Sunday, June 08, 2008

Hope - The Sermon

So, I knew for 3 weeks that I had to preach at last night's service. I love doing that. It's a great group of people and they always give me positive feedback. How could I not love it? So, Memorial Day weekend. I'm at Bell's Dell with the family and I planned to write the sermon. Heck, I planned to write a lot that weekend.

What was I thinking? My family wanted to spend time with me. Was I nuts? They're more important than anything else. Ok ... no writing occurred.

Last weekend I was alone. Max went to Kansas City with his buddy to hang out watching baseball games. I'm going to get this sermon done. Well, I spent all day Saturday starting a study that I've been wanting to write for awhile. Sunday was busy with church and other stuff and Max came home early. I got nothing done on it.

My week fell apart - more about that another day. No writing occurred.

Friday should have been a quiet day at work, but it wasn't. No writing occurred.

Friday night I got home and when I should have been writing, I was playing a stupid computer game called "Insaniquarium." I'll be honest with you. My brain couldn't have written a single word at that point. What I did have by this point was the title and the scripture passage that I was going to use. Whew! That really is the biggest thing for me.

I went to sleep at midnight Friday. This might seem early for me, except for one thing. I had to get up at 4:30 am to take my sister, Alison, Lynne and another friend to the airport for their mission trip to Belize. I shocked awake at 4:39 am, they were there at 4:42. I was out the door at 4:45. Back home by 5:30 and I was wide awake until 7:30. Working on the sermon? Ummm ... nope.

I slept until 10:15 when Max finally made me get up. I now have 6 1/2 hours to write and practice this sermon. Yes, I work better when I am under pressure. Max brought me breakfast, I swore to not allow myself to play the computer game until I was done and I opened my Bible and began to pray (not urgently yet, just for understanding and God's Word to open up to me).

Honestly, I was done with the sermon by 2:00 pm. I practiced it several times, Max went to Office Depot to buy some ink for the printer so that I could actually have a hard copy to work from and I headed to church. It was a good evening. I'm thankful that I am able to spend time with God as I process on things in His Word. Those are probably my best times of my days.

I was telling Max today that I really love God's Word. I deeply love it. I love teaching from it, I love studying it, I love understanding it and those moments when I see how He connects things from the Old to New Testament just put me on my knees! I could live without a lot of things, but I pray I never have to find out how to exist without my Bible.

I'm going to split my sermon up across the next few posts. God is so good to us. Hope is a gift from Him so that we can continue to live through the evils of this world.

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