This morning, I read an interesting op-ed written by a woman who is a lawyer and mom. She talks at length about the difficulty she has in that role and the hard truth that she often chooses her work life over her family because it fits her priorities.
She laments the fact that she skipped birthdays and phoned in her participation in her kids’ school activities because her work was more important. I disagreed with the author on several points, but found myself identifying with her perspective because the same struggle often plagues folks in my line of work.
Pastors often find themselves called away from their lives in order to be with a family in the hospital or counsel a married couple as they face divorce, or any number of other catastrophes. I imagine farmers have a similar dilemma, in that work is always there and has to get done or the farm faces failure.
In fact, there are very few careers that I can identify that don’t have that sort of pressure knocking at the door on any given day. The lawyer/mom finally acknowledged that there will always be another case and she would inevitably trade time with her kids for her legal career. This truth applies to every profession.
For me, there will always be another aspect of ministry to attend to. Farmers will always have another thing to fix or field to spray. There is always more work to do. In the case of the gal writing the article, I’d argue that though there will always be another case to work on, you won’t get to relive the days with your kids that you missed.
There won’t be another 7th birthday party or 2nd grade Thanksgiving program. You only have your family as long as you have them, whereas work is going to keep piling up even long after you have retired, gotten a new job, or died. This is a simplistic argument that needs some unpacking. I am not saying that work should be neglected or that it doesn’t matter.
In fact, I believe that work is important to our identities and gives us a larger mission in life. Without work to do and a strong work ethic, people tend to wilt. For some folks, that work is
caring for their families full time. That is work and fits the definition of work that makes life meaningful. The danger with deriving meaning from work is that it can become the only thing that matters in life. This is a problem. Our relationships give life meaning and purpose in a way that work simply cannot. Typically, this is the biggest tug-o-war that takes place in our lives: the work/relationships balance. I would argue that trying to balance the two is a mistake because it is really a question of priorities. Work serves a purpose in that it puts food on the table and gives life meaning. These are a high priority in our lives. However, it is not the only priority. The trick is to identify the highest priority elements of our lives and spend our energy on those things. This gives a powerful edge to our family in terms of priority because we have a finite amount of time with family. My daughter will only have swim meets for a few years, and then they are gone forever. My presence at those events means the world to her, and she will likely remember my absences for a long time. In fact, when I have done funerals I rarely hear children of the deceased neglect to mention their parents attendance of sports/school events. The impression will last a lifetime. If you compare that to work obligations, the importance of a particular work task must be huge to demand my attention over family. I’m not advocating that neglect of work. I love my job and a huge part of my identity is rooted in what I do. I put a lot of time in at my job because it’s important, but logging extra office hours is a poor trade off compared to dating my wife or being present for my kids’ events.
