conjectural navel gazing; jesus in lint form

sermon mumblings and a friday five

Abba Poeman said, "Teach your mouth to say that which you have in your heart."
The Sayings of the Desert Fathers
Bendicta Ward, SLG ed.

This first week of the blog fast has been really challenging. I'm not writing at all. I need to shift gears somehow. I have gotten so used to writing on the blog. I cannot seem to write anywhere else. Okay, that's a bit of an exaggeration, but not blogging has revealed just how lopsided my practice has become. The other interesting thing is that I am almost never on the computer at home now. That's been great. I have a nasty habit of checking church related e-mails at home. That means I work from rising to sleeping. Oy! That has to stop!

Once again, I shall have no sermon manuscript for the blog. I am preaching without a manuscript. This is hardly extemporaneous. I muse, mumble and rehearse a great deal for this kind of sermon. It actually takes more of my time than writing a manuscript. Imagine!

Last week I stepped out from behind the pulpit to talk about terrorism and politics. The news of the two mentally disabled women being used as bombs in the pet market demanded my attention. There are a lot of reasons for that. But the focus I took was the right placement of faith and politics. I am told that stepping out from behind the pulpit made a huge impact...a positive one at that. I need to practice that kind of preaching more. It's good to be able to do both. Sometimes standing at the pulpit is appropriate. Sometimes it's simply a hindrance. It'll take some work to figure out when is the best time to do one or the other. But that's just part of the craft, I think.

This Sunday is "Scout Sunday" at our church. We'll have 100 guests. The resident Boy Scout Troop and their parents will be joining us. It's an annual event and should be a good time. Last year certainly was grand. I hope this year is even half as fun.

The Scouts sit by patrol in the first three rows of the sanctuary. It's fun to come down to them and involve them in the sermon in some ways. The older boys manage it really well. And I pray that the embarrassment for the younger boys is not permanently damaging. Heh.

This Sunday I am stepping away from the lectionary (The assigned reading is about Jesus' temptations in the desert. I already preached on that a couple of weeks ago. I was actually thinking ahead! Who knew?). I am preaching on creation...and in some ways expressing a position about the whole creation/evolution debate. I think that the Boy Scouts' philosophy actually underscores the reality of human beings as creatures...spiritual and physical creatures, and not one aspect over the other, but as two important aspects to a complete person. This is what God would have us know about ourselves.

If you don't have anything to read for the next few weeks, I'd recommend The Last American Man by Elizabeth Gilbert. She also wrote Eat, Pray, Love. It's a great book about Eustace Conway. Check it out. It'll show up in the sermon somehow.

As a diversion, I offer up this Friday Five from the RevGals.

1. Did you celebrate Mardi Gras and/or Ash Wednesday this week? How?

Well, we were supposed to have a service that evening. But the weather was horrible. I called around and discerned that likely no one would come. The roads were bad. The snow was falling sideways. It was wiser to cancel it. So, this year I did not celebrate it. And it bothers me.

2. What was your most memorable Mardi Gras/Ash Wednesday/Lent?

I am not sure I have a most memorable. I do remember my first in Chicago. I was singing in the choir at St. Peter's in the Loop, the local Franciscan cathedral. It's in downtown Chicago. I sang one of the noon masses. It perhaps the first time in my life that I noticed business people walking around with ashed on their foreheads. That's when I learned that I had moved to a Catholic city.

3. Did you/your church/your family celebrate Lent as a child? If not, when and how did you discover it?W

e did not. I was not really raised in the church. I guess I discovered Lent when I lived in community at Richmond Hill. I was suddenly living with a Catholic nun and a Catholic priest, an Episcopal priest and some other folk who practiced the devotion. Eventually I found myself as part of the community at Holy Comforter. I don't recall for certain, but I likely celebrated my first Ash Wednesday there.

4. Are you more in the give-up camp, or the take-on camp, or somewhere in between?

I am somewhere in between. I used to be solidly in the give up camp. But the last couple of years my wife and I have been wrangling with diet and the new schedule of commuting suburbanites. Giving up anything else seems foolish. And so too does taking anything on this year. I may do something, but it'll be "hidden." I will give up TV and internet at the house for a week with the children of the church this year. They are choosing their own week to embark on a media fast.

5. How do you plan to keep Lent this year?

Oops! See above!

Ya'll have a great weekend. I won't post again until the Monday videoblog.

Posted by tripp at February 8, 2008 08:44 AM