Give Me a Break
Deryl Fleming
July 19, 2009
Mark 6: 30-32, 45-46
——————–
Anyone here need a break? If not, I suspect it’s because you’ve had one. On Monday the Washington Post carried a long article on the West Wing’s “grueling schedules and bleary eyes”. When the White House mess opens at 7:00 a.m. a line of staffers who have already been at the office for over an hour are waiting for breakfast. When the mess closes at 8:00 p.m., staffers are grabbing dinner before heading back to the office for a conference call or another meeting. Near the end the report noted, “the staff is beginning to take a few breaks”.
Even Jesus needed a break, and he knew the disciples did. So much was going on with and around them they hardly had time to eat. “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest awhile”, he said.
I knew an attorney who claimed never to have had a vacation. I felt bad for him until I realized he was bragging not complaining. Then I told him it was a sin. Everybody needs to get away.
Reading newsletters from several churches I discovered that a common type of pastors’ columns was letting people know how busy they are. Just reading about what pastors had been doing in the past week or month made me tired. When I do self care workshops for pastors I remind them that on the seventh day God rested. If God rested, who do they think they are not to rest?
When people report being “on the run”, I think, What are you running from? and What are you running to? Some people are on the run because of their own unrealistic expectations of themselves. In early December a parishioner asked “Why do I think that before Christmas I have to get everything done that I haven’t done all year long?”
In this era of global warming I miss those 18 and 20 inches of snow we used to get, as reminders that almost all of us are non essential personnel. It seems that God thought we needed a reminder every week. The Sabbath is not only about going to church. It’s about doing nothing to justify your existence. It’s about remembering that as important as you are to God, the world can go on without you.
Some people are on the run because of other people’s expectations, real or imagined. A teenager brings home a report card with four A’s and one C. The parent responds, “I like those A’s, but I know you can do better than that C”. Does the but cancel the affirmation? If I receive an affirmation or a compliment followed by a but I buckle my seat belt and duck.
A young woman goes to college thousands of miles from her family. After a difficult year and mediocre grades her father picks her up at the airport and says, “I am so disappointed in you”. How long will it take her to get out from under that shadow, if ever?
Shia LaBeouf, of box office fame, thinks that an actor’s life is dependent on other people’s opinions. He says that most actors on most days don’t think they’re worthy. “I have no idea where this insecurity comes from but it’s a God sized hole. If I knew, I’d fill it, and I’d be on my way.”
Well, Shia, what if that God sized hole is a God shaped vacuum that can be filled by nothing but God?
The antidote to exhaustion is not a vacation, as helpful as those are (and I’ve already told you that I think it’s a sin not to have them). The antidote to exhaustion is worship, worth-ship, centering your life in God and organizing your other priorities accordingly. Functionally speaking, your God is that around which you organize your life.
After Jesus sent the disciples on to Bethsaida he went up the mountain, not to take a nap but to pray. He was about being grounded and centered.
So, if you need a break, make a plan to go away to a deserted place by yourself with those you love. Put it on your calendar if you want it to happen. Otherwise people will show up needing you. When you go, for God’s sake and your sake, don’t take your laptop and your Blackberry. I’m giving you a papal dispensation, albeit a Protestant one. If you come back rested, a vacation is what you needed.
If, when you return, you’re still out of gas, exhausted, what you need is the wholeness that comes from worship, a proper worth-ship, ordering your life in God.
In her recent An Altar in the World Barbara Brown Taylor titles her chapter on the Sabbath, “The Practice of Saying No”. By the way, do you know that no is a complete sentence? (Anne Lamott).
Where are the green pastures and still waters for you? Where might you get your soul restored? Arcadia National Park, Burke Lake trail, the labyrinth, the sound of the ocean, the view from the mountain, Beethoven’s ninth?
MaryAnn has the radical idea that it could be in the thing we most do in Northern Virginia other than work, driving. Heaven help us all. On second thought, it does keep you humble, driving. And the deadliest of the seven deadly sins is hubris. Maybe that’s the beginning of a theology on driving.
I’m often asked by someone I haven’t seen in a while, “Have you been busy?” I’ve told you about the bumper sticker: “Jesus is Coming. Look busy”. Busy is easy, but it’s not a virtue.
The better question for your spiritual health is, have you been still, as in “Be still and know that God is God”.
In the Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
