You will hear many self made millionaires and entrepreneurs saying that you shouldn't get up every morning and go work for someone else when you could work for yourself.  Working for someone else only puts money in their pockets.  In some ways, that makes a lot of sense.  I have to admit that there are mornings when I get up to go to my secular job, I wonder if it's all worth it.  But the above statement is only true in some cases.

First, it depends on who you are working for.
Secondly, it depends on what you are doing.
Thirdly, it matters if you are enjoying your job or not.

I'm thinking here in terms of ministry.  I have the best boss in the world and beyond!  Working for God is very different than working for anyone else, even yourself.  He doesn't need His pockets lined.  He owns everything already!  So when I work for Him, He lines my proverbial pockets!

When you work for God, you are always doing something worthwhile, even eternal.  How many self-made millionaires can say that? In fact, there is the wise proverb that reminds us that "you can't take it with you."  so I have to ask myself, why would you work like crazy to accumulate something you can't take with when you die?  Why not invest in something eternal that you can store up while you are on earth and enjoy for all eternity?  That sounds like good business to me.  

Lastly, when you are working for God, doing what you He asks, you will always have joy.  You may not enjoy what you are doing every single minute, but even in the tough times, there is an abiding joy and peace that is in you, but not of you.  Your happiness is not connected to how well your job is going.  It remains constant through the good and the bad times.  What better job could you have than that?

So I've come to the conclusion that you can say a whole lot of things about ministry and ministers, but one thing you can't say is that ministry is a dead end job!  It actually is quite the opposite.  If you are successful, it will lead others to eternal life!  And even if some do not end up on the right side of eternity, if you have given them enough information to make their own decision, you have succeeded.  What you do is not from your own wisdom, ingenuity, or talent.  The boss completely provides everything you need to do your job and do it well!  If you rely on Him you can't not succeed!  And in terms of benefits, you just can't beat his benefit package!  

So, Hi Ho, Hi Ho, it's off to work I go! 

My last trip to the eye doctor produced two pairs of glasses instead of one.  Because of my age-a whopping 53-I now needed computer glasses AND distance glasses.  My computer glasses I wear at work.  The distance glasses were for when I was out and about running errands or for those days that I didn't want to wear contacts.  After a few days I found that my computer glasses enabled me to see well enough to drive, so I stopped carrying both pairs of glasses and just wore my computer glasses.  They don't correct my distance vision well enough to see house numbers and detail, but I found that I could get away with the computer glasses most of the time.  After a while, I didn't even notice the difference.  

The other night I actually sat down to watch a basketball game and decided to grab my distance glasses instead of my computer glasses.  When I put them on I was startled at how clearly I could see the tv.  I hadn't realized how much detail I was missing out on by wearing my computer glasses to watch tv. I had been satisfied with less than perfect vision because of the convenience of only carrying one pair of glasses but had missed out on the details of the things I had been seeing.

I think that, for the most part, we do the same thing with our spiritual lives.  What we know and experience is good enough to get us through life and supply what we need to survive.  Unfortunately, those things about living for Christ that we don't understand remain a mystery and our Christian experience is rather lack luster because we are not fully experiencing the power of God working in our lives.  The Bible talks about being "dull of hearing."  I think that we are also dull in vision as well.  When a prayer is not answered the way we know God could have answered, when we struggle with something that we know God could fix, when we do not have the continual joy of the Lord, we accept it or find some pseudo-spiritual explanation for it instead of just admitting that we missed some details along the way that would have changed the course of events to line up with what we know is God's best.  We settle for blurry vision instead of searching out the scriptures, taking an honest look at what's lacking in our own knowledge, experience and faith.  After a while the Christian life can become dull and we start to slip away from God instead of drawing closer to Him.  

Clearly scripture tells us that "we see through a mirror dimly now, but then face to face."  We will never see completely clearly until we are like Him, but surely we are not living in the revelation that the disciples had nor walking in the power of the early church Fathers.  We have "settled" for partial vision.  We must apply the salve of the Word of God, receiving God at His Word, and allow faith to build in our hearts so that we can see and know God in the fullness that was provided for by the death and resurrection of Christ.  It is then that the world will see that truly what we have is different and desirable.  We really do them a dis-service by living with blurred spiritual vision and we misrepresent God to a lost and dying planet.  

I don't know about you but I look forward to bed time.  When my kids were little, I looked forward to it too, but from a different motivation! LOL!  Now that I'm older and usually the first one in bed at night, bed time means something different than it did when the kids were small.  When the kids were small I dropped into bed from sheer physical exhaustion.  Now that I'm older, it's more mental exhaustion than physical, although there are days when it's both!  There are many things that I like about bedtime.

~It's quiet time.  It's time when no one is saying "Mom, Mom, Mom, Mom."  (That is if I'm lucky.  There is the occasional knock at the door, of course!)  But I can just get cozy under the covers with a good book or my laptop and chill.

~It's a resting time.  My muscles just seem to stretch out in that king sized bed and say "Ahhhhhhhh!" 

~It's a time to let go of today and embrace tomorrow.  With my day planner in hand, I can get my next day set.  I get more done that way....until my day planner wrecker finds out that I actually had plans and suggests we do something else that is.  Gotta love a hubby who is as spontaneous as they come.

~It's a secure time.  There's just no better feeling than to be relaxed, warm and wrapped in the arms of the person you love most on this earth.  I can just breathe deeply and drift off to sleep.   

I have a day off today-my first paid vacation day in well over 27 years!  It's very nice to be able to spend the day with family having fun and getting paid not to work!  What a blessing!