Amateur Preachers

Yesterday was our 5th Sunday service, where (theoretically) we do more singing than usual. My plan for yesterday was to preach half as long as I usually do, and I ended up preaching longer than normal. Oh well. The thing is, I really love preaching. I am an amateur preacher, in that I absolutely love what I feel called to do. (BTW, the word "amateur" originally meant someone who did something for the love of it, "amore" being the Latin word for love.)

In the movie "Chariots of Fire," the main character is an Olympic runner who at one point says "when I run I feel God's pleasure." Although it doesn't always work out this way, sometimes when I preach, I feel God's pleasure, and it is a wonderful feeling. What do you do that enables you to feel a pleasure like no other?

Speaking of preaching for a long time out of passion for what you are talking about, in last night's Bible study we looked at a hilarious story about Paul in Acts 20:


⁷On the first day of the week we came together to break bread. Paul spoke to the people and, because he intended to leave the next day, kept on talking until midnight. ⁸There were many lamps in the upstairs room where we were meeting. ⁹Seated in a window was a young man named Eutychus, who was sinking into a deep sleep as Paul talked on and on. When he was sound asleep, he fell to the ground from the third story and was picked up dead. ¹⁰Paul went down, threw himself on the young man and put his arms around him. "Don't be alarmed," he said. "He's alive!" ¹¹Then he went upstairs again and broke bread and ate. After talking until daylight, he left. ¹²The people took the young man home alive and were greatly comforted.

Even after inadvertently killing someone with his long-winded preaching, Paul proceeds to miraculously raise him from the dead, go have supper, and then teach for several more hours! Now that is an amateur preacher.

By the way, the name "Eutychus" is a Greek word that means "lucky." Go figure.

Another by the way: the illustration of this scene above is from a pretty hilarious project that somebody spent alot of time on, illustrating scenes from the Bible with legos and sometimes embellishing the stories a tad. It can be found at: http://www.thebricktestament.com/