At the reception following my ordination years ago, an older woman approached me and said, “It’s a wonderful thing you are doing, young man, giving up all the pleasures of life to serve the Lord.”
I don’t remember how I responded—probably something pastoral like, “Thank you very much.” But her comment stayed with me. I had the uneasy feeling she knew something about ministry I didn’t, and I sometimes wish that I had asked which pleasures she had in mind.
Have I really given up “all the pleasures of life to serve the Lord”? She still makes me ask, Why am I a pastor?
BMW-sized sacrifice
Not long ago I celebrated both a milestone ordination anniversary and a milestone birthday (one with a zero in it, and that’s all I’ll say about it). My thoughts turned—quite naturally for men my age—to sports cars, and so on a day off I went to a car dealership and drove a used BMW with low mileage that was in my price range—that is, the price of a new American car. I hadn’t been so excited about a car since I was 16 and drove my mother’s Mustang.
Since my last two cars were a station wagon and a minivan, I had a lot of pent-up automotive excitement waiting to be let loose. (Did I mention that the BMW was a convertible?)
Later that day I called a member of the church with whom I talk over lots of things, and I mentioned the car. Since he drives a pretty fancy vehicle, I thought he would say, “Go for it, Doug. You’re only [this particular age with a zero in it] once.”
Instead he said, “I don’t know, Doug. The church is looking at a major building campaign for next year. How’s it going to look if the minister is driving around in a BMW?”
I felt crushed. Who cares how it looks? I thought, but I knew he was right. How was it going to look?
My car-buying decisions—and a host of others—have an effect on the people I serve. I wish they didn’t, but they do. I believe in leading by example, but leading by example is often hard, sacrificial work. I ask people to do only what I am willing to do.
Is it worth it?
The issue is not just about BMWs. The issue cuts across most aspects of my personal and public behavior. Pastors do more than preach and celebrate the sacraments. Whether I like it or not, I live my life with a unique responsibility.
Some friends I have made along the way belong to various religious orders. They have taken vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Now, those are vows, I used to think. In comparison, my ordination vows seem tepid and undemanding. But there is more to them, I now know, than meets the eye. I haven’t given up “all the pleasures of life,” but I have given up a few.
My wife sometimes reminds me that since my ordination, I—actually we—have given up every weekend and all major holidays to serve the Lord. Yet to me that has never seemed much of a sacrifice; I was not much of a party animal on Saturday nights before entering parish ministry, and I have always taken a day off during the week. So where’s the sacrifice?
I wanted to hear, “Doug, here’s five steps toward health in your work life.” What I got was a well-phrased question.
Yet even though my sacrifice isn’t as costly as others’, at times the question returns—why do we keep at it?
Muted trumpet call
At my seminary commencement, the speaker was Frank Harrington, then pastor of Peachtree Presbyterian Church, at the time the largest Presbyterian church in the country. Speaking of his enthusiasm for ministry, he declared, “As far as I am concerned, I still hear trumpets in the morning.”
I remember thinking, What a way to wake up! To feel as if you’re being summoned to something important, to feel as if your work is critical in people’s lives—that’s what I want, too!
But the truth is most pastors (most people, for that matter) don’t hear trumpets in the morning. We may hear alarm clocks, but we seldom hear an inner summons to bound out of bed and meet the day’s challenges once again.
My conversations with fellow pastors tell me that many of us struggle to find meaning in what we do. We struggle to get excited. We struggle to find the motivation to do our best. Some have long since decided to find meaning elsewhere—other than in the work we were called to do.
Inconsequential unhappiness
Once I decided I was in the wrong line of work. Ministry had been interesting, occasionally rewarding, and unquestionably challenging, but now it was time to move on and think about doing something else with my life. I thought, Lots of people have two or three careers during their life. Haven’t I encouraged unhappy people to get out of unhappy careers and try something new?
The first person to hear about my decision was my wife, who took it rather well. “Okay, if that’s what you want,” she said.
Next I made an appointment with a person who talks to a lot of pastors who wonder what they’re doing with their lives. This professional put me through the usual battery of tests, most of which I had taken twenty years before as part of the process leading to ordination.
Not surprisingly, most of the results were similar. At least my personality is still intact, I thought.
Next I was asked to write a little essay about what I (not others) thought the major accomplishments of my life were up until that point. This assignment was quite a bit more difficult than answering the multiple-choice questions on the personality tests.
My final assignment was to talk to the counselor about my unhappiness. I told him there were days when I felt like the director of a small nonprofit organization. I raise money, I encourage a staff, and I worry about lots of inconsequential issues.
“For example?” he asked.
“Like parking,” I said. “When I first signed up, I wanted to make the world a better place, and what I find myself doing instead is listening to people tell me how hard it is to find a parking place on Sunday morning.”
A good listener, my friend was mostly quiet through all of this. Once or twice he asked a clarifying question, probably so I would know he wasn’t daydreaming. He leaned forward in his seat and looked both thoughtful and concerned—everything you would want in a good friend at a moment like that.
Then he said, “Mmmmm. Sounds like you want to get back to whatever it was you originally felt called to do?”
That was it. I wanted to hear, “Doug, here’s five steps toward health and wholeness in your work life. Tomorrow get going on step one, which is . . . ” What I got was a question, a well-phrased one at that.
What was it that I felt called to do with my life?
Claiming the calling
That process led me to realize the issue is less occupational—”What do you want to be when you grow up?”—and more vocational—”What is God calling you to do and to be?”
It then became clear to me that I am already doing what I am uniquely gifted to do. Ministry is what I have been called to do with my life. I wouldn’t be happy doing anything else.
It’s terribly frustrating at times, and it’s terribly hard work at others. But ministry isn’t simply my career; it’s my life. It’s who I am. I am a son, a husband, and a father. And just as certain, I am a minister of Word and Sacrament.
This confirmation of my identity has enabled me to claim my calling with a new freedom and excitement. I’m not stuck in a job I don’t like; I’m doing something God has been preparing me to do my whole life. If there’s another career out there that can make better use of my combination of gifts, skills, and genetic wiring, I’d like to hear about it.
Reaching this conclusion was not easy, and the trumpets have sometimes been muted. Maybe it is never easy. Maybe it is in the nature of a call to have to wrestle with it, to ask questions, and to look deep inside oneself. Maybe it is also in the nature of a call to take a wrong turn or two before finding the path. I know I’m on the path again.
Douglas J. Brouwer is pastor of First Presbyterian Church in Wheaton, Illinois.
Adapted from Perspectives (December 1993 & 1997). Used with permission.
1998 by the author or Christianity Today/Leadership Journal. For reprint information call 630-260-6200 or contact us.
