Running on Empty

Looking out at the road rushing under my wheels
I don't know how to tell you all just how crazy this life feels
I look around for the friends that I used to turn to to pull me through
Looking into their eyes I see them running too
                                    --Jackson Browne, "Running on Empty"

A week ago today was the one-year anniversary of the day I was Installed as Pastor of St. Peter Lutheran Church in Campbell Hill, Illinois.  That means I've been back in parish ministry for a few days over a year now. In many ways, this has been the best year of my life. After over four and-a-half years in the "purgatory" of CRM status, the Lord has brought me to this place and these people to let me serve and love them and to be served and loved by them. The reception my family has received here has been nothing short of familial, which, especially after how Faith was received elsewhere, has been a balm. I'm serving a loving and faithful congregation with a Board of Elders who is supportive and encouraging; and as long as I faithfully preach and teach administer the sacraments, visit the sick and shut-in, and keep the parsonage lawn, things are quiet and peaceful. If I were inclined to complain--and y'all know I am capable of such things--I'd have very little to complain about, other than the cows sometimes being too loud across the alley from the parsonage. But we love "our" cows, especially the white one who stands alone in the herd.

All that being said, I will admit to a certain fatigue. It's been a hectic year. We moved our family and belongings, with me nearly breaking my neck in the process. (And yes, I still have pain and tingling and numbness in my left arm.) To justify the faith placed in me by the St. Peter congregation, I've thrown myself into this Call with a vengeance. But I've been a little stupid about it. I've gotten out of the practice of taking my regular day off, and I know better than that. I learned that lesson in North Dakota when I didn't take a day off between Christmas and Easter during my first year in parish ministry. After over four years away from full-time parish ministry, I wanted to make sure I didn't miss anything. I wanted to cover all the bases, dot the t's and cross the i's, so to speak. I had my mid-week Lenten sermon series written almost a month before Lent began. I've done the visits, written my own Bible study for our Sunday morning class, and preached every week since my Installation, except when we invited Southern Illinois District President Scharr to bring the Word to us. I've been involved in every youth group activity, and we're planning more--much to my delight.

But now I've got a case of the blahs. It's not a bad case of the blahs, but I've got 'em. It's not burnout. It's not depression. (Don't think I haven't considered that possibility.) My diagnosis: Part of it is not taking that regular day off. Part of it is that I'm in sore need of a vacation, and we had to cancel the one we had scheduled (we'd be in Louisiana right now) because of Mississippi River flooding and the opening of the Morganza Spillway, which even now is spewing water towards my wife's hometown. Part of it is that Faith and I haven't been out together since New Year's Eve, and I really miss my wife! Part of it is that I'm not able to regularly exercise because of my neck issues, and I really miss my exercise routine from my time at the Rec. I can swim and walk, and that's it. My knees make walking problematic, and the nearest year-round public pool is . . . Carbondale? (Yeah, this is me making excuses, blah, blah, blah. Get those new sneakers on and just do it.) 

More than those, I think the real problem is that I've not been as faithful in my prayer life as I know I need to be as a parish pastor. I wrote my MDiv thesis on the topic of daily prayer, and I know how important it is for everyone, more than just pastors. My copy of "The Treasury of Daily Prayer" is sitting on my desk as I type. It's not collecting dust--perish the thought! (I keep a notepad on top of it to keep the dust away.) I have numerous hymnals, Gerhard's "Sacred Meditations", "The Brotherhood Prayer Book", Lindemann's "The Daily Office", Loehe's "Seed Grains of Prayer", Dobberstein's "The Minister's Prayer Book", and half a shelf more. The discipline to open and use these resources is what's lacking. "The spirit is willing, but the flesh" and all that.

I don't write this seeking your pity or even your recommendations. I've heard them all. Twice. However, if you are so inclined, your prayers would be appreciated. As always.

"O Lord, open Thou my lips . . ."

Let me find in You my pleasure . . .

"Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light." -- Matthew 11:28-30 (NKJV)

This will be the first week since the end of June where I won't be heading off on Sunday morning to step into the pulpit and preach the Word to God's people. Though it has been a pleasure to return to a weekly preaching schedule for most of the past four months--and I think I preached more in these past four months than I did in my whole last year in Ohio--I'll admit that I'm ready for this break. As a parish pastor it was a fairly simple three-step process to recover from the drain of preaching:
1. Go into the study on Monday (or Tuesday) morning, close the door, and meditate on the Word.
2. Get on my knees and pray.
3. Go to the hospital and visit the sick and suffering in the congregation.
Doing those things always helped me to be able to get past the crash of preaching the previous Sunday so I could begin to prepare for the next.

Preaching ten of the last twelve weekends has left me in need of some serious spiritual refreshment. Now that I work a full-time job outside of the pastoral ministry, that recovery process is not so easy. Although I am able to a certain extent to set my own work schedule, that doesn't include a whole lot of time for me to sit at my desk and meditate on the Word, much less pray. And I obviously don't have shut-in or hospitalized parishioners to visit. I can spare some time here and there, but I have to make do with the barest fraction of the time I used to take to refresh myself spiritually. I also don't receive the body and blood of Christ as often as I did as a parish pastor, as I would frequently commune with my shut-in members. My prayer life is better now than it was before I went to seminary, but it's not nearly as healthy as it was when I was a parish pastor. As a result, I find myself worn down, more susceptible to weaknesses and temptations, less patient.

I'm an orderly person in some respects, not the least of which is that I like to have a fairly good idea of what my schedule will be. I can alter that schedule as the need arises, but I work so much better when there I have structure. (You should have seen my bookshelves in my study in both North Dakota and Ohio. Faith thinks I'm OCD, and she may be right.) But right now, in order to garner for myself more time for spiritual refreshment, I must be more flexible than is my usual wont. I must utilize the flexibility I have when doing my recreational reading to fit in more theological reading and reflection. I must find more time in my life for prayer. I don't think it is necessarily salutary to abandon all my amusements, because those help refresh me physically and mentally. But I can have a better balance. I must have a better balance.

Wisdom's highest, noblest treasure,
Jesus, is revealed in you;
Let me find in You my pleasure,
And my wayward will subdue,
Humility there and simplicity reigning,
In paths of true wisdom my steps ever training.
If I learn of Jesus this knowledge divine,
The blessing of heavenly wisdom is mine.
-- LSB 536, though I like the TLH translation better

A new resource for daily prayer

Prayer is one of the greatest gifts God gives to His people. The ability to call upon Him as Father, as taught to us by our Brother and bestowed upon us in Baptism, is a rich blessing. Nevertheless, prayer is another of God's gifts that often finds itself neglected. I certainly speak for myself in this matter. I've tried ex corde prayer (prayer from the heart). I've tried using my miniature-sized copy of Lutheran Worship as my prayerbook. I've used numerous books that are specifically prepared as prayerbooks, such as The Brotherhood Prayer Book from the Lutheran Liturgical Prayer Brotherhood; The Minister's Prayerbook, which was edited by Dobberstein; and my favorite to this point: The Daily Office, edited by Herbert Lindemann. I even wrote my MDiv treatise on daily prayer. (And it's no earth-shattering work, I assure you. If I had it to do over again, I'd at least quadruple the research and spend more than six months working on it.)

Despite all this, my prayer life has always been a struggle for me. Too often I find myself not praying when I get up in the morning, when I eat, when I go to bed at night. My prayers lately seem to have become the products of the moments of need. "Lord, help me put the children to sleep." "Lord, give me patience." "Lord, I'd like to be a parish pastor again." The Lord certainly hears and answers these in-the-moment prayers. However, being outside the parish ministry at the moment, the struggle to maintain daily prayer has become more difficult. As a parish pastor there's always some flexibility to your morning schedule, and you can pencil in time for prayer and study before you head out for visits or hit the books for your sermon and Bible class work. But working in an office and having young children in the house, maintaining a schedule has been difficult at best.

Though no book can make it easier to schedule time to pray, the new Treasury of Daily Prayer from Concordia Publishing House has the potential to help you make the most of the prayer time you have. With orders of worship, daily scripture readings included in full, the entire Psalter, and a liturgical calendar to follow, you have a large collection of resources in one place. If you feel the need to supplement these resources with readings from the Book of Concord, the book suggests readings from the Confessions for each day. It's a flexible book, and it's completely Lutheran--and thus completely Christian--in its content.

I received my copy of the Treasury today, and I used it for prayer tonight. I prayed the Order of Compline, which is exactly as I remember it from Lutheran Worship as we prayed it at Concordia Lutheran Theological Seminary. The ease of the book and its convenient size--about the size of a hymnal or mid-sized Bible--are surprising. Though it's too early to say for sure, Treasury of Daily Prayer may supplant The Daily Office as my favorite prayer book. I can already without hesitation recommend it highly.