There are some things that happen to me that I can’t figure out how to work into a sermon. They are illustrative and funny but decorum would suggest they are better suited for other media than for the pulpit. I have a much different purpose here than I have on Sunday morning. Although I should warn you that one of my favorite books is Elton Trueblood’s The Humor of Christ. I don’t believe that preaching should bore you into a state of utter mind-numbing confusion, so I tend to use humor when I preach. But this one I can’t work into a sermon, not yet anyway. I will tell you the story if you promise not to tell anyone at Trinity in Ruston that I wrote this, ok?
Here goes.
I was having a medical procedure done a while ago. It was one of those things that you had to spend the day before “getting your system cleaned out for the test.” There is a whole comedy routine on the cleansing process, but I will spare you that.
I showed up all cleansed for the test and the nice nurse got me all “prepped.” In other words, she gave me a blanket and told me to create some “southern exposure.” There I am not very clothed, except for my sweatshirt and she proceeds to give me “controlled substances.” The test went off without a hitch. On that day, I was “clean as a whistle.” It was what happened after the test that has me snickering.
Have you been in a darkened room with a woman to whom you are not married and she says, “Preacher, I have your jeans around your ankles but you will have to pull them the rest of the way up?” I didn’t think so! Last December it happened to me. I remember thinking; I have never heard anyone say that to me before!
The event has no theological purpose, nor can I make a great sermon illustration of out if. It is simply something that you don’t hear said to you every day as a preacher.
I wanted to share the joy by sharing the strange thing said to me in that darkened room. It was really no stranger than for some of you to say, “Preacher, I’ll see you in church on Sunday.” That would make me really smile!
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