Weekend warriors

Too tired for sleep, Guilt and Rationalizer decide to have a chat.

When spring arrives, I compartmentalize into two people. Like so many people today, you see, we have “fun in the sun” with an extra home on wheels, though that house with wheels actually stays in one spot, in a trailer warren at Birch Bay.

Friday arrives, out comes the sun, and we’re out of here, SuperStore baskets packed with food and clothing. The car knows its way to our weekend sojourn! My husband can write some postdated tithe cheques to assuage the guilt and we tell ourselves we’re church visiting, or even reason that a good devotional, some godly music and a prayer time will suffice. After all, sitting on a sunny deck overlooking the water is communing with God. Lots of people are doing it. The Schroders, third row over, are gone almost every weekend, as are the motor home group with their “Friendly Sam” memberships and KOA bookings. They even have church services at Black Mountain campground and The Glen!

If one rushes like mad all week, cutting the grass and cleaning up the garden and house, one can tiredly scoot off to the trailer warren every weekend and cut the grass and clean up the garden down there too. One might even get a chance to wash the windows, clean the blinds and defrost the fridge before returning home Sunday evening, in time to throw in the wash, ready to start it all over again next weekend. Ah! Those long restful days of summer!

Often, lying in bed, too tired for sleep, the two women in my head will decide to have a chat. Guilt usually starts with her feelings of being isolated from the church body and missing the fellowship of her own congregation. She always questions whether three-week annual vacations and afternoon hikes are actually better, not only on the pocketbook and energy levels, but also on my service and commitment to the church body.

Rationalizer will pipe in that pastors expect people to take vacations during the summer and people need a break away. She finds that Guilt can be quite profound and stirring at times and blow things out of proportion. Rationalizer has to throw back some other family names with their cabins and ski boats, airmiles and time-shares to settle Guilt down.

I lie there thinking of the way things used to be when people could not afford the motor homes, the trailers and fifth wheels, the cabins and KOA memberships. This new wave of popcorn vacationers leaves the pastor preaching to empty pews and spending his time calling to find vital workers available at home, able to serve at communion or help in the service.

The idea of a second home, whether a cottage or home on wheels, as a way to “escape” the rat race is simply mis-named. The greatest holidays are always unrealistic, and the acquisition of things can tie us down to more “must do” and “should do” lists than we bargained for. If we do not use our new and expensive recreational get-away homes, we can tell ourselves we are not making adequate use of the dollars spent. Yet if we endeavour to maintain both a main residence and a recreational home, and also keep abreast of our church home we find ourselves treading water, struggling to keep afloat in a sea of commitments. We have created for ourselves another “rat race,” the very thing we were striving to escape!

Our forebears did not have this struggle. The farm was home, morning and evening church services were a given, and the occasional trip to visit grandparents or cousins was an exciting adventure. Now we need to step back, take a realistic look at what we have created, and understand that the idea of popcorn vacationing needs some rules and guidelines before it controls us.

When the people in your home church, the church you have attended for more than 25 years, give you the “welcome visitor” hand-shake, it is time to take stock of just how many actual Sunday services or Bible Study hours you have contributed this year. And if you find, as we have, that the benefit gained from the little holiday get-away place is losing its lustre, because you have to give up too much – the feeling of being connected to your church, the sense of belonging, the continuity of the pastor’s messages, and valued prayer connections – it may be time to re-evaluate the sacrifice. The treasure we have lost at our church from being a weekend warrior has not been worth it.

Vonnie Mostat is a member of South Langley (B.C.) MB Church.