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Eugene H Peterson, Working the Angles: The Shape of Pastoral Integrity (Grand Rapids Eerdmans, 1993 [1987])Reviewed by Darren CronshawEugene Peterson calls pastors to prayer, Scripture and spiritual direction. These are the three angles, he suggests, that if aligned will ensure the lines of ministry (preaching, teaching and administration) fall properly into place. It is repetitive and hard work, but Peterson is a great coach to keep at it. Peterson was a pastor for thirty years and is my literary mentor as a pastor and a grounded academic. He is a wonder with words and adept at exegesis, but demonstrates a capacity to relate his learning to the world of parish and people. Rather than office management, image projection, voice control and creative plagiarism, all geared to make the pastor look good and the people feel happy, Peterson calls pastors back to their true craft. Pastoral leadership is not merely about satisfying a congregation but attending to God. This is the shape of pastoral integrity, in which he suggests three acts are foundational:
Contexts vary – from self, to the history of Israel and church, to a person – but it is God to whom pastors pay attention. When diary demands, human needs, career ambition and drivenness to succeed get me out of shape with my calling as a pastor, Peterson comes with welcome re-calibration. PRAYER In an age of technology and progress, in the spirit of the Greek god Promotheus who sought to make life better for everyone with any available tools, Peterson summons pastors back to ‘cultivating a grace-filled relationship with God’ (p.30). In response to requests for ‘a little prayer for the occasion please Pastor’, Peterson declares there are no ‘little prayers’. In the face of Enlightenment-inspired biblical criticism which sidelines the Psalms as the cries of a defeated though pious people, Peterson reminds us that Psalms were the prayer and worship out of which the prophetic developed. He reminds pastors that effective mission begins in prayer: ‘Anything creative, anything powerful, anything biblical, insofar as we are participants in it, originates in prayer. Pastors who imitate the preaching and moral action of the prophets without also imitating the prophets’ deep praying and worship so evident in the Psalms are an embarrassment to the faith and an encumbrance to the church.’ (p.40) The Psalms, furthermore, remind us that prayer is ‘answering speech’. They are five collections of prayers, ‘out of the depths’, in answer to the five books of Moses. It is not we, but God, who has the first word. God speaks creation and redemption into being, and we respond. Athanasius said most Scripture speaks to us, Psalms speak for us. They are personal and wide-ranging and the best place to do an apprenticeship in prayer. It seems that spontaneous prayers are highly valued in evangelical churches, suggestive as they are of a personal relationship. Yet the best prayers do not arise from our own reflection, but from Scripture-soaked imaginations. (See also Eugene Peterson, Answering God, San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1989.) My high school physics teacher, Mr Sewell, doubled as my Inter-School Christian Fellowship teacher. Mr Sewell taught us to pray with the Psalms. Every Friday morning, 8-9am, we would read 5 psalms. For example on the 2nd of the month we would read and reflect on what grabbed our imagination from Psalm 2, 32, 62, 92, 122. We added Proverbs 2 to throw a bit of wisdom in. That habit grounded my prayers for years and gave me a language for my joy as well as my pain, and helped me express my heart to God from mountains tops or valley bottom experiences. Peterson argues the best gift and most helpful framework to guard time and space for prayer is Sabbath. He describes Sabbath not just as a day off or a utilitarian tool to get fresh energy (which is a bastard’s Sabbath), but a reminder that God is working and does not need us to be active every day and every night. Sabbath removes our bodies from circulation. It separates us from people who cling to us and from frenzied routines to which we cling to for identity. Peterson says it is ‘Not a day to get anything done but a day to watch and be responsive to what God has done ... not primarily something we do, but what we don’t do’ (p.82). When we sleep and wake up, and after we Sabbath and come back to work, we are reminded God has been at work without us. We can ask, ‘What have you been up to God? Where do I fit? Where can I join in?’ Peterson explains there are two commands and reasons for Sabbath.
The world needs not more frenzied activity but, in the words of poet W H Auden, better prayer and better play. Peterson and his wife regularly take Sabbath prayer walks, which inspired Jenni and I to plan monthly Sabbath walks. The day is a mix of date, day off, recreation, reading space, prayer retreat and sightseeing. Our pattern is to drive up the mountain to Warburton. We start with a coffee and reading, and after an hour or two head off for a walk and prayer in different directions. We meet back at a cafe for lunch. After lunch we walk together – one way I listen to and encourage Jen, and on the way back Jen listens to and challenges me. We see this time as mutual spiritual direction. Our plan was to go every month, although in 2009 we have only done it three or four times. Funerals, sick kids and teaching has postponed some days. We both aspire to be more disciplines in keeping the dates. But our Warburton retreats have been among our most refreshing times of the year. Warburton has offered us space for Sabbath play and prayer: ‘There is a large, leisurely center to existence where God must be deeply pondered, lovingly believed. This demand is not for prayer-on-the-run or for prayer-on-request. It means entering realms of spirit where wonder and adoration have space to develop, where play and delight have time to flourish.’ (p.65) The night before we invariably feel there is much else to do, but we are learning to enjoy Sabbath with a reckless disregard for our ‘to do’ task list. SCRIPTURE Peterson puts his finger on my pulse that in studying Scripture for theological education and preaching, I have tended to listen less to God. This is a danger for modern pastors. Listening to and applying the word of God has been supplanted by the printed word and acquiring information about it. The printed word, our education systems and pastors’ consumer-driven job-expectations have all sidelined hearing the Bible on its own terms. Peterson appeals for the primacy of the ear over the eye (see also his more recent book Eat This Book). He encourages us to be ‘passionate hearers of the word rather than cool readers of the page’ (p.88). As a pastor, I can tend towards a dispassionate glance over the words rather than a deep listening of what God is saying. Rather than a surgical approach to exegesis that cuts through layers of history, language and culture, Peterson advocates contemplative exegesis. This does not treat the Bible as a textbook but listens to the aliveness in the Word: ‘Contemplative exegesis means opening our interiors to these revealing sounds and submitting our lives to the story these words tell in order to be shaped by them. This involves a poet’s respect for words and a lover’s responsiveness to words.’ (p.125) The Ethiopian seeking to understand Scripture (Acts 8:30) needed a guide for his questions and not just an explanation. What helped him was the communal activity of listening, questioning and conversing toward faith. He did not need it summarised and abstracted. He did need help in making sense in how it connected with God and pointed to Christ. The encounter at Gaza points toward a prayerful and devotional reading as suggested by Brevard Childs: ‘Prayer is an integral part in the study of Scripture because it anticipates the Spirit’s carrying its reader through the written page to God himself’ (p.136). SPIRITUAL DIRECTION After prayer and Scripture, spiritual direction is the third angle that shapes pastoral integrity. Spiritual direction is when two people agree to give full attention to what God is doing in one of their lives. It reminds me to discern signs of grace everywhere and to help people see what God is doing, rather than racing in with the advice I love to give. I find it a helpful framework and model of ministry not just for designated ‘spiritual direction’ with someone (which I have not done), but for visiting, counselling, coaching and general conversations (which happen every day). In contrast to society’s preoccupation with big events and signs of success, spiritual direction focuses on discerning God in the everyday; to ‘notice the small, persevere in the commonplace, appreciate the obscure ... the aspect of ministry that explores and develops this absorbing and devout attentiveness to the “specific detail of everyday incidents,” “the everyday occurrences of contemporary life.”’ (pp.149, 150) Peterson says it helps shape the agenda of a pastor’s work from the souls of people rather than the demands they voice. Part of the attraction of it for pastors is that it is not another task or role to add on to a busy schedule, but a perspective to bring to what pastors already do in helping people discern grace and learn to pray. I resonate with Peterson’s articulated need for a spiritual director. It is easy to be a pastor and neglect attention to prayer and Scripture, God and my soul’s attentiveness to what God is doing. When I rock climb, I appreciate and rely on Patrick, my more experienced climbing mate. He helps cheer me on and keep me safe, lets me set my own pace and goals but is also there to help me if I get in trouble. We go together through the dark wet valleys as well as the high mountain peaks. Pat’s hobby is climbing but his vocation is spiritual directing. In my spiritual trekking, I have similarly relied on Pat and other directors to help me discern what path to take, when to push on and when to be cautious, and to see what God is unfolding. It is advantageous to have a companion who can pay attention with me to my faith and prayer instead of relying merely on my own resources. My pride and self-reliance does not like it so much, but my spiritual health and vitality depends on it. I resonate with Peterson’s need: ‘I began to pray for someone who would guide me in the essential, formative parts of my life: my practice of prayer, my understanding of grace. I wanted someone who would take my life of prayer and pilgrimage with Christ as seriously (or more seriously) than I did, who was capable of shutting up long enough to hear the distinct uniqueness of my spirituality, and who had enough disciplined restraint not to impose an outside form on me.’ (pp.170-171) Pastors easily fall short of the ideals of spiritual direction when they quickly offer advice, theological debate or things to busily do (rather than space to just be). Spiritual direction is not a set of tools or formulas, but primarily am attitude and openness to discern what God is doing in a person. Peterson thus counsels spiritual directors to cultivate:
Cultivating awe, prayer and awareness of ignorance is a helpful corrective to tendencies to rely on programs and being dependent on pastors. The intentional focus is God: ‘I am a supporting player and not the lead. I do my very best, but in no way do I speak or act so that the person’s response to me is the center-stage action. God wants to meet with this person; this person wants, unfocused as the want may be, to meet with God. I must not manipulate the conversation or construe the setting so that I am perceived to be in charge, or I merely delay the things of God.’ (p.191) Peterson brings out the best in me and my aspirations as a pastor, a biblical student and a praying lover of God. He deeply appeals for pastors to love out their vocation through prayer, Scripture and spiritual direction. Employing this ‘trigonometry of ministry’ helps other tasks be in sync with what God is doing: ‘Pastoral work disconnected from the angle actions – the acts of attention to God in relation to myself, the biblical communities of Israel and the church, the other person – is no longer given its shape by God’ (p.5).
Darren coordinates leadership training with the Baptist Union of Victoria and hosts a monthly Eugene Peterson lunchtime reading group. In the first half of 2010 the group will meet at Red Cafe in Royal Parade Parkville for lunch 12midday-1:45pm and discuss:
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