Weekends
19/08/13 07:24
We know from the biblical narrative that our people have struggled with the concept of Sabbath from the very beginning. The idea seems so simple: Take one day each week for rest, restoration and appreciating all that God has done. God did it in the beginning with the Creation. Who are you to think that you can work harder than God? Who are you to think that you don’t need a day of rest?
By the time I came along, we had mixed Sabbath theology with something that we call the “protestant work ethic.” Somehow our people had deeply ingrained in us that to find meaning in life one needs to work hard. Hard work equals success was the formula that I was taught. And it was demonstrated in the lives of the relatively successful people that surrounded me.
Such a notion came late to this world. It is accurate to make a connection with Protestantism, if for no other reason than the simple fact that the idea that there could be some sort of social mobility arose around the same time as Protestantism. Ideas of democracy, upward mobility and many other similar concepts find their roots in the time of the invention of the printing press. Before books became affordable and there was a level of literacy, such lofty ideas weren’t accessible to most people. If you were born poor, you would die poor. If you were born rich, you would die rich. There was no thought that you could change your circumstances.
As the notion of social mobility arose, there was a kind of competitive nature that arose with it. Ideas of equality and common good were slower to develop.
In my time, the Protestant work ethic has risen to a kind of social competition. People seem to think that if you are poor it is because you didn’t work hard enough. If you didn’t “get ahead” it was your own fault. Although this is incomplete thinking, it took deep roots in my psyche. I have lived much of my life as if I could solve problems by working harder, putting in longer days and taking less time off. Rationally, there is a flaw in this kind of thinking. I know that working longer can mean working less efficiently and accomplishing less. I know that success comes from a variety of factors of which hard work is just one. But emotionally, I almost always respond to a problem by trying to out work my colleagues. When I lead a camp, I am first to rise in the morning and last to go to bed. At the office, I am often first to arrive in the morning and last to leave in the evening.
But much has changed in my lifetime. When I was a child, Sabbath was a social norm. In our town, it was expected that businesses would not be open on Sundays. Merchants were supposed to take the day off. Most of us went to church every week. My dad would occasionally go back to the shop and do a little work on a Sunday afternoon, but usually that was incorporated with some family activity and we went with him.
The world isn’t that way any more. We live in a 24/7 world where stores never close and there are people working at every hour of every day. Although schools and government offices take the weekend off for the most part, many minimum wage workers have multiple jobs and rarely have a day off unless they are sick.
Being a minister, the concept of a weekend has never taken a firm place in my way of living. I once joked with a search committee that was raising the question of why I expected four weeks of vacation after only a year of service, that I didn’t think many of them would trade all of the weekends of the year for two weeks of vacation. I usually take a day off each week, but am less disciplined about it than the scriptures suggest.
This summer, we got the idea of taking some “weekends.” The plan was that we would take Mondays and Tuesdays off each week. With an associate pastor, the duties at the church could be covered and we could take our camper on some adventures in the nearby hills. The idea seemed like a good one at the time, but I have found that I rarely am able to take Tuesdays off. We have some Tuesday meetings, I have a list of things that need to be done and there is no real way that another person can do my job. I have convinced myself that I am indispensable. There seems to be a real theological problem with that way of thinking, but I catch myself at it from time to time.
So it is August and we have yet to take a “weekend” camping trip. We have decided to give it a try. Yesterday after church and after a lunch meeting of the young adults group of our church we went home, hitched up our camper and came out to Sheridan Lake. It is only 12 miles from home and I come her several days a week to paddle for exercise. We will be heading back home in the early afternoon and our entire trip will have taken less than 24 hours. But we have had a lovely supper outside, paddled on the lake at sunset and I was paddling again at sunrise this morning. We have gotten away from cell phones and the Internet. And we are taking a break. Next week, we’re taking the concept a bit farther with a two-night reservation in Custer State Park. We hope to actually take Tuesday off from work. It is the last week before labor day, but we finally have arranged for a weekend.
It may take some practice and a bit of thinking before we go so far as to take a three day weekend. Sometimes we do so at Thanksgiving, but a lot of people take a four day holiday for that celebration.
For now we are resting in a very beautiful place and enjoying a break. The commandment about the Sabbath is a good one. I should take it more seriously.
By the time I came along, we had mixed Sabbath theology with something that we call the “protestant work ethic.” Somehow our people had deeply ingrained in us that to find meaning in life one needs to work hard. Hard work equals success was the formula that I was taught. And it was demonstrated in the lives of the relatively successful people that surrounded me.
Such a notion came late to this world. It is accurate to make a connection with Protestantism, if for no other reason than the simple fact that the idea that there could be some sort of social mobility arose around the same time as Protestantism. Ideas of democracy, upward mobility and many other similar concepts find their roots in the time of the invention of the printing press. Before books became affordable and there was a level of literacy, such lofty ideas weren’t accessible to most people. If you were born poor, you would die poor. If you were born rich, you would die rich. There was no thought that you could change your circumstances.
As the notion of social mobility arose, there was a kind of competitive nature that arose with it. Ideas of equality and common good were slower to develop.
In my time, the Protestant work ethic has risen to a kind of social competition. People seem to think that if you are poor it is because you didn’t work hard enough. If you didn’t “get ahead” it was your own fault. Although this is incomplete thinking, it took deep roots in my psyche. I have lived much of my life as if I could solve problems by working harder, putting in longer days and taking less time off. Rationally, there is a flaw in this kind of thinking. I know that working longer can mean working less efficiently and accomplishing less. I know that success comes from a variety of factors of which hard work is just one. But emotionally, I almost always respond to a problem by trying to out work my colleagues. When I lead a camp, I am first to rise in the morning and last to go to bed. At the office, I am often first to arrive in the morning and last to leave in the evening.
But much has changed in my lifetime. When I was a child, Sabbath was a social norm. In our town, it was expected that businesses would not be open on Sundays. Merchants were supposed to take the day off. Most of us went to church every week. My dad would occasionally go back to the shop and do a little work on a Sunday afternoon, but usually that was incorporated with some family activity and we went with him.
The world isn’t that way any more. We live in a 24/7 world where stores never close and there are people working at every hour of every day. Although schools and government offices take the weekend off for the most part, many minimum wage workers have multiple jobs and rarely have a day off unless they are sick.
This summer, we got the idea of taking some “weekends.” The plan was that we would take Mondays and Tuesdays off each week. With an associate pastor, the duties at the church could be covered and we could take our camper on some adventures in the nearby hills. The idea seemed like a good one at the time, but I have found that I rarely am able to take Tuesdays off. We have some Tuesday meetings, I have a list of things that need to be done and there is no real way that another person can do my job. I have convinced myself that I am indispensable. There seems to be a real theological problem with that way of thinking, but I catch myself at it from time to time.
So it is August and we have yet to take a “weekend” camping trip. We have decided to give it a try. Yesterday after church and after a lunch meeting of the young adults group of our church we went home, hitched up our camper and came out to Sheridan Lake. It is only 12 miles from home and I come her several days a week to paddle for exercise. We will be heading back home in the early afternoon and our entire trip will have taken less than 24 hours. But we have had a lovely supper outside, paddled on the lake at sunset and I was paddling again at sunrise this morning. We have gotten away from cell phones and the Internet. And we are taking a break. Next week, we’re taking the concept a bit farther with a two-night reservation in Custer State Park. We hope to actually take Tuesday off from work. It is the last week before labor day, but we finally have arranged for a weekend.
For now we are resting in a very beautiful place and enjoying a break. The commandment about the Sabbath is a good one. I should take it more seriously.