Kicking the Dog

I have a weird job.

I'm a pastor, and I guess to most people that doesn't seem too weird, but it truly is. There's always the joke that a pastor only works on Sundays-- ha ha-- but most people know that's not true. But if pressed to say what a pastor does, most people aren't quite sure how to answer it.
I don't know how to answer that question.

My oldest brother, being a bit cynical about growing up in a pastor's house, often said that people went to work, got mad at their bosses, and instead of going home and kicking the dog, they called the pastor and took it out on him (or her). Sadly, that is often true. After all, I'm a pastor, we're supposed to be "nice," so we won't yell back. It's kind of like kicking the dog-- except in this case, the dog gets spared.

There's no job description for what I do. People expect me to show up on Sunday to preach, but other than that, the rest is very vague. Actually, there are as many job descriptions for my job as there are people in the church. Then there is the Bishop and the Conference and their ideas of what it is we're supposed to be doing. The bottom line is, a pastor never gets to the end of a day and says, "whew, I got everything done." There's always more. We never go home, because we live in the parsonage, the church-owned house, so our job goes home with us. We live the job. Truly.
I'm not saying ours is the only profession where that is true. I imagine doctors often feel the same way, being on call a lot, being called in for emergencies on odd days and hours. But at least they get to go to their own home.

When I first went into the ministry, I had aspirations to change the world-- or at least make a difference in my immediate universe. I wanted to be prophetic, I wanted to be inspiring, I wanted to stir people's hearts for God. I wanted people to get excited and pumped about reaching out to others, doing mission, reaching out to those whom Jesus would reach out to. Even being a pastor's kid, I was not prepared for the amount of time wasted on complaints about the typos in or the color of the bulletin. I pick hymns that I believe support the sermon, the Word I am trying to deliver-- I was not prepared for coming down out of the pulpit only to hear that the hymns had too many verses or we sang too many of them. I've never gotten used to people complaining anonymously-- "a lot of people are upset" -- and yet the "lot of people" don't talk to me about it. Or someone sends me a nasty email instead of coming to talk to me about what upset them.
It's not unique to any one church; I've experienced all of this every place I went.

I feel most like I'm in ministry when someone is in the hospital, someone is dying, soomeone is grieving or just needs to talk, or when I pray with someone. Or when someone tells me that one of my sermons actually made a difference in their life and relationship with Christ. But when the reports to the Conference need to be filled out, they want to know how much money we made, did we pay our apportionments, how many new members or new programs did we get this year. They never ask how many hearts were healed, how many came back to church for the first time in forever, how many hearts were comforted by prayer blankets, or about the ones who started learning more about the Bible and what it has to do with their lives, or who found food for their souls when they thought they'd die of grief after losing a loved one. They never ask us, 'did you preach the Word?' 'Did you hold someone's hand while they waited through a loved ones' surgery?' 'Did you hold someone and let them cry when their spouse died?' or 'Where do you experience the presence of of the Resurrected Christ in your ministry?' If they'd only ask those questions, I'd have plenty to say.

I want to tell them about Dennis, the homeless man who stunk to high heaven, but who I got to fix a bowl of soup for on numerous occasions. Or about the time I took him to the grocery store because he just wanted a couple of cans of baked beans. I want to tell them how my heart broke when he died. On many days, he was Jesus to me.
I want to tell them about the children who cry out when I walk through the local school and say, "hey, Pastor Peggy!" I want to tell them about the baby that was born 9 months after I watched a very dear friend die, and how that baby always reminds me that Life is the final word, and that the Communion of Saints is real.
I want to tell them about the numerous times I've sat in surgery waiting rooms with people, or held someone's hand in the hospital, or held the grieving in bitter-cold cemetaries. I want to tell them the things you can't measure or report on a short line on an annual form, but the things that make me feel like ministry is worth doing, at least for today.

I have no doubt that Jesus gets bored with our committee meetings, our Power Point presentations on how to bring in more people, our arguments over whether the new screen covers up the cross or how we should cook the baked potatoes.
Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to live in my own house, where I could change the carpet when it needed changing or paint the walls flourescent green if I wanted to.

I just know that when I get my hair cut, my palms start to sweat when they ask me what I do for a living. I want to lie, because I don't want them to think I'm some uptight, clueless, no-fun person who thinks joy is a sin.
Sometimes I want to worry about bigger things than what whether someone is upset over the color of the bulletin.

Maybe I'll get a stuffed dog that I can kick at the end of the day.