Beauty Tips for Ministers

Tulips Are In!

January 29, 2008 on 11:59 pm | In Self Care, Theological Reflection On Your Fabulousness |

Greetings to my post-holiday, perhaps more-than-slightly exhausted darlings,

About six years ago, PeaceBang took a “vacation” after the holidays which consisted of driving to New Hampshire (2 hours or so away), staying in a hotel, eating meals alone, and sliding home down the highway through a blizzard two nights later. This experience was more depressing than 21 straight days of rain in May (that happened one memorable year, too, and just the memory of it makes me want to stick a fork in my eye), and the following year PeaceBang said to her Board of Trustees and Worship Committee, “I’d like to take two weeks of my vacation time in January, if you please.” Because they are good and wise people, they said, “Why, certainly.” I gratefully packed myself off to Mexico, and a January vacation has remained a cherished institution in my life since then. Not only restful but productive: I outlined no fewer than four sermons after good, long, uninterrupted afternoon naps, and read several eminently preachable books and articles.
We NEED TIME OFF AND AWAY, my doves. We are not automatons, we cannot drive to the great spiritual filling station on a random busy afternoon and expect to get a full tank of the Holy Spirit and drive away humming “How Great Thou Art.” The body gets tired, the brain gets weary, the spirit starts to drag and stagger, and the psyche craves deep time in the well of silence and restorative sleep.

You must advocate for vacation time for yourself. You must put aside savings for it. You must understand that you need and deserve REAL time off. No, Jesus did not go on vacation. But let’s remember how short his earthly ministry was, my friends. You are in this for the duration and the last time I looked, none of ya’ll could walk on water, either.

So PeaceBang came home from vacation and noticed today that the TULIPS ARE BACK in the florist shops, a fact that made her sigh with rapturous, sensual pleasure (oh, those oranges! those lipstick pinks! Delicious!) and a blunt, creaturely yearning for beauty. She filled her eyes with their saturated colors and thought of all of you, all of us, and wished this wish:

“I hope my powder pigeons are right now pushing their chairs back from their desks, looking out the window for a friendly chickadee or slash of turquoise sky, laughing belly laughs with a trusted friend, feeding themselves with something exquisite and nourishing instead of grabbing a granola bar in the car, and taking a few moments on the way out of the hospital to stop in the gift shop to play with the stuffed animals before they head to their next meeting. I hope some of them are stopping to inhale the smell of their children’s nap-sweaty heads, getting a massage, painting their toenails Dutch Tulip red, sneaking off for an afternoon at the movies, stirring a pot of intoxicating chowder for a posse of pals, or making love. I hope they are stopping to breathe, to absorb color and light, to let music wash over them like a divine anointing, and allowing themselves uninterrupted moments of simple human pleasure.”

Here in the northeast we’re just starting the Drab Time of year. So from here on in until the chinook starts blowing in, I will try to have tulips in my home to remind me of all the glory that abounds, even under the tired-looking snow and in the austere New England winter landscape.

Be beautiful!