Wanting More

Well, I just finished my last day as a member of a ministry staff team. It’s been a long path since my wife and I decided it was time to step aside back in July.  I am very thankful that God provided the path that He did and that He was faithful during this long time of transition.  I’m trusting that He will continue to show us the next steps as we seek Him more and more. 

I had no idea how I was going to feel today in the office or what it was going to be like to leave. 

Today was not really different than any other day around the office. I had already emptied out my office so I wasn’t carrying boxes out with me today. I was just trying to make sure that everything that needed done got taken care of.  The only thing that made it different was knowing that it all had to be done today. I couldn’t leave anything till tomorrow.  

While I did have a few sad moments I was also reminded of a lot of the reasons this is the right decision. I was there and happy but I definitely did not feel alive doing what I was doing.  I was also reminded of a number of the reasons I wasn’t the best fit for this particular church. 

When I got home my wife and kids had hung a few balloons, banners and streamers and prepared a great celebration dinner.  I can say quite confidently that I have a very incredible wife.  

The best way to describe how I’m feeling now is tired. You know that tired after you’ve been going on adrenaline for a while and then you get a chance to stop.  I still haven’t decided what the next few days will look like. I want to get a big jump on a lot of work that needs done but I also realize I could use a little break.  I have no scheduled plans until Monday and it would be great to just hang with the kids a lot. 

Thanks for reading along with me on my journey over the last while.  Hope you’ll stick around the blog as I develop it beyond a bunch of ramblings of my transition.

In previous posts I’ve mentioned that I am in the process of leaving my ministry position but haven’t really talked about why. Well that is what I’m going to do here. I apologize for the length. 

The best way to describe it is that I want to feel alive. I want to live a passionate life and my current ministry position was hindering that rather than enhancing it.

I have worked in a halftime Director of Worship position for about three and a half years.   Before I was called to this position I worked full-time in music. I played piano for everything from a large variety of bands, opera and musical theatre. I’ve been teaching private lessons for about 10 years. I’ve done instrument sales (if you can sell pianos in Costco, you can sell anything). When I was young I even did a two year apprenticeship for piano tuning and repair work. But the thing that always made me feel most alive was working doing recording and audio work.  

Somewhere in the middle of all of this I had dedicated my life to Jesus.  

Shortly after I married my wonderful wife I felt a stirring in me.  I struggled badly with what I saw taking place during worship services. I am big on doing something all or nothing, doing it the best that I can and doing it for the absolute most right reasons.   It is not my desire to judge how or why anyone else does something. If I’m being honest back then it probably was said with a bit of a judgemental attitude.  

I was looking around and wondering how and where I could help.  That lead to the stirring I had. I wanted to get involved and help in anyway that I could.  That lead me to eventually apply and work in my current position.  It meant us moving from our hometown but when you feel God calling you go. 

It was a halftime position I applied for which at the time I thought was fantastic. It let me get involved and help but would allow me to continue on with the other things I was interested in. Especially the studio.  Boy was I wrong. My all or nothing attitude started to kick in. I totally worked on pouring myself into what I was doing. But the problem was which thing do I pour myself into? I tried pouring myself into everything. Well that is just a recipe for exhaustion and frustration. Which I started to suffer from.  It was not helping me feel alive. 

Then we had a baby. Then we had another baby.

Needless to say the balance in my life was way out of whack.  So we began examining our lives to see what God was calling us to do. I really love leading worship in the local church. However, the reality of serving in that type of ministry began to take it’s toll. Always trying to make as many people as happy as possible and trying to meet all expectations (both real and perceived) makes it difficult to connect with God on a Sunday morning and it also begins to work it’s way into other areas in life as well. To be totally honest, I also put too much pressure on myself and there were larger goals I thought could be accomplished in my ministry but were probably not going to become a reality in the near future.  I think handling these struggles would be more manageable (not solved) in a full-time work situation. The reality of having these stresses and then needing to go and make a living became too much.

During this time more and more work was and is being provided for us in the studio.  Working in the studio excites me to no end. Even needing to deal with clients, business and tax details, technical problems and some crazy working hours doesn’t stress me out because I can see the bigger picture with what I’m doing. This past summer we were seriously wrestling with this possible decision and feeling led to leaving my ministry position but really struggled if we could make this move work financially.  Then I had a meeting with a photographer friend. Photography has been my creative outlet for a few years and I had helped this friend out with a few shoots and stuff for fun and to make a couple of extra bucks.  Well he offered me a job doing post production work for him.  This is what made us believe we could afford to make the change we are currently making and felt like God was providing these opportunities.

So basically I want to focus on the things in life that make me feel most alive. That is closeness with God, and time with family and pursuing my creative goals musically and photographically. I want to live.