapist who survived Auschwitz, Viktor Frankl, whose Man’s Search for Meaning is one of the most widely read books of our time. Frankl used to say: Don’t ask what you want from life. Ask what life wants from you.’

Before I trained as a Baptist minister, I had a career in the building society world.  For a long time, I found great fulfillment in it.  I moved to another building society for a substantial pay increase and a company car, only to find that the job satisfaction vanished.  I had had a sense of calling to pastoral ministry for some time; now was the time to pursue it.  This was what life – or God – wanted from me.  I believe He still does!

4.     ‘The fourth rule is: make space in your life for the things that matter, for family and friends, love and generosity, fun and joy.’

Early in my time as a Baptist minister, I became a bit of a workaholic.  This was what I had been called to and I was enjoying it so much that my working week was closer to 80 hours than the 35-40 that is the norm in other walks of life.  I tended to wait until the end of the week to see what time was left for leisure.

I came to realize that overwork is not a virtue.  It is a denial of the Sabbath rest that God has built into his plan for us. I now try to build leisure into my week, irrespective of how much there is to do.  I work from rest, rather than the other way around.  I feel much better for it and, strangely, the ministry is usually still done and is probably more effective.  Oh, and I still enjoy the ministry – most of the time!

5.     ‘The fifth rule is work hard, the way an athlete or concert pianist or cutting-edge scientist works hard. The American psychologist, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, calls this the principle of “flow”. By this he means the peak experience you have when you are working so hard at a task that you are unaware of the passing of time.’

Whilst overwork is not a virtue, hard work is!  It is quite possible for clergy to ‘underwork’, since a lot of the time no one knows what we do!  Sacks reminds that the Hebrew word for serving God – ‘avodah’ – also means hard work.  Whilst ministry can be a slog, I often find that there is fulfillment in working hard especially when following a passion.

Sacks concludes:

There are many other rules but these are some of the most important. Try them and you will be surprised by joy.’

Accepting God's Call

This is the text of what I shared with my church, as I had the emotional task of telling them that I and my family are moving on.

We are called to accept one another as Christ accepted us. Sometimes, we are called to accept one another’s decisions.

As Christians, I think that we should be constantly asking the Lord if we are walking in his will, and serving in the place that he wants us to be. Last year, I spent much time in prayer and through retreat days, asking God if here at Park Road was where he wanted me to be. To be honest, I really didn’t know what he was saying, but whatever it was, I wanted to be obedient. With that in mind, I decided to talk to some other churches to see what God would say, seeking either a renewed call to be minister at Park Road or a new call to serve elsewhere. One door in particular kept opening wider: through a meeting with a pastoral search team, and a meeting with deacons, and a visit to preach and meet the church, and then, last weekend, an invitation to preach with a view. After a special church members’ meeting last Thursday, that has culminated with a clear and decisive call to be minister and team leader at Newbury Baptist Church. So, in the summer, the Edworthy family will be leaving Peterborough to go to pastures new.

We love this church, and since you are the church, that means we love you. We have shared with you through life’s joys and sorrows and, thankfully, the joys have come out on top. We can think of many reasons not to leave Peterborough: among them, the exciting things that are happening here, our friendships here, our children’s education, Wendy’s job. One thing outweighs all of those things, and will always outweigh them – that is … God’s will. We believe that God is calling us to Newbury and from Newbury, because He is already there! I recognize the implications of our departure from here, but I know that God has his plans for this church and this city.

Discerning God’s will is not always easy, and Wendy and I have agonized through this process of what God has and hasn’t being saying to us. However, a friend reminded me that living in God’s will is the best place to be. I feel completely at peace about accepting the call to Newbury, and believe this to be God’s will. We ask your prayers for us as a family as we plan to move, and your prayers for Newbury Baptist Church as with them we enter into a new sphere of ministry. We shall continue to pray for you, not least as we have four more months of ministry to share, and as the future unfolds.

With love in our Lord Jesus Christ.

18^th March 2012

Mr Holland's Opus

Recently, I was introduced to the 1995 film, 'Mr Holland's Opus', starring Richard Dreyfuss.

Mr Holland is a musician and composer. He dreams of composing music that will be performed to many. Like many in his field, he takes his teaching certificate as a 'fall-back' in case the composing doesn't pay. In the film, we see him as a young newly-married man, who takes a teaching job in a high school. With his income, and his wife's, in four years he will be able to give up teaching and concentrate on composition. That is what he really wants to do.

It doesn't happen! Mr Holland teaches, grudgingly at first, trying to draw out a little talent from a lack-lustre collection of music students. As time goes by, he becomes loved by the students for bringing out their potential, but still he dreams of being a famous composer.

Mr Holland's teaching career is brought to a close, age 60, by budget cuts at his school. Now, he protests at the lack of options for the pupils at the school, but to no avail. He thinks he has achieved nothing of what he should have, as he wanders through the school a final time. Hearing a noise from the school assembly hall, he opens the door to find out what it is, and is greeted by enthusiastic applause. Pupils, past and present, are there to say thank you and wish him farewell. The Chair of the Governing body gives a speech. She tells the audience that he is not famous, and he has dreamed of being somewhere else. Then, stirringly, she says to Mr Holland:

'Look around you. We are the notes of your symphony!'

It's good to have hopes and dreams. Yet I wonder how many of us spend much of our lives wishing that we were somewhere else, when all along we are in the right place? Perhaps our impact where we are, is greater than our impact would be if we were where we wanted to be? Maybe, when we meet our Maker, God will rewind the film of our lives and say to us, 'These people you served, these situations you battled through, these times when you thought you had achieved nothing - these are the notes of your symphony!'