"It's a vocation!"

Proposed and possible changes at Workplace Support, some events around the Church, sleepless nights, frustrations and a consultation with my doctor have me revisiting the idea of getting an easier job to see me out till my "retirement". Many of my aquaintances of the same age are choosing that. "Why put up with the hassle?" I ask myself. I even got to dialing the new Bunnings warehouse that is to open in July, but I suspect they had taken the phone off the hook because so many applicants were ringing.

I was talking about my feelings with a woman during the week. "You can't" she exclaimed. "Why not?" I asked, and followed it with the challenge,"You have changed your career a couple of times in your life, why can't I?" "Oh yeah...." she replied, "But that's just a 'job'.... your's is a vocation! a calling! You don't opt out of a vocation!" It was interesting because she was not a particularly religious person. I would have liked to point out that stopping paid ministry does not necessarily mean I stop exercising my vocation. The Apostle Paul had a 'job' (tent maker) and still fulfilled his vocation. We got interrupted at that point by a further question put to me by someone else on a different matter that led to a very significant group conversation. But as she left to go back to work, she was still claiming that I could not opt out of the ministry/chaplaincy role, her understanding was that I was locked into it for life.

A little bit later in the day I got talking to a man about his job. He was passionate and skilled at his work. He had a high level of education in the field and talked to me about the various tasks and how he approached them. But he told me that he had a lot of frustration about the place where he worked. He was critical of policies, management decisions and directions. As he talked though he spelled out his way of coping. "I divide the two in my mind" he said. "I say to myself that I love my 'work'.... its just my 'job' that annoys me." He claimed, "If I keep the two apart in my mind I can enjoy my 'work' and not let my 'job' ruin it for me." It rang bells with me because in a way I thought that was what I had been trying to do even though I had not spelled it out so clearly. I guess what I have been trying to do is to overlook the frustrations of the 'job' because I valued the freedom I have to follow my 'vocation'. I guess lately with extra responsibilities and pressures I have been finding it hard to do the "overlooking". This man's tactic gave me a different way of thinking about things. Even though I didn't talk with him about my ministry/chaplaincy issues, he helped me through sharing in this conversation.

We had a positive Church Annual General Meeting today, and some people said some nice things about me, so I really should not be grumpy.

I had a small run tonight but felt quite free, energetic and, dare I say it, "young". I may yet get back to really free, "this is great!", "what a blast!" type of running again. Watch this space.