Renting my Brain

I take one concept very deeply from Garber’s book, a concept originated in his analysis of what the contemporary university prepares you for. He quoted from Neil Postman’s Technopoly:

“There is no set of ideas or attitudes that permeates all parts of the curriculum. The curriculum is not, in fact a “course of study” at all but a meaningless hodgepodge of subjects. It does not even put forward a clear vision of what constitutes an educated person, unless it is a person who possesses “skills.” In other words, a technocrat’s ideal – a person with no commitment and no point of view but with plenty of marketable skills”

Reading this I was convicted, not so much that I didn’t get a bigger picture in my university years, or that I didn’t have a sense of general concepts of telos in my life (on the order of “love God and enjoy him for ever”), but that I am now living as a disconnected skill for hire. I apply my skills to the problem at hand in the institution at hand without a bigger picture or moral program. I am not approaching what I do with a strong commitment or point of view in any consistent fashion. In the past 10 years, I have been in a holding pattern, feeling that my deeper purpose is not being fulfilled in my work doing IT management for the insurance firm, but yet not taking firm steps in any other direction. I have spent many of those years renting my brain without much concern or care for the ultimate outcome of its effort. There are two contending realities here – one is that I minimize the importance of Christians honestly and deeply living out their faith in the context of the professional life. I need to be looking for mentors in this arena. The second reality is that I’ve allowed myself to feel comfortable dismissing the present because I’m expectant for the future. I love my work, but I don’t care about it, even though I feel my skills have been well used there. I’m always feeling like the real work might be around the corner, or at seminary, or in the next opportunity and that I’ll really care about it when God calls me… What does my performance in the now say about the way I might be prepared for the work that might come in the future? I do know that God has used the impersonal nature of my labor - the transaction for a paycheck to provide material and space in the context of my marriage, family and life. But now I look harder.