pastor || writer || speaker
What if the church was ‘more like a way station than a destination’? When I first became a Christian, I read an article by J. I. Packer that introduced me to the idea of the church as a hospital. The gist of Packer’s thought, as I recall, was that church is a community where we …
Continue reading "What I Learned from ‘Leaving Church’ (pt 3)"
We talk a lot about burnout, but in Let Your Life Speak Parker Palmer does a good job of diagnosing the root cause of burnout in our vocation. One sign that I am violating my own nature in the name of nobility is a condition called burnout. Though usually regarded as the result of trying …
Here, Parker Palmer offers poignant insight into the challenge of exceeding our limits when we have noble goals in our work. If I try to be or do something noble that has nothing to do with who I am, I may look good to others and to myself for a while. But the fact that …
Continue reading "Exceeding Our Limits (Palmer, Let Your Life Speak 4)"
Later in Let Your Life Speak, Parker Palmer addresses our own need for limits and the temptation toward burn-out for those who really care about their work. If you are like me and don't readily admit your limits, embarrassment may be the only way to get your attention. I go on full alert only when …
Continue reading "Needing Limits (Palmer, Let Your Life Speak 3)"
Here are a few words from Parker Palmer on wrong approaches to thinking about our vocation: Here, I think, is another clue to finding true self and vocation: we must withdraw the negative projections we make on people and situations - projections that serve mainly to mask our fears about ourselves - and acknowledge and …
Continue reading "Negative Projections (Palmer, Let Your Life Speak 2)"
Matthew Erickson 