Workaolic Legacy

My resignation from ministry as a pastor was perhaps the greatest struggle I faced. Facing new limitations was/is the source of my greatest frustration and even at times anger. The greatest casualty of Parkinson’s disease is the theft of my ministry, my life’s work, and the excitement of looking forward to 20 years or so of my ministry as a pastor. Standing back, taking a look at my angst, it is easy to see a somewhat less than faith-full response. There are far too many personal pronouns for my response to reflect a strong  faith that God is … God is love …and God is at work. The work ethic was ingrained into the person and pastor I had become. A little background/nostalgia may help.


As a pastor of 25+ years, I had a pretty good sense of what it meant to live my faith. I knew that my first priority was to spend time with God so I wouldn’t be too cranky with the people and so I would have the resources I need to serve others. I knew that I must pray much and plan well to see progress or success in ministry. I knew unless I built leaders and included people in praying and planning there would be no shared vision. I knew that I was not a mega church pastor.

Writing these words, they seem rather presumptuous in an “I’ve got it all figured out” kind of way. But I’ve got that covered too because; I knew that I didn’t have it all figured out. At times I still wonder what shape my ministry would have taken had I not been diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease. My best bet is that I would have become much more, or at least somewhat more, radical in the “last ten years/nothing to lose” period of my ministry. Maybe God was trying to save his kingdom from the fallout from that scenario.

There was great struggle as I tried to get a handle on what it meant to live out my faith while facing the annoyance and restriction of disease. I am old enough to be old school. Pastoral candidates were indoctrinated with the idea that a pastor must work hard. A “successful” pastor (i.e. lots of bodies and maybe even souls in the pews) shared his secret of success with a few of us young pastors. “There are only three things you need to do” he said . . . "Work ! Work ! Work!"

The generation before me was called to pastoral ministry within the context of a holiness revival. My generation was called to pastoral ministry in the context of the revival of the Jesus movement. We didn’t fit the mold. In fact we hated anything that faintly resembled any kind of mold.

Everything was changing. Dress codes were out the window. Suddenly rock and roll and Jesus were being used in the same sentence. The 60's era was a rebellion against hypocrisy, materialism, war, and violence. The mantra was “do your own thing” , don’t trust anyone over 30, make love not war, give peace a chance.

There was a throng of young people who became genuine followers of Christ. These Jesus people were out to change the world for Jesus. I was part of this vast group of Jesus people who would go out into our world gossiping about Jesus. Jesus’ commandment to go into the world with the good news was a life style. College campuses, spring break, coffee houses, rock and roll concerts, were all vehicles for the good news of the gospel.

To a certain extent, however, we (as in old hippy types), inherited the standards of the greatest generation, those of the WWII era. The expectations of a pastor were quite clear: a minimum 60 hour work week, knock on doors, have lots of kids in Sunday School, make at least 1,000 calls (i.e. homes visits) each year, and incidentally preach twice on Sunday teach Wednesday, youth group Friday nights. It was an all consuming life, and not without biblical precedent. Paul spoke of pouring out his life as a drink offering and of sharing his very life as well as the gospel.

As a young pastor I did everything in the church not the least of which was the weekly bulletin. The process began with a paraffin stencil upon which letters could be typed. This stencil was cut in half, unless there was the good fortune of having a wide carriage type writer. The announcements, statistics, order of service, and information were typed on the stencil; if a mistake was made it could be corrected with some ether smelling red liquid stuff. There were even reports of some rather fantasmic pseudo-spiritual visions after making too many mistakes.

The art work was then added. These cute little pictures of everything from picnic baskets, to flags, banner headings came on a blue sheet from some publishing house somewhere. The item would be cut out of the blue page, then outlined on the stencil, the shape cut out of the stencil and the little picture glued in. THEN, the two previously cut halves were glued together, THEN was placed on the mimeograph machine, saturated with ink and printed on the bulletin paper. A blotter page went between each bulletin as it cranked out of the machine. Upon drying, the bulletins were folded and ready for another Lord’s Day. Seriously, we did that every week.

Workaholism was the name of the game. There is a central core of that legacy which is positive. It is a good thing to recognize that pastoral ministry is not just playing games. The ministry was and is joyful, fulfilling, and positive in so many ways. However, the nature of this life and calling is to be all consuming. Evangelism was the number one priority. Nothing was more important than bringing people come to faith in Christ.

In the months following my diagnosis, this workaholic lifestyle had become, to quote my neurologist, “untenable”. I could no longer work hard all week. Parkinson’s was an adversary setting boundaries of weariness, stiffness, and confusion around me. I struggled with the affliction of PD and the false guilt of doing so much less than I still expected of myself.

When the tragic circumstances shake your identity and clamp limitations on what you are able to do, the most difficult faith decision of all is to accept that which has come our way. Henri Nouwen speaks of drinking our cup … choosing our lives:

Drinking our cup: Choosing our lives

Drinking our cup of life makes our own everything we are living. It is saying, “This is my life,” but also “I want this to be my life.” Drinking the cup of life is fully appropriating and internalizing our own existence, with all its sorrows and joys.

It is not easy to do this. For a long time we might not feel capable of accepting our own life. We can move beyond our protest, put the cup of our life to our lips and drink it, slowly, carefully, but fully. Pg.30

Accepting the tragedy and pain of life is a daunting spiritual challenge. Living out our faith is not surrender to the tragedy and pain of life but to live with a sense of acceptance but not surrender. If we can somehow, with God, by grace live through our trial with faith God will be glorified, people will be encouraged, and we will know the joy of the Lord as our strength.