It’s official – we are a bi-vocational church plant. I started my second job with Minneapolis Parks and Rec last week. I am working out of the service station in North Minneapolis and focus on a general area with a couple other guys. The work that I do is basic manual labor – cleaning park bathrooms, emptying trash, weed whipping, dragging and lining baseball fields, etc. I leave the house at either 4:40 or 5:30 AM (depending on whether I ride the bus or drive), but I’m home between 3 and 3:30 in the afternoon.
I’m very excited about this position for several reasons:
- I like doing this kind of stuff - I get to be outside all day, doing the type of work that I enjoy doing anyway.
- It’s very straightforward – I’m the low man on the totem pole, which is a nice change of pace. As those of you in any sort of leadership position know, sometimes there is a desire to just show up, do the work that you’re told to do, and leave work at work. I get all of that in this job.
- Theory vs. Reality – I get to see if reality matches up with theory. Again, the top two reasons we made this intentional change is (1) missions – finding and engaging those who are disconnected from Christ and have no interest in His church, and (2) leadership development – relating to the lives of current and potential Gospel Community leaders (who all have full-time jobs) in order to best guide them as they apply the Gospel to groups of people.
- Be a better man – With two jobs, I will have no choice except to become more organized, more efficient with my time, a better communicator with my wife, better at prioritizing my calendar, better at resting, etc. I have leaned heavily on Paul’s words from 1 Corinthians 9 for the basis of bi-vocationalism, and I love the way he ends this chapter – “But I discipline my body and keep it under control.”
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