TAKING MY OWN ADVICE

We preachers often, okay, sometimes, have a difficult time taking our own advice. In other words, we do not always practice what we preach. Now I am not thinking about our taking the high moral ground in the pulpit and then, in our personal lives, taking the road that leads otherwise. We all do that at times as we are all sinners. Ordination does not exempt one from succumbing to the temptations of the flesh as we preachers are all humbly aware.

What I am referring to is our sometimes inability or lack of resolve or whatever we may want to call it when we do not follow our own good advice that we hand out from the pulpit or newsletter or simply conversation. For instance, I have over my forty-six years of ministry always encouraged those over whom I had pastoral responsibility to make and take the time to get away from it all.

In other words, take a vacation. A real vacation, not one where we take our work with us. Not one where we have to keep constant ties on what is going on back home. That may be getting away but it is not taking a vacation – vacating, as the word means, from what is daily filling our lives. And the reason why I could and still can preach the necessity of getting away from it all on occasion is that Jesus did it as a regular part of his life and ministry. If you don’t believe me, read the Gospels.

My ultimate dream vacation is two weeks on the beach somewhere. That is still on my bucket list although my brother Fran is beginning to put that reality on the front burner as he and his wife just came back from a one-week on-the-beach-with-nothing-to-do-but-relax vacation. And they needed it much more than I ever have, Jesus did, going somewhere to get away from the maddening crowd who were always chipping at his heels no matter how tired he was.

In lieu of the two-week- beach getaway, Arlena spent eleven days and thirty-four hundred miles driving to Austin to visit daughter Autumn and see her new home. The we headed to Des Moines for the Iowa State Fair and then to Nanny’s (Arlena’s Mom) to make sure her refrigerator was full and her meds were in order, and then home. No one in his or her right mind would call that a relaxing vacation. But it was.

My cell phone was mostly off. We listened to no news or read no newspapers. I did have to check what the Pirates did each day, but the Pirates are part of my DNA, so what can I say? And, yes, I know, Arlena and I are very blessed to be able to take such a trip when so many, many people are not. We are very thankful.

Vacation time is over: the kids are back in school. Even so (putting on my preacher’s hat), even if we never get away, never get to a beach, we can still take quiet time on a regular basis to refresh, reflect, and be still. We must. Our health depends on it.