Ah yes, that old tension between 'doing ministry' and 'being in ministry'. The perennial tussle between Martha and Mary. Perhaps never intended to be sweetly resolved into a perfection of equipoise, but an ongoing down and dirty wrestling match day by day? For most people in ministry there is certainly a huge amount of doing. Often an overwhelming, overloading, remorseless, unremitting amount of doing 
. And a sense that somehow the very essence of the way we think about doing and being in ministry has gone awry. What is it that we’re doing? How do things pass through our filters and choices and decisions to become the things we do rather than the things we don’t do day by day? And how do those things we end up doing reflect and relate to our core sense of who we are and what we are for?
Perhaps these are some of the questions we can start to explore together on the Sheldon Hub?
Comments
Mike Reeder Nov 11, 2016
Being and doing are as important as each other but often doing becomes the stronger partner because it is nearly always a good friend of need. We seem to embrace need as it feed our inner needs and the outward needs of those around us. I give thanks for those around me who help me to restore the balance between the two
Daphne Norden Nov 09, 2016
6 times that the word doing appears above! Much more to the point is to think about who we are, not even BEING in ministry, but just being
Mike D Williams Nov 09, 2016
For me the doing part of ministry has to have a foundation of contemplative being. The day by day choices are hard but the discipline of quiet at some point helps. The way we think about doing and being is important - how can we be counter cultural when the demands on us grow in our anxious church?
Howard Peskett Nov 09, 2016
Here rises the issue of authenticity. Is what I do just like a rotten branch that has lost its life-giving connection with the tree? Or is there a life-giving continuity between my person and my actions. Am I just an actor or propagandist? Or do I live and speak the truth?