Daily Lesson for August 4, 2017

Today's Daily Lesson comes from Mark chapter 7 verses 31 through 35:

31 Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went by way of Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. 32They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him. 33He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. 34Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, ‘Ephphatha’, that is, ‘Be opened.’ 35And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly.

As I look back on my life and these past 12 years of ordained ministry, one thing I know is that is sheer grace in my life is the gift of preaching. It is impossible to describe how poor a public speaker I was growing up, and how bad preacher I was in the early years of ministry. I had good ideas, but I was ten tons of nerves and a tongue as thick as bacon. After a minor (for me major) public speaking disaster before the whole student body of Irons Jr. High School, I swore I would never speak in public again. And the one preaching class I took in seminary was a mortifying repeat. As Yogi Berra said, "It was deja vu all over again."

As I think on all this perhaps a great part of my initial reluctance to go into ministry had to do with my fear of having to stand up and say something with all eyes on me. I just never felt comfortable in that situation. The thought of speaking made me tremble because I knew I would feel so odd and out of body -- like I was still in the 8th Grade. The thought of it was terrifying and something to run from.

And so here is the minor (and for me again major) miracle: the gift of simply speaking plainly. This is my little gift, given only by the goodness of God to remind me where my words come from. 

There is an old saying, "God does not call the qualified, qualifies the called."  May that be your little hope for whatever God might be calling you to do or to say. God made the mouth and the tongue, and if God has put something inside us that needs to be said then it shall be said one way or another.

And the word we have for that is called Grace.