I am planning to take my sabbatical next year, in 2014. Next September I will have been your rector for 4 years, and your priest for almost 7 years. And while serving as your priest has been, and continues to be, a wondrous privilege beyond words, it is also a full time, round the clock, 24/7 endeavor that allows very little time for rest and renewal and reflection. And so I am in dire need of some…sabbath time.
The word sabbatical comes from the Greek, meaning "of the sabbath." A sabbatical is intended as a time of rest; a time to refresh our energy; a time to re-member our best selves and renew our approach to the work we love. And so after six years of glorious ministry in this parish I am thinking that it is time for me to take a rest, in accordance with God's own example of resting on the seventh day. A critical part of the creative process, according to our own Creator, includes a period of rest.
And so I am planning to follow God's good lead and plan my sabbatical for next fall. And I invite you to do the same. In this season of Advent when we are intentionally minding our margin, making space for God, I invite you to join me in planning a time of refreshment and rejuvenation in your own life. I invite each of you to think about taking your own sabbatical next year; to take a month or two or three three off from something that you love to do, but is weighing heavily on your….energy; something that is near and dear to your heart, but that could use a bit of time off, a bit of space for regeneration; something that no longer feels like the broad place that it once may have been.
Whatever it is, I invite you to put it down for a bit of time. Allow yourself some space to renew your interest and your energy. Allow yourself some space to renew your creativity. Whether it is something that you do at church, or in your vocation, or in your family life, or in your community life, or a hobby, or an element of your lifestyle; whether it is a sabbatical from a position of leadership, or a commitment to an organization or an ongoing activity; whether it is a habit of staying up too late, or cleaning the house, or doing laundry, or whatever it is that seems that it is burning you out and weighing you down. I invite you to join me in a period of rest. Put your holy work down for a period of time.
The world will not come to an end if we take a break. Either someone else will pick up the work, or it will go undone. But, when we return to our post after having rested, we will be re-energized for our sacred work. Our feet and our hearts will have been transplanted to a broader and more open space where there is room to move and to grow and to think more creatively, and with more integrity.
The sabbath is God's own example of rest, grounded in our story of creation, in Genesis, from the beginning. And it is reiterated in the book of Exodus in the recitation of the ten commandments. Number five is: remember the sabbath and keep it holy. And so a sabbatical is a healthy, more-than-recommended constituent of our spiritual well being. One could even go so far as to say it is a spiritual practice mandated by God.
So today I invite us to think a bit radically. To hold in prayer the work from which we might like to take a sabbatical in order to renew our deepest sources of energy; to think about the places where we need a rest, where we need a break, where we need some down time. Even if it is hard to imagine, or difficult to even consider, I am guessing that we each and all have at least one place in our ministries that might benefit from a sabbatical;
where we can best serve and honor God by taking time to make space for God's good gifts and God's divine inspiration of and through us.
And so as the last line of today's psalm instructs: Be strong, and let your heart take courage, all you who wait for the LORD. I think a sabbatical would be a great place to begin that sacred wait. So today's question of the spirit is: What will be the object of your sabbatical, in service to God's broad place?
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