...nnn... I don' wanna go to school...

My pastors recently told me about how there have been many Sundays where they wanted desperately to just skip church - you know, just "miss" a turn and keep going on down the highway. Apparently this horrifies parishioners, who seem to consider such sentiment absolute heresy. I found it understandable though.

This is just one of those weeks when that feeling is catching up with me. Nothing in particular and everything in general is just weighing on my mind. It's odd going through the motions, treating some aspects of this internship like any old job - something that has to be done before the end of the day. Like homework almost. Maybe more than almost.

Every job is probably like this sooner or later. Some day when you don't want to go into work just because. Why should pastoring be any different - jobs may differ, but the real issue is that it is a person who carries it out. Even pastors wear down - and chances are they wear down more often than people think.

It's rather convenient to assume that there are some people out there - mystical giants like Monks, Nuns, Priests, and Grandmothers - people who will always be strong, always be great, always spiritual. Why do we want to believe this fantasy? We always tell such stories for a reason of some kind, so why this one? We watch movies about heroes because we want to believe that there are causes worth fighting for. We read romance novels because we want to believe that our own love life can one day be like that one, either for the first time or once again.

And so, I guess, we want to believe that pastors are always spiritual for one of two reasons. In the first case, it is because then we can feel okay about not being spiritual ourselves - that's their job, so I don't need to worry about it. In the second case, it is because we want to be spiritual like that, and we haven't made it yet. The first an excuse, the second a dream. Most people live between the two I'm guessing. Enough dream to feel good about ourselves, enough excuse to get out of the hard work the dream requires.

All of this in the service of avoiding the weight of responsibility we have as full participant in the priesthood of all believers. And don't think this doesn't critique me, just because I am a pastor.

So, now it's off to text study, then to sermon prep, reading, talking with peers. Maybe getting away from the computer will do me good - conversation and the mutual caring and consolation of the people of God tends to do that. Thanks be to God.

Almost 3 Months In

Well, I'm nearly 3 months into my internship. I'm feeling the burn now - probably because I get so frustrated with sermon and confirmation help material that it ends up being easier to design lessons on my own. I'm sure that I'm not doing as good a job as other folks would do, but I do enjoy getting my hands dirty while preparing material. I'm pretty sure that this is also helping me work through my seminary education now before I forget some of its finer points. Still, all that time spent trying to prepare for lessons, studies, or sermons can be draining.

I'm learning a lot, though concrete applications for this knowledge seems a bit absent at present. Getting used to being out of the rhythms of the academy has been disconcerting, but knowing that I'm actually being employed full time has its own way of keeping me going.

Time spent with seminary friends of late has been nice. Last week, I saw some friends at Luther on my way to a conference at which I saw Steve Paulson. The previous two weeks I got to see the interns around me and catch up with them - It's fun since several of us went to the same college.

Now, however, I'm looking forward to weeks without long distances to travel to conferences or cluster meetings and actually having five days to get work done.