Sabbatical
TAKE MY OWN MEDICINE?
NOTE: As we share below, Journey is on summer sabbatical until August 1. We will return at that time with fresh content. Until then, we will post a series of “Best Of” articles from our six plus years of writing. This post on sabbaticals will remain in this place throughout the summer. To access our “Best Of” posts, on the Journey home page, hover over “The Journey Blog,” and then click on the “Archives” menu. Each summer article will be there in order, from the most recent to those earlier. In the name of Him who is our sabbath rest.
After 40 years of vocational ministry, the last almost seven years as a pastoral coach, I am about to be hit with my own counsel; I’m being “forced” to act on something I’ve counseled many others to do but have never done.
I’m about to take a sabbatical.
SWEET AND SOUR
And to tell you the truth, I have mixed emotions about it. While I look forward to what I am envisioning as my own “desert fathers” season, I’m not looking forward to separating myself from what I am privileged to do with my life every day. Neither am I looking forward to not walking with the quality people whose journeys I am privileged to share – a lot is going to take place in their lives and in mine, but we won’t walk these things together. I see pleasure and pain in my approaching sabbatical.
I think part of my problem is my ministry credentials. I am credentialed by a denomination that has not really understood the importance and value of rest. Our ministers are known for many laudable qualities, among them, hard work. But not sabbath. And certainly not sabbaticals. I’m not blaming my denomination, but only identifying my enablers: overwork was my choice.
Maybe this is one reason why, though we preach the overcoming victory of the Spirit-filled life, so many of our ministers burn out and leave the ministry. Maybe this is one reason why, though we teach the value of the Spirit-empowered life, so many of our burned ministers don’t leave the ministry, choosing instead to shut down their emotions and cruise or to shut down their relationships by letting their hearts become hard and bitter (Click to read more about these all too prevalent heart conditions).
To be fair, many leaders of larger ministries are adopting this practice, this spiritual discipline. But most of our ministers serve in small to medium-sized churches, are staff pastors, or are bi-vocational. What about them? What provision have we made for them? What provision can we make for them? Earlier today, I spoke with a minister under forty years of age who sees the need to address this with low-cost retreat centers for ministers just like these. But is it feasible in most evangelical denominations as currently constituted? I doubt it. Too much to do, too little time in which to do it, we tell ourselves. How can God get by without us, right? We’ll have eternity to sabbath.
LIFE AND DEATH PROBLEMS
I have friends in other denominations whose churches mandate vacations of four consecutive weeks every year, and extended sabbaticals every seven. These pastors seem to stay at their churches for a long time. Interesting, isn’t it?
Does this create problems for their local churches? Probably. Every church has problems. But, to a large extent, every church can decide which kind of problems it has: life OR death problems.
Death problems are evident: too many parking spaces for too few cars; far more seats than people; no babies in the nursery; no need for volunteers to serve in or lead the nursery ministry (or any ministry, for that matter); and finally, the pastoral revolving door, pastoral burnout, and pastoral exit.
Life problems are equally evident: too few parking spaces for too many cars; not enough seats for the people; too many babies for the nursery; a never-ending need for more volunteers and ministry leaders; and finally, pastors who survive and thrive for a lifetime of healthy and effective ministry.
Leaving your ministry post to take a sabbatical is definitely a life problem in a thriving ministry. How so? In our absence, the people in whom we have invested, demonstrate the value of our investment: they step up and shine. They not only meet the needs of the season of our sabbatical, but they come to realize their own ministry giftings, and they develop relationships they otherwise would not have made.
TIME TO PUT WHAT I’VE “DONE” TO THE TEST
At Journey Pastoral Coaching, we’ve worked seven years not only pastoring individual young ministers, but developing a coaching community, a mutual investment community where we have not just one coach but many coaches. As I, the leader of these leaders, step away from the circle for a time, these leaders will do what they have always done. They will demonstrate the value of our mutual investment: they will step up and shine. But now with me out of the way for a time, they will shine brighter than ever. I will have worked myself out of a job, the goal of every pastor.
Will I have a position to return to after my sabbatical or will the members of Journey have discovered they are just find without me? We’ll see.
When I return from my time away, I’ll let you know how it went.
Until then, here are several reasons why you need to consider not just a weekly sabbath, but a regular sabbatical.
1. WE ARE REMINDED OF THE CREATOR
“God commanded Israel to keep the Sabbath as a reminder of creation and their Creator.” Ceil and Moishe Rosen, Christ in the Passover
2. WE EXPERIENCE RE-CREATION
“To be at our best physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually, we must engage in re-creation – a necessary and God intended part of the human experience that “re-creates” the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual resources we’ve expended in the pursuit of our calling.” Michael Todd Wilson and Brad Hoffman, Preventing Ministry Failure
3. WE ESTABLISH A NEW INNER WORLD ORDER
“We try to bring order to the inner world by beginning with activity in the outer one. This is exactly the opposite of what the Bible teaches us, what the great saints have shown us, and what our dismal spiritual experiences regularly prove to us.” Gordon MacDonald, Ordering Your Private World
4. WE DEFINE TOMMOROW’S INTENSIONS AND DEDICATIONS
“When we rest in the biblical sense, we affirm our intentions to pursue a Christ centered tomorrow. We ponder where we are headed in the coming week, month or year. We define our intentions and make our dedications.” Gordon MacDonald, Ordering Your Private World
5. WE BREAK THE IDOL
“I am temperamentally an over achiever, what one wise friend describes as a self-control freak. Vacation, days off, Sabbath, and rests do not come easily. At the heart of it all is probably the notion that God needs me. Pausing – honoring the rests – allows me to step back and remember that God doesn’t need me; I need God. God created in six days and rested on the seventh, whose creative work culminates in Sabbath rest, invites me to pause. Rather than trying to play frantically for 64 measures, I am discovering the grace of playing nothing.” Mark Davis, On The Grace of Playing Nothing
6. WE TUNE IN TO HOLY SPIRIT RHYTHM
“Inappropriate, anxiety driven, fear driven work would only interfere with and distract from what’s God was already doing. My “work” assignment was to pay more attention to what God does than what I do, and then to find, and guide others to find, the daily, weekly, yearly rhythms that would get this awareness into our bones.” Eugene H. Peterson, The Pastor: A Memoir
7. WE FIND SPIRITUAL GROWTH AND REST
“(Sabbath rest) was not meant to be a luxury, but rather a necessity for those who want to have growth and maturity. Since we have not understood that rest is a necessity, we have perverted its meaning, substituting for the rest that God first demonstrated things called leisure or amusement. These do not bring any order at all to the private world. . . They provide a momentary lift, but they will not last.” Gordon MacDonald, Ordering Your Private World
FINAL WORD
Fundamentally, a sabbatical (a seventh year sabbath), is rest for future fruitfulness:
The Lord said to Moses at Mount Sinai, “Speak to the Israelites and say to them: ‘When you enter the land I am going to give you, the land itself must observe a sabbath to the Lord. For six years sow your fields, and for six years prune your vineyards and gather their crops. But in the seventh year the land is to have a year of sabbath rest, a sabbath to the Lord. Do not sow your fields or prune your vineyards. Do not reap what grows of itself or harvest the grapes of your untended vines. The land is to have a year of rest. . . Leviticus 25.1-5
Here’s how I said it in my December 1, 2020 article, “A Christmas Wish List for Pastors.”
“A Sabbatical is not a longer-than-usual vacation. It’s not a time to get away to write a book, attend conferences, take a leadership course, finish a degree, or work in any form. The word “Sabbatical” is a form of the word “Sabbath,” so taking a sabbatical to work really defeats the purpose.
“A Sabbatical is an extended Sabbath with the sole purpose of rest. The pastor renews his/her heartbeat in the biblical teaching and Holy Spirit led experience of learning to rest in God as a way of life. Because ministry is an all-consuming calling, often 24×7 lifestyle, the pastor needs seasons in which he or she can actively refresh the soul in resting in God – not only during the Sabbatical, but as a way of life in ministry. Sabbaticals are seasons of retuning the soul to the tone of the Spirit, realigning our spiritual heartbeat to the rhythm of the Spirit…
“A Sabbatical is a season in which your pastor can rest in the Lord, learn how to rest in the Lord as a way of life (especially in the busy, stress-filled life of ministry), and return to ministry duties strong. It’s a win for the pastor, the church, and the kingdom of God.”
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