I am getting back into work after a week off today. We didn’t go anywhere, we were just able to stay at home and not work without guilt. We had a few day trips and visits here and there. Nothing major, but off nonetheless.

I don’t think I have yet had a holiday and come back to work reinvigorated or refreshed. I find the dread builds and the overwhelming feeling that I should be doing anything else grows. I have previously said this:

As the resumption of duties bears down on me, I review every reason why I am not really cut out to be doing this, every reason why – even if I were cut out to be doing this – I am not sure I want to be doing it, and every reason why I should do just about anything else. Only, I’m not really qualified to do anything else. I’m not even sure I am qualified to do this in another place. I am to all intents and purposes entirely unemployable outside of what I am doing, which I am not convinced I do very well at any rate, but this seems the worst of all possible reasons to stay doing it!

Since I wrote those words, I have determined I am not going to be a pastor. I am in the final furlong and, far from making it easier to come back, it feels even harder than before.

I also wrote then, ‘A sense of inadequacy can be overcome by a broader sense of purpose and drive. A feeling that we are not up to the job can be offset by a belief that, inadequate as we are, what we are doing has some purpose and value.’ Perhaps what is making matters harder this time is the sure knowledge that I am a lame duck, grinding out the final months. Purpose, drive and value are hard to come by.

How does one even get up in the morning when they feel like this? How does one do this work when this is how it seems? I suspect there are a few basic things worth reminding ourselves.

First, the thing in front of me is the thing that Jesus has given me to do. This is true for you too. The thing Jesus wants you to do is the thing he has put in front of you. He calls us to be faithful in the thing he has given us to do. For Jesus’ sake, we need to get up and get on with it.

Second, the scriptures warn us against being idle (cf. 2 Thessalonians 3). We are to be busy at the thing Jesus has given us to do because he tells us to work as we’re able, to be busy and productive, to provide for our families. If for no other reason, this is what Jesus wants us to do so we should get on with it.

Third, despite how I often feel about it, the bible says clearly that being an elder is a ‘noble thing’. It is a good thing. I might feel inadequate. I might quite often just not want to do it. In a few months, I won’t be doing it. But I am one now, I have been given it to do now, and Jesus says it is a good and noble thing to be doing. I will get up and get about it because Jesus tells me it is a good thing to do and I trust him more than I trust me.