Reflection 012: Vocation is the Easy Part

Eat, Drink, and Find Contentment in Your Work

When it comes to vocation,
hearing the voice of God isn’t the hard part.
It’s the over enmeshment of identity with work.

When it comes to vocation,
hearing God call us to become a pastor,
missionary, nurse, or business person is easy.
It’s the emptying of self and serving others
within the context of our work
that is the hard part.

When it comes to vocation,
seeking favor with God and with man isn’t the hard part.
It’s learning to name the evaluative scales and awards
that are driven by logics of marketplace
as opposed to the Kingdom of God
that remains difficult.

A person can do nothing better than to eat and drink and find satisfaction in their own toil. This too, I see, is from the hand of God. Ecc 2:24

I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God. Ecc 3:12-13

So I commend the enjoyment of life, because there is nothing better for a person under the sun than to eat and drink and be glad. Then joy will accompany them in their toil all the days of the life God has given them under the sun. Ecc 8:15

I once asked my mentor, “How do I become a happy pastor?”

After an hour’s worth of discussing discipleship theories and systems, I finally asked the real question in my soul. Of course I did so semi-facetiously compensating for how honest my inquiry actually was.

His response will never leave my body.

You already know the answer to that, Mike.
To be happy, you sleep 8 hours a day,
exercise regularly, and eat well.

Well, damn.

What a litmus test:

Does your current lifestyle of work and recreation allow for adequate sleep, exercise, and home cooked meals?

Listen to your body for a second. Is it asking you to go for a run? 😅

Is it asking you to finally eat some food God intended us to eat at creation?

Your spiritual, physical, mental (and probably financial) well being is answered in tending to the basic needs of sleep, food, and exercise.

There is this twisted nobility in America with the phrase, “I’m so busy.” It is our primary excuse for displacing responsibility. Particularly for those who are in the helping professions (clergy, therapist, nurse, etc.), we think being busy must mean we are really serving God and others.

Eugene Peterson says busy pastors are worse than adulterous pastors. When you are a busy pastor, then surely, you are not a pastor who prays deeply, you are not a pastor immersed in the Scriptures, and you are not a pastor who listens attentively to the people in your care.

We’ve all met aloof pastors more concerned about the next task than the person (or the Holy Spirit) in front of them. Aloofness suggests your mind is over occupied. But it’s subtle. The more explicit manifestations of aloofness are unhealthy vices and an inability to enjoy the gifts of God.

Here is a semi-provocative mantra I live by:
God did not call you to work because God needs you.
God has chosen this work to make you holy.   

The refrain from Ecclesiastes is less intense, and much more profound:

There is nothing better than to eat, drink, and find satisfaction in one’s toil.

Pause and sit with those words again.

There is nothing better than to eat, drink, and find satisfaction in one’s toil.

The best things in life are its most basic.

And the Scripture invite you to embrace them. This too is a life lived in God.

Whenever I marinate short ribs, chop up some lettuce, and steam rice to serve it to friends and family with a side of kimchi, there is both contentment and dignity. Whenever my wife and I get childcare and sit down together at a wine bar for charcuterie and sauvignon blanc, I know we are both living out our vocation in God.

May you work as if working for the LORD.
May you eat delicious and healthy food with thanksgiving.
May you sleep well as an act of worship and rebellion against the world.
May you detach your identity from W2 employment.

In the name of Christ
whose yoke and burden
are easy and light

Amen