| Subject: Repost: SJ: Why Am I Taking a Sabbatical? (2002/12/31) |
Author:
Eugene
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Date Posted: 21:35:56 09/21/03 Sun
2002/12/31
SJ: Why Am I Taking a Sabbatical?
Genesis 2:2-3
“By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. And God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.”
I feel kind of funny about calling my 2003 journey sabbatical. A Sabbath in the Biblical sense is taken after six days of productive laboring. A sabbatical year, or a year of rest, is also taken after six years of labor. In this sense I wonder if I am qualified to take a sabbatical, since I really have trouble calling the last 10 years of my life productive labor (especially in the spiritual sense)?
On the other hand, taking a sabbatical year has become a common practice for certain professions, especially those in the academic world. It is customary for professors to take a year off from teaching every 5 to 10 years; he or she is supposed to use this year to re-charge, research, travel, and hopefully produce some publishable writing. The whole idea is for one to use this year to sharpen his/her intellectual edge, which undoubtedly gets dull after years of the daily teaching routine.
It is in the latter sense of the term that I am taking this sabbatical year. When I look back, most of my faith journey up to this point has been one of routine. Because I need to believe that I have some kind of worth, I served and studied to feel like I am achieving some respectability and earning some kind of truce with God (so that He will leave me alone). It is not until lately that I realize that behind all the “going through the motions”, business as usual sorts of service and study, I have not been able to built my faith and to love Christ at all.
That is the reason why I am taking a year off from any “official duty” at church. I believe that I need to do this -- taking time to experience fundamentally how to live with Christ and to reflect upon the meaning of life in the body of Christ.
I am keeping this journal as a discipline to encourage myself to move on with my journey in Christ daily -- so that this Sabbath may become truly blessed and set-apart as holy, instead of a year of simple inactivity. Meanwhile, I am keeping it open to people who are perhaps on the same journey. You are welcome to be my co-traveler and your beautiful foot-print here also.
May 2003 turns out to be a year of being overwhelmed Christ’s love and by our inherent worth in Him.
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