For sixteen years now, I've been part of what's referred to as the "new economy." For years, futurists have been telling us that more and more people will be working from their homes. Increasingly, that is happening. A good friend of mine, for example, is chief financial officer for a major company; yet does much of her work at home while being a wonderful mother to her boys. (That's multitasking!) 

I feel part of that economy as well. I'm a pastor. The first congregation I served in northwest Ohio was in a rural setting. The parsonage sat next to the church building. My wife and family were apt to come to my office any time. I was likely to "take a break"and saunter over to the house, too. Since 1990, I've been serving as pastor of a new church. We don't have a building and my office has been in my home throughout. Most meetings and many small group gatherings have taken place here. Ninety-five per cent of the "counseling" I've done (although I shy away from calling what I do "counseling") has happened in this house. Like other members of the "new economy," which finds increasing numbers of people connected to other places via telephone, email, and fax machines, I have learned how to not balance, but integrate work with family living. (My family has learned how to do this with me.) 

When we first arrived here ten years ago, this "integration" drove me nuts. In spite of the close proximity of the rural church and parsonage, two walls and a sidewalk had nonetheless separated us when I was "on duty." I used to get angry when my wife, who works in our local public schools, would come home at 4:00 in the afternoon and ask whether I had made some important telephone call to a mechanic or gutter-cleaner, the kinds of calls her job simply prevented her from making. She would get upset with me and wonder why I hadn't taken a few minutes--say, while I took a "lunch break"--to put the breakfast dishes into the dishwasher. As usual, my wife was in the right, of course. I was imprisoned by the notion that "I was at work." (More accurately, I was probably using that as an excuse.) Working at home has forced me to integrate my life. Just a few moments ago, our son, recently graduated from high school and working odd hours these Summer months, called out to me. I'm in my basement office; he's in the family room. "Hey, dad! They're going to have Chris Farley's interview with Paul McCartney." The "interview" is a favorite Saturday Night Live skit of ours, one in which a tongue-tied Farley asks McCartney, "Do you remember when you were in the Beatles?" I took a pass on viewing the skit, airing on the Comedy Channel at 12:30 in the afternoon. But in this era of "multitasking," in which it's okay to simultaneously be a pastor, a father, a husband, and who knows what else, I wouldn't have felt too guilty about going upstairs and watching the skit. That's because in this era of multitasking and integration of work and family life, tonight, after most of the house is asleep, I'll probably go online. I'm likely to send emails of encouragement to members of our congregation. Or, I'm apt to visit web sites that will contain information I can use in my work. 

Simultaneously, I might be receiving instant messages from my brother in Florida and listening to some new music with my son or daughter. I don't think of all of this as "balance," really. Steve Sjogren says that what we need in our lives is not "balance," but "stasis." That makes sense to me. "Balance" implies a "balancing act" involving two different magnetic poles. But we're all pulled by many different poles: work, spouse, family, friends, work, community, hobbies, entertainment. 

And like a sensitive thermostat, constantly seeking the right temperature in an environment apt to be impacted by many different factors--outside weather, the numbers of times doors are opened, the running of showers or dishwashers, and so forth--the challenge is not balance, but stasis. When a crisis is going on with a member of our congregation and my presence is needed, stasis will demand a different allocation of my time and personal resources. When major events are happening in my family--as with our son's graduation or our daughter trying out for the high school concert choir, stasis will find me moving in a different direction. 

When my wife or my children and I have something that needs to be intensely discussed, the telephone answering machine can pick up incoming calls, the TV can be turned off, books put down, the CD player turned off, and the computer ignored. But all these activities will happen even as I maintain my identity and do right by my duties in every area of my life. (Or at least, as I try to.) At the risk of being high-fallutin', I call all of this integration multi-poled stasis. Frankly, I love the life this term represents. Life in this new economy is akin to life in an agrarian culture. There, breadwinners stayed at home to do their work, acted as guides and role models for their children even as they conscientiously went about their business. Throughout their years of growing up, our kids have gotten to see me do my job, be involved in the community, pray and read, interact with friends, and so forth. My wife has rarely wondered where I was or when I would check back in with my family. 

Multi-poled stasis has allowed me to be my whole self. I'm more of an integrated person because of it. My mental, spiritual, social, familial, and physical selves are more integrated wholes. And I don't even mind taking care of the telephone calls or cleaning up the breakfast dishes. In short, I feel that life in the new economy has allowed me to integrate my walk with Christ into my everyday living and working...and that's what I've always wanted to do. There has also been a "professional payoff" in that my Sunday morning messages often are imbued with the sense of reality, the real world where moms, dads, children, husbands, and wives live. I feel I better connect with people because I haven't spent the past sixteen years walled off from everyday reality. I've been in the thick of it even as I did my "job." 

Recently, our congregation conducted a capital campaign which will result in a first building unit for our church. It's exciting! But I long ago decided that I will continue to work at home. An arrangement I once resented has become for me, the best way to work...and live.