Healthy Steward
28/03/15 04:42
The United Church of Christ has two major ethical statements. My life has been framed by promises and covenants and i take my commitments very seriously. The Ordained Minister’s Code is an ethical code for those who are called to ordained ministry. Similarly, the Church Educator’s Code is for those called to teach. Since I find myself called to preach and teach the Gospel and since I am both an ordained minister and a certified educator, it makes sense to me that I am absolutely bound by both codes.
Both of these codes have the same line about care for our physical bodies:
“I will attend to my physical well-being and avoid abusive behaviors and abusive use of substances.”
I have been fortunate in that I have not suffered from addiction to alcohol, tobacco or drugs. Keeping that part of the code has not been a problem for me because I don’t suffer from those particular addictions. The substance that I am prone to abuse is food. I have struggled with my weight for decades. I was very careful with diet and exercise during my seminary years, and I learned back then, when I was in my twenties, that the tendency to overeat would be a life-long struggle for me. I’d been eating yogurt and apples for lunch for decades before it became popular. Still, I am overweight, and technically that other “O” word: obese. My doctor confirms that each year at the time for my physical.
As a minister, however, I don’t particularly stand out. As my mother once observed after attending a meeting of ministers with me. “The ministry certainly is a porcine profession.” We do sit a lot. We are offered a lot of food wherever we go. And more than a few of us are heavier than is healthy.
Playing upon our natural tendency for guilt, the health insurance program of the United Church of Christ, administered by Blue Cross-Blue Shield, has instituted a program labeled “healthy stewards.” The program offers very modest cash incentives for ministers to regularly report health statistics such as height, weight, exercise, and lifestyle choices. It is, like many similar programs offered by big insurance, not as the name might imply, a program to improve the health of ministers. Rather it is a very thinly-veiled data mining operation designed to lower costs for the insurance company. I have not been tempted to have more forms to fill out and more reports that are due. I also can’t understand a program that gives incentives for joining a gym and “working out” on a treadmill or a stair machine, but doesn’t pay any attention to how many times I go up and down the stairs in my home or at the hospital (10, count ‘em, 10 stories). There is no way for me to report a day of splitting wood with the Woodchucks or the simple fact that I shoveled, hauled in a wheelbarrow, spread and raked over 8 tons of gravel this week, working after I got off of “work” in the evening.
The real “kicker” that has kept me from enrolling is that the program makes no distinction between paddling a canoe and paddling a kayak. Heck, it doesn’t even have a place to register rowing a real boat, only rowing a machine.
I believe in working hard to be a wise steward of my health. I know that I promised to take care of my health, and it is a promise I take very seriously. Trust me, however, I am far more motivated by the promises I have made than by the insurance company’s program to cut their costs. Actually, so far it has worked out really well for the insurance company. I’ve been remarkably healthy over the span of my life so far. I must have inherited pretty good genetics and I’ve been fortunate when it comes to major illness. A couple of accidents cost a trip to the emergency room, but so far I’ve avoided hospitalizations.
I may have a big belly, but like other paddlers and rowers, I’ve got strong arms and my upper body strength is not bad for a guy my age. My back muscles are strong enough to roll a kayak and rotate my torso for a full reach brace in a canoe. As one of my river rat buddies says, “Not bad for an old coot!”
Beyond all of these things, the physical quality that is most important for my profession is endurance. I exercise for endurance. There are days - and next week will have seven of them - when 12 hours are a minimum. I can still work a 60-hour week past the age of 60. I’ve always been able to put in the hours.
I am not, however, as young, or as strong as I once was. I notice it when I put in the really long weeks and I need to take a day or so to recover. I used to be able to fall asleep in exhaustion, sleep 5 or 6 hours and get up and do it all over again. These days I can fall asleep, but a few aches and pains will have me up and reaching for the aspirin a couple of hours later if I’ve been over doing it.
Here’s the deal: Instead of signing up for the “Healthy Stewards” program with the insurance company, I’d be glad to host any insurance executive who wants to follow me around next week. In fact, we can start today. I’ll be on the lake before sunrise. I’ve got an extra boat I can loan. Then, after breakfast, I have a huge mound of topsoil that needs to have all of the rock picked out of it and then it needs to be raked and smoothed. Planting the grass and spreading the straw will be easy after picking and hauling all the rocks. Then there is a pickup to unload at the dump. That’s just Saturday. It’s on Sunday when the real work begins. Good news! We get to move the communion table and set up and take down the stage this week.
I’d love to see how “chipper” that insurance executive will be by the 6 am Sunrise Service on Easter. I’m thinking I shouldn’t plan on him wanting to preach the 9:30 service that day.
Both of these codes have the same line about care for our physical bodies:
“I will attend to my physical well-being and avoid abusive behaviors and abusive use of substances.”
I have been fortunate in that I have not suffered from addiction to alcohol, tobacco or drugs. Keeping that part of the code has not been a problem for me because I don’t suffer from those particular addictions. The substance that I am prone to abuse is food. I have struggled with my weight for decades. I was very careful with diet and exercise during my seminary years, and I learned back then, when I was in my twenties, that the tendency to overeat would be a life-long struggle for me. I’d been eating yogurt and apples for lunch for decades before it became popular. Still, I am overweight, and technically that other “O” word: obese. My doctor confirms that each year at the time for my physical.
As a minister, however, I don’t particularly stand out. As my mother once observed after attending a meeting of ministers with me. “The ministry certainly is a porcine profession.” We do sit a lot. We are offered a lot of food wherever we go. And more than a few of us are heavier than is healthy.
Playing upon our natural tendency for guilt, the health insurance program of the United Church of Christ, administered by Blue Cross-Blue Shield, has instituted a program labeled “healthy stewards.” The program offers very modest cash incentives for ministers to regularly report health statistics such as height, weight, exercise, and lifestyle choices. It is, like many similar programs offered by big insurance, not as the name might imply, a program to improve the health of ministers. Rather it is a very thinly-veiled data mining operation designed to lower costs for the insurance company. I have not been tempted to have more forms to fill out and more reports that are due. I also can’t understand a program that gives incentives for joining a gym and “working out” on a treadmill or a stair machine, but doesn’t pay any attention to how many times I go up and down the stairs in my home or at the hospital (10, count ‘em, 10 stories). There is no way for me to report a day of splitting wood with the Woodchucks or the simple fact that I shoveled, hauled in a wheelbarrow, spread and raked over 8 tons of gravel this week, working after I got off of “work” in the evening.
The real “kicker” that has kept me from enrolling is that the program makes no distinction between paddling a canoe and paddling a kayak. Heck, it doesn’t even have a place to register rowing a real boat, only rowing a machine.
I believe in working hard to be a wise steward of my health. I know that I promised to take care of my health, and it is a promise I take very seriously. Trust me, however, I am far more motivated by the promises I have made than by the insurance company’s program to cut their costs. Actually, so far it has worked out really well for the insurance company. I’ve been remarkably healthy over the span of my life so far. I must have inherited pretty good genetics and I’ve been fortunate when it comes to major illness. A couple of accidents cost a trip to the emergency room, but so far I’ve avoided hospitalizations.
I may have a big belly, but like other paddlers and rowers, I’ve got strong arms and my upper body strength is not bad for a guy my age. My back muscles are strong enough to roll a kayak and rotate my torso for a full reach brace in a canoe. As one of my river rat buddies says, “Not bad for an old coot!”
Beyond all of these things, the physical quality that is most important for my profession is endurance. I exercise for endurance. There are days - and next week will have seven of them - when 12 hours are a minimum. I can still work a 60-hour week past the age of 60. I’ve always been able to put in the hours.
I am not, however, as young, or as strong as I once was. I notice it when I put in the really long weeks and I need to take a day or so to recover. I used to be able to fall asleep in exhaustion, sleep 5 or 6 hours and get up and do it all over again. These days I can fall asleep, but a few aches and pains will have me up and reaching for the aspirin a couple of hours later if I’ve been over doing it.
Here’s the deal: Instead of signing up for the “Healthy Stewards” program with the insurance company, I’d be glad to host any insurance executive who wants to follow me around next week. In fact, we can start today. I’ll be on the lake before sunrise. I’ve got an extra boat I can loan. Then, after breakfast, I have a huge mound of topsoil that needs to have all of the rock picked out of it and then it needs to be raked and smoothed. Planting the grass and spreading the straw will be easy after picking and hauling all the rocks. Then there is a pickup to unload at the dump. That’s just Saturday. It’s on Sunday when the real work begins. Good news! We get to move the communion table and set up and take down the stage this week.
I’d love to see how “chipper” that insurance executive will be by the 6 am Sunrise Service on Easter. I’m thinking I shouldn’t plan on him wanting to preach the 9:30 service that day.