Speechless

Yesterday I had an experience that was unlike anything I’ve encountered in my 5 years of ministry.

I was speechless.

Not speechless in the sense of being too awe-struck, dumbfounded, or emotionally choked up to be able to say anything. I wasn’t at a loss for words. I was at a loss for voice.

I guess it was sometime around Wednesday or Thursday that I woke up and discovered that I was coming down with a cold (an early Christmas present from the twins). It wasn’t until Saturday night that I entertained the thought: Will I be able preach tomorrow?

Now normally this wouldn’t pose a big problem; In a typical situation like this I could call on Sondra to pinch hit. The only problem? She had already called on me to pinch hit for her due to the fact that she was in the hospital with her daughter, Jennifer, all weekend.

“Well,” I thought to myself, “maybe I’ll wake up tomorrow morning and my voice will be better. Not perfect, but strong enough to preach at least.”

That was my hope going to sleep Saturday night. On Sunday morning when the human alarm clocks (aka James and Luke) went off, the sad reality was not only that my voice wasn’t better…it was actually worse!

So what do you do in this kind of predicament?

I suppose I had a couple of options:

1) I could’ve struggled through it and forced out a sermon with all the vocal grace of a muted bullfrog.
2) I could’ve surprised our Children’s minister, Andrew, by informing him during the choir anthem that as a part of his contextual education training at Candler he needed to learn how to preach on the fly. But given the amount of stress he’s under these days what with finals and all, I realized that dumping that on him at the last minute would likely cause his head to explode... which would be unfortunate because then I’d be faced with having to preach his funeral too.
3) I could’ve let the person who came up to me before the service and volunteered to preach to do so. But I’ve learned to never entrust the pulpit to anyone who volunteers to preach by saying, “Let me get up there. I’ve been wanting to give these folks a piece of my mind for years.”

I had some options.

But in the end I decided that the best thing I could do is throw up my hands in surrender and simply be content to let God be God, let the church be the church, and let worship be worship…with or without a sermon.

So in lieu of a sermon, we sang. And you know, the more I think about it, the more I realize just how appropriate that was for us to do…especially during the season of Advent.

Because after all, that’s what Mary did after she was visited by the angel. That’s what Zechariah did when his son, John the Baptist, was born. And that’s what the angels did the night Jesus was born.

They sang. And maybe that’s because, as H. Richard Niebhur once said, “There are some things so profound that they can only be said in song.”

This past Sunday the sermon was given in song. Was it a typical sermon? No. Will we likely do it again? Not unless we have to. But for me, it was one of the most holy moments I’ve ever experienced here at Briarcliff.

In fact, as we stood together as a congregation and sang the final verse of “Joy to the World,” which starts, “He rules the world with truth and grace…” I don’t know that I can describe the incredible sense of worshipfulness that I felt envelope me other than to say:

I was speechless.