Books

If the idea is comparing working at Barnes and Noble to being a minister in a congregation, the most obvious overlap is BOOKS. I love books. In fact, I love books so much that one year for Lent I gave up buying more books because I have half a library full of unread books. And even so, it was still a spiritual discipline to NOT buy more books.

A fabulous perk of being a pastor is the book fund. Almost every minister has one, and it is truly glorious. Books on ministry, books for preaching prep, books for spiritual formation, books about books, even books that are collections of other books to read. It’s a bottomless pit of written word—albeit a beautiful bottomless pit. All paid for (well, not all but more than one can read in a year) through the book fund. On a scale of one to five, the book aspect of ministry gets a solid five stars.

On to Barnes and Noble. It’s a bookstore—an obvious five-star bookstore. But being around books doesn’t mean you get to have all those books, so careful analysis must be ensued. Employees get 30% off books at BN, and for one spectacular week of the year which happens to fall in December when the seasonal help is around, 40%. While that is pretty beautiful, I’d give it about 3.5 stars (Spoiler alert: in a post or two, I’ll compare salaries—in brief, I doubt I’ll even break even being around books this much, discount or no, based solely on the pittance a seasonal bookseller makes—this is a social experiment, not a financial endeavor.) However, two days into orientation, I learned the tipping point: the book loan program (queue the heavenly host). In order to keep the bookseller as best up-to-date on books as possible, all booksellers are allowed to borrow any hardcover book with a sleeve for up to two weeks FOR FREE! as long as the bookseller brings the book back in mint condition. OH, FIVE STARS. I told a friend about this program when I found out—his first thought was, “They should have a place where you can do that on a regular basis.” Yes, in brain-milliseconds, it quickly dawned on him that that place is called the LIBRARY?! However, the library gets two strikes in my book—one, it’s germy; and two, there are ridiculously long waiting lists for the super popular new releases like the Lost Symbol (Dan Brown—the book gets 3.5 stars, btw—dragged a bit at first, picked up speed and interest toward the end) and Under the Dome (Stephen King—1/2 way through already gets 5 stars, more when I finish) which I have already gotten germ and finance free (on loan, of course—but who really needs the actual copy of such books. They don’t exactly serve as reference material….) Between the discount and the special tipping point of the book loan program, BN seasonal bookseller also gets a solid five stars.

Tied to this point at 5 to 5—the adventure continues….