Answered Prayer or Too Much?

In September of 2017, I received my license to exhort, or preach, in the Christian Reformed Church. Since then, I have averaged preaching 3.5 times per year at both CRC churches and other denominations. The next few weeks will greatly increase that average.

I am scheduled to preach the next five weeks at a small non-denominational church near Bussey, IA. Looking it up on Google Maps, the facility is in the middle of farm fields and a long way out of the town of 400 people. It looks like a fun place to learn and opportunity to preach in a place I probably would have never noticed otherwise.

Since getting my license, I have only stand-alone sermons meant for single visits. I did one stretch of preaching three weeks in a row, but it was three different congregations and I used the same sermon at two of them. I have had a this sermon series in my head for about a year and prayed for an opportunity to use it, and this is it.

Today started with an easy topic, at least for me, using the law in evangelism. I finished writing it a few weeks ago and sent my PowerPoint off to my church contact. Since then, I have been slowly, but regularly, working on the subsequent messages. This past week was working on sermon four and finishing everything for it. Late Friday, it occurred to me I only sent the church information on my first message, and nothing else. Sermon two was just over a week away, so I sent my message titles and Scripture references for all of August.

The next few weeks will rapidly get busy and I pray I keep everything straight and manage time well. I haven't done great on time management and coordinating my sit time the last few days and will need to be careful with weeks ahead.

One of my sayings is that I'd rather be busy than bored. This will be a busy time in the quad life, but I'm thankful for the opportunity and may look forward to another one to come.