Shannon over at the Mets Police pointed me to Seth Godin’s blog which got me fuming this morning…
I was talking to a religious leader, someone who runs a congregation. She made it clear to me that on many days, it’s just a job. A job like any other, you show up, you go through the motions, you get paid.
I guess we find this disturbing because spiritual work should be real, not faked.
Indeed. And how often do we settle for much less?
Often ministers fall short, not because of their own personal failings but because they are afraid to let others see all that they are. They don’t share their passions with um…passion. They don’t let others see what moves them into belief.
In short, we don’t know them. They don’t let others know where and how God MOVES them in their lives.
With young people this can be very important. They know when you’re faking it and when you’re not. They can smell phoniness a mile away. But they also know genuine spiritual experience as well. As do most people of all ages. So the most important rule in being a minister is to be yourself, or better stated…
Be naked.
The more I share of myself, the more I find that others are willing to share themselves with me. They trust me and open up to me and am able to see me as a trustworthy person. When I get uneasy about sharing something I almost always regret it. And I’m not talking about inappropriate self-disclosure either. I’m talking about sharing from one’s own experience and living an authentic life that states that living a life of purpose matters and that staying connected to God is meaningful. Where in your life have you needed God? Where has God helped or comforted? How is this different from talking to yourself or to the wall?
Being naked means not hiding in our own arrogance or protectiveness. We need to be vulnerable enough to be our true self for others. And that person is far from perfect, but they are confident enough to allow others to see them struggle with all that they are and vulnerable enough to let others see that they can’t do everything alone.
What difference does God make in your life? Because as the minister in Godin’s post notes, some days you just go through the motions–and as Godin notes, that ain’t exactly inspiring.
Naked ministers are able to let others see that God is all that they’ll ever need.
And in that self-disclosure we meet the God that we all crave.