In my letter to Tim last Thursday I told him that I was going to take two months off from the work I've been doing for the past eight and a half years... the work of being available to pastors. The financial gifts from my friends have been spent, and I have a mortgage that needs to be payed. My temptation is to solve my dilemma of "needing more money" by "raising more money" for the non-profit, so that I may continue this good work with pastors AND live in a work that gives me such life. Instead I have chosen a different and hopefully temporary route. To give the non-profit bank account some space to grow, and to foster my growing gratitude to God and those who have given, I began a completely new vocation:
Bending Over.
Some folks call it landscaping, but for me it's just a chance to get closer to the earth. My favorite author, Wendell Berry, says it well in a poem entitled Below. One line brings me great clarity -
... I aspire
downward. Flyers embrace
the air, and I'm a man
who needs something to hug.
My body must be excited, because this morning I'm sore all over.
My heart must be young, because I awake with a return to my first love.
My mind be must free, because the land is hugging me back.
And yes, just for the record, I'm still a bit conflicted over this choice I've made. I know that God doesn't work on the barter system, but if He did, how good it would be if He would trade an ounce of quiet patience for a pound of good work to this man who can hardly get out of his chair.
