One of the most helpful ideas that has been offered to me in recent years to help me navigate life and ministry was from my spiritual director. My spiritual director was a man I used to visit every 6 weeks to two months just to reflect on the movements of the heart and in my Christian life. I was particularly committed to this because in the busyness of ministry and the sheer variety of situations you might find yourself, its good to have something in the diary which causes you to pause, reflect and just reorientate yourself. For the same reason, I build retreat time into my diary – this is often a lot of silent, hidden time, not necessarily in silent places, but in anonymous places where I can just have the space to be, to breath, and to allow the important things space to arise.
Back to the spiritual director: here’s the thing. As a pastor, one minute I can be discussing a very practical community project, then immediately counselling an elderly saint feeling the frustration of older age, followed immediately by a community group where the conversation is so wild that I don’t know that I can contribute anything more than not getting involved in the discussion! A few minutes later, I can be in the midst of a sincere prayer meeting with people thoroughly committed to the the Kingdom, and the expectation of God moving. Shortly after, I can be in an academic scenario considering ideas which are wonderful in and of themselves but have borne very little relation to all of the above, sometimes written theoretically in an ivory tower. The next I can be in my ‘crafting’ world, where it’s quite obvious that my vlogs in that area are building some sort of connection with people round the world, not only through the crafting, but in the ways that people engage with my conversation to camera. That’s just a very small snapshot.
Here’s where the spiritual director helped: he offered me a picture of rooms. He helped me see that all of these scenarios are like rooms where I am invited to go. I go there and seek to connect with people where I find them. I am meeting people on their ground, on their terms, on their tuft. There are several ways where I can connect, but I often leave either added to or taken from – or both. I can come away and the car journey can feel like a recovery from some sort of multi-personality disorder! The key question the the SD offered was, ‘where is your room, Andrew?’, ‘what are the things that inhabit that space that give you peace, comfort and recovery in every way?’, and ‘how often do you need to spend in that room so that you can effectively inhabit other peoples spaces/lives?’
I don’t think I’ll ever get to the end of those questions – that’s not the aim, and they’re not really that kind of question. These are questions that I’m invited to live with, not answer. What they do do, however, is help me understand the dissonance and confusion that the average day can bring, and remind me that I’m always invited into ‘my room’, where I sit with Jesus, him and I.
Andrew S M Clark 