The Sixth Movement: The Homily

There is more than a bit of fear and trepidation that accompanies a Saturday nights for a pastor. It's a reality that only fellow pastors really understand. For most, Saturday night is the joyful wrap-up to long week, but for the preacher of the Word, the week has evaporated by mid-afternoon, and by Saturday night, though the sun is down, a new week has already dawned.

I can't speak for other preachers, but from those I've talked with, their process is similar. Here's how it works for me...

Thursday is my wrestling day. I spend the vast majority of the day immersed in books, articles, dictionaries, and commentaries. Because I don't have original language training, I'm also frequenting websites that help me understand Greek and Hebrew meanings, tenses, and peculiarities. My study is often done a series at a time, so I go into most Thursdays with a decent of where I'm headed, but most of the time having no clue how I might get there. Through a long process of praying, thinking, writing, erasing, starting over, and often some time staring off into space, I emerge from my office (most weeks) with some level of confidence. I've heard, I've organized, and I know how we're getting to where we're headed.

Friday is a rest day for me. A twenty-four hour Sabbath time, during which I avoid anything that looks like church work like the plague. By Saturday, I'm typically headed to meetings, counseling appointments, classes, and the like, and I try to have some down time in the afternoon to hang out with the kids, get some chores done around the house, or hang out with some friends.

And then it happens.

About 6:00pm on Saturday night, I can start to feel the weight building. Every few moments, I find my mind wandering back toward Thursday's preparation. There are some weeks where I can't remember any of it. There are other weeks I remember it all, but can't remember what in the world I was thinking. Every once in a while, I still feel as confident as I did emerging from my office on Thursday afternoon. I've learned that those are the scariest weeks.

By 7:30, I'm no longer worth being around because I'm so preoccupied with the weight of the message for the morning. By then, if not before, my loving wife sends me upstairs, as I'm clearly of no more use within the flow of the family. It's at that point I look back at my work from Thursday and begin to try to make sense of what often seem to me to be unorganized words that have absolutely no connection to one another.

I look at my outline, at the passage of Scripture, then back to the outline. On good weeks, I begin to sense the primary message for us as God's people and I start to focus there. On bad weeks, I consider starting the whole process over. I read over things, re-read resources, think through things as I walk through a mindless preparation routine. But more than anything, the weight settles onto my shoulders. More weeks than not, I feel like I enter the shower at night 4-6 inches shorter than my 6'3" frame, having been weighted down for the last few hours. Will I get in the way? Have I truly heard form God? Will others be able to hear from me? The sins from the past week rush into my head, and I confess them as quickly as I can think them. The unfinished work, the connections that have gone unmade, the calls and emails that have gone unreturned--each feels like an insurmountable barrier that the Spirit of God will need to leap if the message will ever be able to land. Faces and names swirl... Have they been in church recently? Will that joke offend them? How will she hear that point? Will he think I'm talking to him?

Sometime during this mayhem, I begin to weary. I set an early alarm, and drift to sleep, still thinking through the opening illustration. By 4:15, I'm up and thinking again, this time with new urgency. The countdown is on. Coffee, read, pray, read, eat, pray, coffee, preach to myself, take a few notes, preach to myself again. The routine is far from dynamic or exciting, but there's comfort in it, and so I do it. By this point, the weight is often like a dark shadow that feels like it's sitting on my forehead, pressing my head down and slumping my shoulders. However, within a few hours, it will be gone. The words will be out. Some weeks, they're out with joy. Other weeks, it's more relief. But they're out. And another week will be able to finally get started.

The homily. The ancient, timeless, eternal Word of God brought to bear on modern ears for modern lives. This is the first step out of the presence of God into the waiting world. The homily gives feet to the substance of the Word; application to its Truth. The old, old story is made new again each week. It is manna that will help us each survive the week ahead. 

The message is secure, but the messenger is not often so fortunate.