Due to the pandemic and the federal government’s response, about 150 million Americans are eligible to receive stimulus checks. Yet when my wife and I found out we were going to receive a check we started to ask: do we really need it all, or might we know somebody who needs it more?

Several weeks ago, two friends and I in Denver hopped on a call to explore what we could do to help. After some back and forth, we decided to start a website called SharetheStimulus.org.

The idea is simple: we’re asking people to make a pledge to give a portion of their stimulus check to any cause or person in need, go and make a donation, and then share the story with us. And it’s getting some traction. Here’s a story 303 magazine did about the movement.

We’re now about 3 weeks into this project and here’s what we’ve learned.

(1) People like giving in community rather than alone. As we reached out to individuals, churches, businesses and nonprofits, we found that it was really pastoral leaders who took this idea and ran with it.

One pastor, Jim Bergen of Flatirons Church, asked his congregants to consider whether they needed all of their stimulus check, and if they didn’t, give 50 percent away. Just in their church, as of April 28 they had 521 people give a portion of their stimulus checks. Woodmen Valley Church in Colorado Springs had 395 givers give nearly $200,000 in just two weeks.

What we learned was that it was far more effective to ask people to give alongside trusted community, like a church, than it was to give individually. Churches are critical avenues of generosity and trust in a time of need, and as unemployment benefits drop at the end of July, they’ll be critical support systems as the recession deepens.

(2) People like giving locally. What have people given to? People have given to all sorts of charities, like food banks, rescue missions, or organizations caring for immigrants. But they’ve also been really creative: one person gave a writing desk to a person who was out of work to finish her novel. One person gave his stimulus to cover the medical bills of neighbor. One family made a list of single people they knew and did a circuit of dropping off meals and homemade cards.

When it comes to giving, many feel alienated, like it’s only something for the affluent. One man said, “‘Generosity’ is normally something commended to upper-middle class and wealthy people. But this felt like a ‘generosity for the rest of us’ idea. We can all realize our affluence and identify others with greater needs than we have.”

This movement of “giving in the middle” is a powerful force, not only for economic impact, but for creating social capital and real relationships in a time of isolation.

(3) Widespread giving is a powerful tool for social and personal renewal. In Yuval Levin’s A Time to Build he said that social reform and the renewal of our institutions requires personal renewal. Thinking about my own experience sharing our family’s stimulus check, I think this is right.

Last weekend our family had fun sharing our stimulus check by putting together an elaborate gift package with goodies for our grandma who was shut into her nursing home. As we drove by in a family parade in front of her nursing home and cheered on Grandma Alberta, I felt this deep sense of joy wash over me. It really was more blessed to give than to receive.

Ryan Streeter mentioned in a USA Today 0p-ed that perhaps now is a time for a national tithe. Perhaps forms of local generosity – even something as small as giving a portion of an unexpected check to a neighbor – may be just what our hearts, and society, need most.

Nonprofit Work

List of Colorado Charities and Nonprofits: Denver, Fort Collins, Colorado Springs, Pueblo

April 26, 2020

Not sure where to give to or what charities to support?

Here’s a list of nonprofits along the Front Range that are serving the spiritual, economic, and social needs of Coloradans.

Denver

Colorado Springs

Fort Collins

Pueblo

Don’t see your favorite Colorado charity on here? Drop me a line by contacting me and, as able, I’ll add it to the list.

This post first appeared as a part of SharetheStimulus.org, a campaign to encourage widespread generosity to both individuals and causes affected by the recent pandemic.

Culture Theology Work

Known By our Love? | 2019 DIFW Annual Report

April 22, 2020

Hi Friends,

As we were preparing this year’s annual report, we could have never predicted that three weeks in March would change everything. A virus spreads, millions are out of a job, and as the economy shuts down, nearly everybody’s daily work has changed. This is a time to lament. But at Denver Institute, we also believe it is a time to love.

In this year’s report, I ask: are Christians in our society today known for their love? At Denver Institute for Faith & Work, our mission is to form men and women to serve God, neighbor, and society through their daily work. Leaning on Jesus’ Great Commandment, we believe our daily work is an opportunity to love God, serve our neighbors, and demonstrate the gospel to an unbelieving world.

We live in uncertain times. However, as you’ll see in this report, there are reasons for hope:

Angela Evans, a 5280 Fellowship alumna and journalist at the Boulder Weekly, shares about her vocation to highlight vulnerable communities through her writing;
Last year, over 1,000 people came to events last year covering topics like “God, Energy and the Environment” and “Teaching Character Formation in Public Schools”;
Denver Institute was even mentioned by the New York Times as a thought leader in the national faith and work movement.

As we move into 2020 and beyond, would you consider financially supporting the Denver Institute community? Your gift goes directly toward creating more podcasts, short courses, events, publications, and transformative experiences. Your giving forms a community that can respond with grace, truth, and love to the greatest challenges of our time through their vocations.

Thank you for your generosity. As the nations are in an uproar, my prayer is that we might, “Be still and know that I am God…The LORD Almighty is with us” (Psalm 46).

With deep trust,

Jeff Haanen

Founder and Executive Director

PS. You can give by returning the enclosed envelope or by visiting denverinstitute.org/give.

Work

A Letter to the Denver Institute Community

April 9, 2020

Dear Friends,

In the last four weeks, our work and our world have changed dramatically. Millions are now unemployed, nearly 3.5 billion people are confined to their homes, and each of us is trying to adjust to what feels like a different world.

Two weeks ago, when I drove down Denver’s 17th Street, I was reminded of the prophet Jeremiah’s lament, “How deserted the city lies, once so full of people! How like a widow is she, who was once so great among the nations! … The roads to Zion mourn, for no one comes to her appointed festivals. All her gateways are desolate, her priests groan, her young women grieve, and she is in bitter anguish” (Lamentations 1:1, 4).

In the last month, I’ve been on calls with dozens of people in our community. Business owners are shocked that they must shutter the doors of what they’ve worked to build for a lifetime; young professionals have been fired from what seemed like promising careers; families buckle under the pressure of school, work, and isolation. All of us are bewildered by uncertainty. Last week, as I walked through King Sooper’s and saw empty shelves and people wearing face masks, I wondered: what is happening to our world? Anguish is the right word.

But it is not the final word.

Here at Denver Institute, we remain committed to forming men and women to serve God, neighbor, and society through their daily work. Our call — now more important than ever — is to love God, serve our neighbors, and demonstrate the gospel through our vocations.

As we think about this task, and each of us seeks to listen to God’s voice amidst such pain, it is my conviction that we must first begin not with society, but with ourselves. We must look squarely at the fear and anxiety clouding our senses, and then redirect our eyes toward Jesus, who is the Bread of Life (John 6:35). Each day, we must practice soul care for uncertain times and learn to give our anxieties to God, who cares for us (1 Peter 5:7). The Living Water is ever present to each of us, if only we will drink. We must first learn the spiritual practices and adjust our daily rhythms that will allow us to firmly rest in God’s unchanging love and care for each of us (Matthew 6:25).

Second, we must care for each other. As we all struggle with isolation, now is the time to be present, be vulnerable, and be hopeful. Whether it’s a coworker, a mother-in-law, or a single friend, we need each other. At Denver Institute, in the next 90 days, in lieu of events, we will host more online gatherings for business leaders, for women, for the brave souls in health care, and for those who work in a variety of industries.

Third, to the best of our ability, we must keep working. We were designed for work. And though we are confined to our homes, and many of us are struggling with grief over work that has been lost, we recognize that work is good for our souls. As such, each day provides opportunity for paid and unpaid service to the common good. Searching for a new job, delivering food to a neighbor, doing homework with children, and doing sales calls — all are needed. The economy — and our neighbor — needs us to inhale the peace of God and exhale the creative goods and services that this brave new world needs the most. Though it feels like we’ve been carried into exile, now is the time to “build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce” (Jeremiah 29:5).

Also, as we are bombarded daily with haunting news, we must aggressively limit our intake of media and learn to think theologically about our work and cultural moment. What is most needed in a situation without easy answers is wisdom. At Denver Institute, will continue to publish content and courses that reframe our work and our world in light of the biblical story.

Finally, now is the time to serve. Now is the time to double down our generosity toward the causes we care most about; now is the time to serve others while physically distancing; now is the time to find innovative solutionsto serve our coworkers, neighbors, and family members.

We are still here for you. If you have a need of any sort, please reach out to us. We are actively praying through how our programming might expand to better serve our city. In this season, we will commit to calling, praying, thinking, networking, teaching, learning, and finding ways to serve you in an unprecedented moment in our nation’s history.

This is a time to lament, but not to panic; a time to pivot, but not to stray from our core convictions; a time for public concern, but also a time to trust that Jesus is the savior of the world, and we are not.

As we head into Holy Week, I’ve chosen to fast on Good Friday as I pray for our city, our country, and our world. Yet on Easter Sunday, my family and I will also go outside to our front porch, dial into “zoom” church, and sing a song of resurrection as the sun rises.

The world has changed, but our joy is unchanging.

Your friend,

Jeff Haanen,
Founder & Executive Director
Denver Institute for Faith & Work

This letter first appeared in an email to the Denver Institute community. If you’d like to receive more updates from Denver Institute on articles, events, educational resources and other opportunities, please subscribe to the monthly newsletter.

Work

Rethinking My Daily Rhythms

March 31, 2020

Just like you, in the past two weeks I’ve had to rethink my daily rhythms. I’ve also realized that my emotional and spiritual health is the top priority right now. The cascading anxiety and panic of our society is something that I can easily internalize. And when that happens, I can experience paralysis, and actually damage those around me, rather than love and serve.

When I step back a look at the things I can’t control, and look squarely at the things I can control right now in my life, I can re-engage my family, friends, and my work. And, as it turns out, though the news makes me feel powerless, I actually can impact much of my life and daily choices.

Last weekend my wife and I sat down to think through – first individually, and then as a couple – what we need to be healthy right now.

Here’s what I came up with. I post it here in case making a simple “rule of life” right now may be the right next step as your endure this strange quarantine.

As the flight attendant always says when boarding the plane, first put the oxygen mask on yourself, and only then put it on others.

Healthy Rhythms for the Haanen’s (Jeff)

Daily Routine Essentials

Spiritual Health – Prayer and silence at 830am, with DIFW staff; noon, prayer for others (before lunch); before dinner, play one worship song with family
Physical Health – Outside every day with the family on walks/gardening; 3-4x/week sweat @ 4pm.
Marital Health – Kiss my wife. 🙂 Play tennis on Saturdays (have fun)
Emotional/Mental Health – Limit news intake (don’t check until 330pm each day); read books from 8pm-10pm (no internet or phones); call friends/family regularly
Family Health – Be 100% mentally present with my kids from 5pm-8pm; Take them outside at 4pm exercise time; piano with Sierra & Alice after dinner each night
Neighbor Health – Pray daily for a neighbor/friend/family/co-worker who has needs/lost a job (prayer before dinner with family)

Weekly Essentials

Financial Health – Cut non-essential expenses right now in family budget; use our regular income to contribute to savings; Use other income toward car debt and giving
Work Health – Stay focused on key projects, relational presence with our community, wise decisions and strategic pivots, and small “wins”
Refocus Each Week: (1) What can I control?, (2) What can I influence? (3) What can I not control, and needs to be released?

Culture Education

School Closures, Coronavirus, and How to Take the First Steps Educating Your Kids at Home

March 22, 2020

Your kids are home. You are home. You both need to get work done. What on earth does working and homeschooling look like?

Millions of American kids are, for the first time ever, being homeschooled. As it turns out, I happen to be married to a brilliant thought leader in the homeschooling world, Kelly Haanen, the director of the homeschool enrichment program at Ascent Classical Academy in Lone Tree, Colorado.

In this guest “post,” Kelly sent a note to parents of full-time K-12 students at Ascent classical academy, giving them tips about how to approach homeschooling for the first time.

If you find yourself trying to reorganize your daily schedule around your work and your kid’s school work – all day long – this article is for you.

As a homeschool parent and director of Ascent’s Homeschool Enrichment program, I want to offer you all a word of encouragement, and a few ideas, as you approach the next month of facilitating your students’ education at home.

First, I genuinely believe that amidst the chaos, we have been given an opportunity. For a few weeks we will be forced to slow down, to be present with our sons and daughters, and to learn alongside them. We chose to send our kids to a classical school because we care about what they are learning and who they are becoming. Second, balancing your own work responsibilities and their school work may be tough. But let me encourage you: you will be given tools and resources from Ascent teachers, you as parents are capable facilitators of your child’s learning, and the ideas below will help you create a flow and schedule for your day.

There are a million great ideas and resources out there; you may have seen the colorful daily schedules and offers for free online learning. Many of you are experienced teachers or previous homeschool parents. I don’t intend to add to the noise; I simply want to offer a few practical ideas that help us through our homeschool days.

I have four kids learning Pre-k through 6^th grade material. I work part-time, and I’ve found that daily rhythms and structure are essential to keeping us sane!

Daily Structured School-Time Tips

1. Space. You don’t need to create an elaborate school room (much of our school day happens at the kitchen table). You do want to make sure you have a space where supplies are easily accessible and students can work without being distracted. Turn off whatever screens you can. If creating this space seems difficult in your home, give them headphones with classical music to help them focus.

2. Schedules. Many of you will be working from home and will need to find creative ways for you and your kids to get work done. Routines and consistency will be your best friends. Decide on the best time of day for you to give your kids 1-2 hours of attention, (note: most kids learn best in the morning hours) then stick to it daily, even if it means waking them up in the morning. Your older students will be able to work independently for much of their school time, but your younger students will need your help. My kids love to use this timer as we move through our school day.

3. Rewards. It’s okay to offer them some motivation! Make it simple – chocolate chips for math problems, stickers for completed work, extra outside time if they finish early, a learning game on the iPad, or more of anything that motivates them.

4. Recess. As you plan for your school time, make sure to include some breaks. Give them snacks and make them move their bodies. Send them to the backyard or download a workout app to use when they need to get moving.

What about the rest of the day??

Finding a few hours a day for structured learning still leaves us with lots of hours with kids stuck at home. While there are plenty of ways to spend unstructured time (creating, cooking, cleaning, reading, playing, pretending, exercising, educational apps, playing instruments, listening to music) most of us will need consistent time each day to work when our kids don’t need our attention. Here are two daily essentials in our home.

1. Outside time. Give your kids significant time outdoors. Bundle them up if it’s cold. Give them an umbrella if it’s raining. Send them to the backyard. Let them ride their bikes around the block. Tell them to collect leaves or pull weeds.

2. Quiet (alone) time. I can’t stress this one enough. Plan in at least an hour when you send everyone to a separate space. My kids devour audiobooks during this time (download the Libby app to check out free audiobooks from the library). In our home this is a no-screen time, but they can play with Legos, puzzles, draw, knit, read or anything alone and quiet. We keep it simple and consistent.

Lastly, let them get bored – without a screen. It might be painful for a day or two, but you’ll be surprised how quickly they start coming up with ideas on their own.

My prayer is that none of you find yourselves exhausted and overwhelmed. Spend some time this weekend creating a plan with your kids. Developing a daily rhythm that works for your family is key! Reach out to teachers with questions. Ask me or a friend for help. Then go ahead and find some good movies on Netflix (Planet Earth, PBS programs, or movies based on classical literature are a great place to start) and relax!

This too can be a time to learn the true, do the good, and love the beautiful. Feel free to reach out with any questions.

Your advocate,

Kelly Haanen, Director of Homeschool Enrichment

Ascent Classical Academy

Work

Designing Workplaces to Be More Human

March 20, 2020

Designing Workplaces to Be More Human

We spend about a third of our waking lives at work. And yet, for the majority of people, work is not much more than a paycheck. We feel lonely, especially men. We feel like there’s a gap between our job responsibilities and our own potential. We often feel exhausted and question whether our work is making any meaningful difference.

How might we reimagine what it means to be fully human in our working lives?

Here are five aspects of what I think it means to be human, and, as a result, what I believe we need to focus on if we’re going to build workplaces that really invest in human potential.

Humans are emotional and spiritual. It’s tough to avoid it. Fear, anger, joy, surprise, sadness, disgust, elation – every day we’re a mix of emotions. My guess is that today, before leaving for work, you experienced at least a few of these emotions. One philosopher has made the case that fundamentally, we are creatures of desire. Dostoyevsky said it well: we crave nothing so much as something to worship. Our emotional and spiritual lives are woven tightly together.

Yet how many workplaces really acknowledge – and embrace – the fact that that we feel, we believe, we worship? Even rarer: who really takes the time and effort to invest in the deep emotional and spiritual health of their employees?

We see the cost when our co-workers are unhealthy – disengagement, addiction, distraction. A full 1 in 5 U.S. adults experience mental illness each year. But do we deeply care about facing our own shadows honestly and creating workplaces where our hearts experience deep peace?

Humans are relational. From our very first breath to our last, we are surrounded by people. Relationships are both the greatest sources of joy and pain in our lives.

The ability to relate well to others – what workforce development professionals call “soft skills” – is consistently the most important skill employers are looking for. Emotional intelligence also happens to be the skill needed for high level leadership.

Yet, how difficult it is to work alongside other human beings! The inability to deal with conflict, our own lack of self-awareness, and a growing loneliness epidemic in America all contribute to the deep challenges we face in our families and workplaces.

Yet each of us longs for community; we long to know others, and be known. We weren’t designed to be alone.

Humans are makers. From the earliest recorded history, humans made things. Tents, musical instruments, tools, weapons, pots, homes. “We are made in the image of the Maker,” says dramatist and playwright Dorothy Sayers. Work is, and always has been, a fundamental part of what it means to be human. Culture is made by what we make, and the meaning we derive from what we’ve made.

In the modern world, we’re constantly surrounded by other people’s work. Coffee cups, drywall, iPhones, books, concrete, electrical outlets, mops, pacifiers. Though some may imagine a day when machines take all of our jobs, history just doesn’t bear it out. Every time technology displaces jobs, we find other things to create. We are creators by nature.

Yet again, there’s so much that hinders our ability to do good work. Distraction, lack of autonomy, insufficient time, low wages, unequal access to opportunity. To make things worse, professionals especially have nearly divinized work as our sole source of worth and identity.

Who are the employers who invest in people’s ability to do excellent work, while holding work in its proper place alongside family and community?

Humans are thinkers. As young children, each of us were naturally curious about the world. We wanted to know. We wanted to learn. And now, as adults, we are in a constant state of debating what is true and good. Ideas matter.

In the circles I run in, it’s now out of fashion to acknowledge that we’re intellectual beings. But any cursory reading of history shows us that ideas matter. Just a review of the wars of the twentieth century – what some have called the age of ideologies – shows this to be true. Those who claim they just want “practical action steps” and don’t care much for “heady matters” are often the most controlled by the ideas of those who’ve gone before them.

In a global economy that changes so quickly, none of us can afford to stop learning. Yet in our jobs, more often than not, we become technicians. We become good at one thing – like processing mortgages or writing marketing copy – yet often are in the dark about the majority of the world. It’s hard to find opportunities to become generalists, and recover the range that we delighted in as children.

Where are the workplaces that encourage curiosity? Where are the organizations that ask employees to read outside of their field, listen to lectures on a regular basis, and really encourage broad, diverse thinking?

Humans are city-builders. This, too, is ancient. Not only do we work, but we work together. And as soon as we work, we form companies. And when we form companies, we realize that we need governments to safeguard those companies, and the rights that underpin them. We also need systems of education to form the next generation of workers and citizens. We need doctors to heal, craftsmen to build, and salesmen to sell. Before you know it, we have built cities.

As much as I’d like to avoid politics, we really can’t. Humans naturally form a polis when we work together. We must find ways to understand each other, live alongside each other, and provide for the needs of each other. “All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny,” said Martin Luther King Jr. “Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” Aristotle once said, “Man is a being best suited to living in a polis [city].”

Humans are intrinsically civic creatures. So, we’re forced to ask questions about not just our own needs, but also the needs of others. What does it mean for us to build just systems? What is a good society? And a question I often ask myself: are our workplaces a part of that answer, or are they a part of the problem?

***

At Denver Institute for Faith & Work, we built our five guiding principles around each of these five elements of what it means to be human. We also designed the educational program of the 5280 Fellowship around each of these principles as well.

Here’s a brief video overview of our Five Guiding Principles at Denver Institute.

My question for you is this: are you thinking theologically, embracing relationship, creating good work, seeking deep spiritual health, and serving others sacrificially?

Though in a secular workplace, you can’t always use theological language, you can take a look at your work environment or company and ask good, honest questions, such as:

Do we invest in deep emotional and spiritual health?
Do we encourage real friendship and relational wholeness?
Do we create conditions for people to do their best work?
Do we stimulate broad thinking about the key issues of our day?
Do we really care about our city, especially the vulnerable?

Sometimes integrating faith and work can seem overwhelming. But you do have a choice. You can shrink back, or you can act. You can accept the status quo, or you can choose to be motivated by doing your small part in the healing of God’s broken world. You can assume “work is work,” or you can imagine, in community, what might be.

You could even print these five questions and bring them up at your next team meeting. It may just convince them that work can be more than a paycheck.

This article first appeared on the Denver Institute blog.

Photo credit.

Culture Work

The Coronavirus Sabbath: 9 Things to Do When Everything Is Canceled

March 15, 2020

Everything is shutting down. Not just major league sports, but swim practices, rec centers, local libraries, and office buildings. And public schools. In my home state of Colorado, even public schools are shutting down for at least two weeks.

This causes lots of problems. For instance, how are workers like barbers, mechanics, and home health care workers – those who can’t work from home – supposed to not only stay safe, but also care for kids who are home from school? Also, how long should employers hang on to employees in the midst of drastic short term revenue cuts? These are big questions that need answers.

However, for a brief window, the Coronavirus also presents an opportunity. As I write this, my office building has shut down, all of my kid’s soccer and swimming practices are canceled, and my calendar is opening pretty fast for the next two weeks. The cancelations have caused both anxiety and sadness in our home (we really enjoy seeing people in our community!) but I wonder: could we also see this unique time as an opportunity to deeply rest and restore our souls?

On the dusty sands of the Sinai desert, Moses descended from the mountain with a message from God. “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God” (Exodus 20:8-9).

God gives the command to take a day of rest for three reasons. The first is trust. Sabbath is a chance to reorient our hearts toward trusting that God is the ultimate provider. It is an invitation to lay down ultimate trust in our money or our work as the source of security, and to release the chains of anxiety and restore us to our proper place as created beings, dependent on God the Father for every good gift (James 1:17).

The second is identity. Why not work every day of the week? Only slaves do that, suggests the Bible (Deuteronomy 5:15). God is the one who has redeemed his people from slavery, and Sabbath was to be a continual reminder of their liberty and identity as God’s people. Forced slow-downs like this current pandemic make me ask myself: have I submitted myself to a yoke of self-imposed slavery?

The third is justice. The Sabbath law includes a command to allow those with the least cultural power (children, servants, foreigners) to rest so that they “may be refreshed” (Exodus 23:12). In the midst of Coronavirus, this word is particularly poignant, as many tech workers will “work from home,” yet many with the least power will have far less ability to choose their hours and work location. Issues of justice and power will quickly rise to the surface as the global economy begins to hemorrhage.

If you are one of those who finds yourself with more time on your hands in the next two weeks, what would it look like to take this time and use it intentionally as a Sabbath rest?

Here are nine Sabbath practices to consider as the world begins to shut down for the coming weeks:

1. Prepare.

The Jewish “Day of Preparation” was a weekly rhythm of preparing to rest well – and it required extra work. Jews would store food and goods so they wouldn’t need to purchase them on the Sabbath day. They informed Gentiles (non-Jews) of their intention to take Sabbath rest.

Consider taking just an hour or two and consider how you might restructure time in the coming weeks. Many people waste Sabbath with entertainment or “vacation,” trying to vacate their daily lives. Instead, pause, find a friend or family member, and sit down together to consider how you might use this time to quiet your heart and life. Be intentional with this time.

2. Feast.

The idea of Sabbath as dour law-keeping is from the Pharisees of Jesus’ day, not from God. In Jewish tradition, Sabbath was a time for richly eating and drinking. It was one of the “festivals of the Lord” which prohibited fasting and outward expressions of mourning (Leviticus 23). Sabbath was to be a “delight and joy,” recounting God’s grace toward his people (Isaiah 58:13).

In these next few weeks, you may consider having old friends over, or even neighbors who may feel particularly isolated. Yes, keep your physical distance, wash your hands, and be safe. However, nearly all state and local governments think that small gatherings with basic precautions are okay.

Consider having a lavish feast with co-workers, family members, or low-income neighbors as a way to express gratitude to God.

3. Worship.

In Lauren Winner’s short, accessible book Mudhouse Sabbath, she notes the difference between contemporary visions of a day or rest and the biblical vision of Sabbath. “Whom is the contemporary Sabbath designed to honor?” she asks, tongue in cheek. “Whom does it benefit? Why, the bubble-bath taker herself, of course!” In contrast, Winner says, in the Bible the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. The difference between “indulge, you deserve it” (the popular vision for vacation) and “drink in the joy of God” could not be starker.

As you plan your Coronavirus Sabbath, leave time for communal worship (especially in smaller groups under 100), for long and short periods of silence, for prayer walks, and for studying Scripture. Worship is the center of Sabbath.

And worshipping Christians in this cultural moment have a unique opportunity to show the world that not fear or disease is at the center of our world, but the Triune God.

4. Re-create.

Sports, hobbies, music – these all can play an important role in a Sabbath period. Jewish culture was built around its festivals and celebrations. Recreation as “re-creation,” rather than leisure or vacation, can be an ingredient in renewal.

The Benedictine monks practiced ora et labora (work and pray.) They endeavored to be aware of God’s presence while farming, working, or even doing dishes. Can you do house chores or math lessons with kids during this time, yet quietly listen to God’s voice? Or internally are you “cranking work out,” nervous about all you’ll need to do when life returns to normal? The difference between the two heart attitudes is the difference between work and rest, Sabbath keeping and Sabbath breaking.

Yes, rec centers, stadiums, and theaters are closing. But the world outside your door is open for slow walks, long breaths, and deep smiles.

5. Remember.

Remembering was a core Sabbath practice for the Israelites. Even amidst the pain of unfaithful kings, the breach of covenant, and eventual exile, they found new life in remembering the Exodus and their nation’s birth out of slavery.

Take time to write down the good gifts God has given in your working life. Get out picture albums, call old friends or co-workers, or ask your parents about their first memories as children.

All is gift, said the Ignatius of Loyola. It often takes loss and forced silence to see this liberating truth.

6. Love your neighbor.

“It is lawful to do good on the Sabbath,” Jesus said as the crippled man “stretched [his hand] out, and it was restored” (Matthew 12:9-12). The Pharisees saw this and conspired to kill him, calling him a law breaker. But Jesus saw that Sabbath was for the restoration of all his people, especially the poor, widow, orphan and foreigner.

During this next two weeks, consider visiting shut-ins (while, of course, taking proper precautions), visiting the grocery store for a neighbor without transportation, or caring for the kids of those who still have to work even though their kids are home from school. My friend Dr. Bob Cutillo, a physician at the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless, once told me, “Don’t serve the poor. See through the eyes of the poor.”

As the Coronavirus transforms American life, take some time to think: how is the affecting the lower wage workers I know? Or the elderly? Or even my own neighbors?

Christians have the unique opportunity to demonstrate hope over fear in the time of Coronavirus.

7. Practice simplicity.

“Tis the gift to be simple, ‘tis the gift to be free.” The classic Quaker song offers a counter-cultural freedom from the entertainment and accumulation-complex of our culture: to possess less and intentionally simplify your life is to experience deep freedom.

Could you take some time in the next two weeks to develop the habit of giving things away? What is causing anxiety in you? What could you use without owning? What could you just as easily share as possess?

8. Renew your mind.

During Sabbath, consider taking time to “be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:1-2). Read not only religious books, but anything from neuroscience to wildlife biology to the history of water rights in the West. Our careers have a way of making us technicians – we know everything about one topic, but remain in the dark about most of the world. Reignite your curiosity and sense of wonder.

Shut off the technology, and find paper books that you can sit with, engage, and genuinely enjoy.

9. Make plans to continue Sabbath rhythms after your “Coronavirus Sabbath” ends.

We’re created to work (Gen. 2:15) and Sabbath days are meant to end. This awkward Coronavirus scare too, will end, and soon enough, we’ll be headed back to normalcy.

But what about the rhythms of the next few weeks could you take with you in the responsibilities of “normal life?” What practices do you want to take up? And which do you want to lay down?

And with whom do you want to practice more sustainable rhythms of work and rest in the future? Judith Shulevitz’s The Sabbath World: Glimpses of a Different Order of Time notes that Sabbath is a communal, not individualistic, activity. Could a spirit of Sabbath rest come to permeate even your working life, your family, your friendships and your community?

In our culture, most are engaging the Coronavirus with a spirit of fear and anxiety. Yet God says, “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand,” (Is 41:10).

Sabbath rest allows us to pause and see the great, colorful symphony that is God’s world. Even a “forced sabbatical” like this, when offered to God, can help us develop the spiritual muscles to hear the voice of God, see the beauty of creation, and embrace our place in it.

Everything may be shutting down right now. But, even as we take proper precautions, as Churchill once said, let’s “never waste a good crisis.”

Photo credit.

***

This article was adapted from a chapter on Sabbath in my book An Uncommon Guide to Retirement: Finding God’s Purpose for the Next Season of Life

Retirement Work

“The days are long, but the years are short.” How should I use my time in retirement?

March 7, 2020

“Teach us to number our days that we might gain a heart of wisdom.”

Psalm 90:12

“The first thing you have to know about retirement,” says Allan Spies, a 68-year-old retired US West executive, “is that you could live another 40 years.”

Spies recalled a conversation he had with his pastor when he was on the cusp of an early retirement in his 50s. The pastor reminded Spies of all the time he had ahead of him As Spies started to spend his newfound time, he was also jarred by how much his schedule changed. “The other thing you’ve got to know,” he says, “is that suddenly your clock changes.”

Many enter retirement busied and harried from the last few months of work. Then, like jumping off a moving train, the forward momentum comes to an abrupt halt. Weekdays melt into weekends. Long breakfasts can become early lunches. The time that was lacking in the pressure of raising a family and pursuing a career now floods into a quiet home.

After an initial honeymoon period, many early retirees find themselves quickly looking for structure to their days and weeks. “I had to do something,” says Lynn Haanen, about her early retirement. “My days lacked a schedule and a sense of purpose.” Initially relieved to leave the “grind” of teaching third graders, Lynn (my mom) gloried in finally having time to herself. But eventually, she realized her weeks were amorphous and needing structure.

Her life in retirement had traded the stopwatch for the lava lamp, with hours and days slowly blobbing into each other without direction.

For millions of Americans, early retirement can feel like entering Dr. Seuss’s “The Waiting Place.” In his classic Oh, the Places You’ll Go!, Seuss warns about “a most useless place” for “people just waiting”:

Waiting for a train to go
or a bus to come, or a plane to go
or the mail to come, or the rain to go
or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow
or waiting around for a Yes or No
or waiting for their hair to grow.
Everyone is just waiting.

Fear of being caught in a useless cycle of waiting leads many to backfill their days with activities, errands, and “busy work” to avoid the anxiety of purposelessness. Time becomes a burden, something to be used up, like too much corn overflowing a silo after harvest. “Oh, I stay busy,” becomes the anxious response to “How’s retirement?”

New research shows that human longevity is giving people a newfound abundance of years – a change few have planned for.

Time, Time, and More Time

In 1900, the average male could expect to live to age 46, and the average female age, 48.[1] Today, “if you are now 20 you have a 50 per cent chance of living to more than 100; if you are 40 you have an even chance of reaching 95; if you are 60, then a 50 per cent chance of making 90 or more.” Over the last 200 years, life expectancy has increased at a rate of more than two years every decade.[2]

If you retire at age 65, this means that you will have an evens chance of living 25 years beyond retirement. (Studies show that half of Americans retire from ages 61-65, and a full two-thirds of Americans are out of the full-time workforce by age 66.[3]) If you exercise, eat healthy, minimize alcohol consumption and have generally healthy relationships, plan on at least three more decades of life.

In Lynda Gratton and Andrew Scott’s fascinating book The 100 Year-Life, they see drastic changes coming to the world in the next 50 years as it ages – and lives longer than ever before.

Out of necessity, people will work into their 70s and 80s. Gratton and Scott ask their MBA students at the London Business School, “If you live you 100 years, save around 10 percent of your income and want to retire on 50 percent of your final salary, at what age will you be able to retire?” The answer: in your 80s. Human longevity is changing the equation of financial planners and government pensions.
There will be new jobs, skills, and a new need for life-long education. If you live to 100 and work into your 70s and 80s, the economy will likely have been completely transformed since your high school, undergraduate, or graduate education. The need to learn new job skills – and to take time to re-invest in your education – will rise in importance.
Family and home relationships will be transformed. Four generations living at the same time will become a norm, and as Baby Boomer budgets are stressed, intergenerational living will become commonplace.
People will be younger for longer. With advances in medical technology, many reporters and social observers have said “60 is the new 50.” Though we should carry a healthy skepticism of the “forever young” narrative of our culture (as we’ll explore in the next chapter), we also shouldn’t ignore the fact that people are now living longer, healthier lives than ever before.

One of the most fascinating changes already happening due to human longevity is that the three-stage life is starting to lose its meaning. For generations, it was assumed that you lived in three stages: first education, then employment, and finally retirement. (Many Christian books have adopted this paradigm and called retirement a “third third,” or a “third calling.” Other books have assumed that “aging” and “retirement” are the same topic, which is no longer true. “Old age” is something that – for most – will happen decades later.) But today, the seasons of life dedicated to work, family, education and rest will become more fluid. You might start a new career at 50, become an undergraduate at 60, and a great grandparent at 70.

Christianity can, and should, dump a bucket of cold water on much of a secular culture’s near-worship of the medical technology that has elongated our lives. “From dust we came,” we say on Ash Wednesday, “and to dust we shall return.”

But Christian thinkers, pastors, and leaders also need to lead the way in communicating that retirement is quite simply no longer a life stage “preparing for the end,” but instead a contemporary social construct that allows men and women to prepare for a new season of life.

This is an excerpt from my book An Uncommon Guide to Retirement: Finding God’s Purpose for the Next Season of Life.

[1] Lynda Gratton & Andrew Scott, The 100 Year-Life: Living and Working in an Age of Longevity (London: Bloomsbury, 2016), 2.

[2] Emily Brandon, “The Ideal Retirement Age – and Why You Won’t Retire Then,” US News & World Report, 12 May 2014, Accessed on June 15, 2018: https://money.usnews.com/money/retirement/articles/2014/05/12/the-ideal-retirement-age-and-why-you-wont-retire-then.

[3] Dan Kadlec, “The Ages When Most People Retire (Hint: Probably Too Young),” Time, 1 December 2016, Accessed on August 12, 2018: http://time.com/money/4584900/ages-people-retire-probably-too-young-early-retirement/.

Business Work

“I am not alone as I work in the world.”

March 6, 2020

This is what one brave woman wrote in a post-event survey after Business for the Common Good, our annual business conference. I decided to post it here simply so I wouldn’t forget her insight and courage.

“This was the perfect mix of addressing all different levels of how to follow Jesus by honoring him in our work. I loved that there was an emphasis on building a foundation of valuing our own mental health and bringing our shame to Christ. If we don’t allow God to reconcile ourselves – inside of us – it will be hard to bring kindness, patience, and lasting change to our neighbors, coworkers, and the workplace structures we seek to improve.

“As a woman, I have increasingly found myself facing fears of being discounted and undervalued in a society that historically does so to women in the workplace. At this conference, however, I found myself being moved to empathy toward men instead of defensiveness as the sessions pointed towards faith in Jesus as the ultimate redemptive force inside of humanity.

“Seeing so many Christian men in business sitting under this teaching at the conference gave me a sense that my fight is not against them, but rather injustice. And this fight I can only navigate when I am rooted in my value in Jesus, not the salary I successfully negotiate or the roles I obtain. He holds my concerns close to his heart, and he does for all of us, men and women, and I am not alone as I work in the world.”