Counting

All of my life I have work in jobs where the result of my labor was easy to quantify. I was the son of a mechanic and working for dad, if you fixed a car in a reasonable amount of time and it didn't return as a result of your repair you were doing a good job. In the maintenence discipline of the petro chemical world, if you could keep it from breaking and fix it if it did break you were doing a good job. In the engineering world if a project finished on time, under budget, actually worked as designed and the client was happy you were doing a good job.

This Discipleship Pastor stuff is a whole different world. Spiritual formation, spiritual growth, and spiritual health are not about what we are, but who we are. It is not about knowing or doing, it is about becoming. And how do you measure what those you pastor are becoming? It is way more abstract than anything I have ever done in a job before.

The results mean way more than whether Tommy is doing a good job or not. The results have consequences way beyond me. It's about the potential of real people becoming who God designed them to be. (BTW - I am not looking for the sympathy comment - "Tommy you are doing a good job". So don't even go there in the comment section...)

" A lot of what can be counted doesn't count, and a lot of what counts can't be counted."
- Albert Einstein