Monday Preaching Blues

Posted on Monday, June 4th, 2007 at 2:34 pm

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No one whom I have ever known as a great preacher has been happy with his own preaching. It seems that the task is too big and the time, talents, and intellect are just too small. Charles Spurgeon, the great pastor of a very large British congregation, suffered from very severe depression although he was, by all accounts, one of the greatest preachers the world has ever known.

Wise advice tells pastors to “never resign on a Monday.” No matter how bad one feels about the sermon yesterday, Tuesday always comes and a new sermon begs to be prepared. I suppose that we, like Chicago Cubs fans, are eternal optimists, hoping that next time something will get better; sometimes it does.

Then there are those rare and amazing days that almost every preacher, speaker, or teacher dreams of, but which come all to infrequently. Those days when the Spirit of God seems to infuse all that we do and everything works together in a way that we could have never expected, let alone planned, and we know that God has been there. We wish it could be that way all the time. We wish that we had some method or formula for making those days occur when we really need them. Alas, the Spirit, like the wind, blows where it will and try as we might we cannot control it. We are just thankful when we can be carried along by the breath and feel like a sailboat being whisked along rather than a broken tugboat being dragged. But this is Monday. Tugboat day. Tomorrow is Tuesday when perhaps, I pray, I will prepare and the Lord will visit in a special way, and the sails will be filled with breath from on high. Maybe . . .