If you go back and read some of my early blogs (starting with November ‘06), you’ll find the recurring theme of loneliness. I wrote about my struggles with being alone in the truck for hours at a time, no one to talk to, and only fleeting glimpses of people who speed past my big orange “elephant.” This was a completely new phenomenon for me; I had never felt loneliness (except maybe as a kid during my first few days at Short Mountain Camp).
There were days during the first month of driving when I literally cried my way from Memphis to the eastern seaboard. I was away from the security and familiarity of home, family and friends. It was tougher than I could have imagined. You can sense the struggles in those early blogs.
Sometime in December when I mentioned those struggles to my friend, Ron Cook, he empathized right away. In fact, he was going through something similar at the time, as was a mutual friend who, like Ron and me, had recently left professional ministry. Strange similarities. Ron gave me a book he had been reading entitled, “Isolation: a place of transformation in the life of a leader” by Shelley Trebesch. This book put my experiences associated with loneliness in a new light.
I learned that isolation can be like a “desert experience” when one is stripped of all the false props of life and left face-to-face with God. The false prop that gave Ron, my friend and me purpose and meaning was ministry. Specifically, the prop was performance which is the bedrock of professional ministry (perhaps in your line of work as well). Ministers receive a lot of accolades and praise. People love us. They think we know it all and tell us regularly. We are esteemed more highly than we should be, and in no uncertain terms, we are elevated to a status above everyone else in the congregation. After a while, we begin to believe all the hype and try even all the harder to prove ourselves. We work longer hours, create more new programs, and generally bask in the warmth of our “well deserved” fame. We actually begin to believe that we have created this for ourselves, and forget that God alone is responsible for whatever degree our ministry is successful.
Then, when for whatever reason our situation changes and we no longer receive the regular doses of flattery, we crash. Trebesch puts it this way:
Since affirmation can not come in an isolation experience from achievement, it must come through beingness. It is this drawing out of one’s beingness that is a paradigm shift that most leaders (who are) used to plaudets from achievement struggle with in isolation.
I didn’t know it at the time, but I was actually detoxing from ministry! During those first months as a new truck driver, I was coming down from the mountain of achievement, flattery, performance, praise, professionalism and more. It was difficult, but it made me realize that all I really need is God. Says Trebesch: “A paradigm shift is a major shaping activity used by God to give breakthroughs in a leader’s life. It is a major change in perspective that revolutionizes how a leader sees something.”
What I began to see is how dependent, debilitated and immobilized ministry can make one. Professional ministry puts one at the mercy of church leaders and congregants and less free to respond only to God. It plunges men and women into the pit of relying on effective performance and praise for happiness and purpose. Instead of deepening one’s reliance on God alone, it actually increases the distance between the minister and God.
Now, here’s something more startling: The same thing can happen in the life of the “ordinary” person in the pew. Church work or religion or church membership or whatever you want to call it can have the same effects on non-clergy. Church members begin to see programs, committe membership, attendance, good works and more as their god. They begin to rely on these things for their identity and even salvation rather than seeing God as the giver of meaning, purpose and life. Church members even vehemently protect the system at the expense of meaningful relationships with those who are not a part of their sacred community. Well, that’s a subject for future discussion.
The point is: what I went through for the first months of my new vocation brought me to my knees, and ultimately to my senses. The Father is all I need. I am learning to be comfortable alone. I am finding purpose apart from personal achievement and public praise. I am finding new ways to converse with God..new ears to hear his voice. New means of living for him and with him. And I have never felt freer!
Have you been to the desert? Care to tell us about it?
