Lengthy

When our former pastor resigned I made an inward and outward commitment: we will take my time to hire the next assistant pastor for our church. The prediction was that we would have someone in place by August 1. Isn't August 1 next week? Ya, we're not all that close to bringing that person to minister to/with us. And so we wait and we search.

I've met some great people along the way and have enjoyed some of the process of the search. Some of it I could do without. But we will get there.

Enough?

It's a funny thing, discouragement. It hits at the wierdest times and in the most unexpected ways. For me, as it may be for others, it comes down to the "enoughs" of life.

• Did I do enough?
• How come they didn't give enough?
• The board said "yes", but did they say yes enough?
• Were enough people at church?
• Will there be enough volunteers?
• How will we be effective enough?
• Did I call enough people?
• Do people feel loved enough?
• Did I work hard enough?
• _____________________________? (fill in your own)

And check it out--it's all centered on performance. But does God want my performance or does he simply want me? He wants me to want Him. He wants me to love Him. He wants me to know Him. Seems to me that Jesus was like this with Mary & Martha--one who was doing and one who was being.

Oswald Chambers makes a distinction between active work and spiritual activity in today's (July 10) entry of My Utmost for His Highest. He writes, "Simple active work and spiritual activity are not the same thing. Active work can actually be the counterfeit of spiritual activity." Trying to do enough is counterfeit spirituality. (I think this is along the lines of what Thomas Merton calls the "false self".)

In a performance driven society it is difficult not to be performance driven our spiritual lives. It is just as difficult to rightly handle performance in our corporate (church fellowship) lives. But it seems necessary. Sure, we have to guage what's going on spiritually, corporately, etc..., but the questions that center on the "enoughs" are just about enough to take one down and lay them out. Tread carefully.