A Great Prioritisation
Today I was scrolling through the news when I came across an article about something called the great resignation. The great resignation is a phenomenon that is unfolding and has been unfolding since not long after COVID struck. It is where workers(employees) are quitting their jobs like never before. There are pictures of fast-food restaurants in the USA, with no workers in them and a sign saying, “we have all quit”. Many of these photos, from all around the USA are showing up. We have seen similar things in Australia, where employers are having to work much harder to find and keep employees – Raising wages and making better conditions.
One of the core reasons this article states as the reason for this happening, is the COVID pandemic and people’s brush with and close encounter with death. Causing more people than ever to ask hard questions about their lives and priorities. With a lot of people reporting that their workplace priorities are significantly different from what they used to be. With pay and career progression now ranking lower than 10th on the things most important things for a job to have. It makes me wonder when the New Testament talks about how many people were following Jesus, if something similar was happening, on a much smaller scale though. Although industries and how people work weren’t structured like they are today. But I think something similar was going on for those who were following Jesus. Some sort of great prioritisation.
Coming back to our mortality and death for a moment: I once heard someone say that the most unknowable thing in our life, is death. Death is an abstract concept that we can’t really talk to anyone about, at least anyone who has firsthand experience. We don’t really have anything to measure and show us how it works. All we do know is that it is very definite, maybe the most definite and sure thing we can see happening around us. Yet with all that certainty, there remains so much we don’t know.
So, as I was reflecting this week gone, on my own death; because in the fathering course Trinity Family Support Network is currently running, we asked people to imagine their kids talking about them at their own funeral. A way to help our fathers start to think about the things that really matter to them. As I was thinking about the things that mattered to me and how I would be remembered, and how I would want to be remembered, which reminded me that we are currently putting the final touches on the garden of remembrance. Brad is working hard on this final stage of making sure that each of the plaques that go up, are done right. That those who have gone before are remembered and have a place for those who are still here to come and reflect. I’m reminded of how much impact those who stuck to their beliefs and stood up for what they believed in, have made on me.
That having these spaces to stop and reflect is so needed. To be grounded in what is important as life seems to run at a million miles an hour. Sometimes it can feel like things are getting away from me and it isn’t until I stop and take stock of what is most important, that I make choices that seem to matter into eternity.
Jesus gives us the assurance that there is resurrection, that there is eternal life with God. And I find comfort in this fact but it doesn’t answer the question of who I will be in this life and how I will live. What I am certain of, is that I want to leave a better place for those after me. That I want to be a good husband, father and Christian.
So, as I think about the great resignation and prioritisation, I’m seriously figuring out what the most important things are for me now. Because, they will be the things people remember me by, when I’m gone from this mortal realm and in a garden of remembrance.