A week ago Sunday at the 10:30 service I felt really good about the service and my sermon.  There had been a minor problem with the bulletin.  When I worked up the worship order for that day on my computer, I was working with the prior week’s order I had saved, and I just changing the elements that needed that.  I had to take out the 3rd grade Bible presentation and the baptism from October 11 and add back the opening prayer and children’s time.   The only problem was that I reversed the order of what I added, so that instead of the opening prayer prayer being right after the opening hymn, as usual and as intended, the children’s time was placed between these, making for an awkward flow.  I didn’t catch this wrong order when I proofed what Lisa had put together.  Neither she nor the other person proofreading it questioned it either.  If they noticed it, they probably just thought the pastor is trying something new. 

Fortunately, I noticed the error, when I was marking the bulletin for myself, so before worship I had told Mike to hold off on starting the children’s time until after the prayer and told the liturgist Evelyth Wright of the error and asked her to have the congregation remain standing after the hymn and join in praying the collect.  I think people were a little confused that morning, some wondering why wehad a strange order in the bulletin and others, why the liturgist jumped ahead to the prayer before the children’s time instead of following the printed order.  Still, it was only a minor glitch, that I am sure people quickly forgot as we continued in worship.  Mike did well with the children, Janet Weyer from the Youth Home spoke effectively about our shared mission there, and five of our children sang with the Chancel Choir on the anthem.  With the good message of the anthem and the fact that both kids and adults sang well, it was inspiring to get up and preach after them.  I felt engaged with the message all the while I was speaking, the sermon flowed especially well, and it seemed to be connecting well with people, as I thought I experienced an unusually strong amount of attention and eye contact and through the sermon. 

As always, I enjoyed greeting people after the service.  Midway through this, when there was a kind of lull in the line, Evelyth came up to me and asked if she had done something wrong that morning.  I thought it had been a nearly perfect service and did not remember any slip-ups, so I said, “No.  I thought you did fine.  What did you think might have been wrong?”  She said, “Well I wasn’t sure where you wanted me to read the scripture.  Only then–5 minutes after the service–did I realize that I had jumped up after the anthem to say how inspiring it had been and went directly into the sermon, instead of letting Evelyth read the scripture first.  People may have wondered why we skipped that, and it may have seemed especially strange that during the sermon I talked about what what Jesus had said as he sent out the disciples on their mission in the Gospel of Luke, “as we had heard.”  Except, only I had heard the gospel reading, in my own mind, and everyone else probably wondered what it said and why Evelyth hadn’t read it.  That may have accounted for the unusually high level of attention that morning:  people were wondering what was going to happen–or not happen–next! 

I slapped my forehead and reassured Evelyth that it was my mistake and not hers.  We both got a laugh out of it.  A little later that afternoon I thought this would be perfect to share in my first blog.  I could confess that both the bulletin disorder and leaving out the scripture reading were my errors, but in my defense I could say, “at least I didn’t forget the offering.”  Only this week at Bible Study did I hear the rest of the story from Evelyth and the others in it who had been there of how, when she thought I was going to set back down, she had started to get up to read, only to sink back down when I kept going.  I guess this happened 2 or 3 times.  No wonder everyone was paying such rapt attention during the sermon, wondering what was going to occur. 

There would have been a time, when I felt horrible about my errors at least the rest of the day.  I celebrate that I have interalized enough of God’s grace to be able to laugh when I mess up.  Two careless, but uninteded errors. did not take away God’s love, mean others would not forgive the mistake, nor override the fact that it had been a good service: the anthem was inspiring, my sermon was effective, and we worshipped, which was what we were there for.  A little bit of humor may have even added to the morning.

Maybe this was partly what Martin Luther meant, when he said, “Go, and sin bravely!”  It is better to be in the spirit moment and trying to serve God, even though we may mess up occassionally along the way, than it is the hang back lest we make a mistake.    I agree with Luther that God’s grace, when received and appropriated, sets us free from excessive fear of sin and death to live in joyous service of God.  God can handle the human foibles, which will always be true for us in this life, but God wants us to be brave in our sharing the good news in word and deed.  This does not excuse intensionally doing wrong nor lull us into carelessness, instead of trying to do our best for God, but it puts in perspective what is truly important.  I think God was able to laugh with us that morning. 

By the way, if you find any typos in this blog, just laugh, and et me know so I can join in.

  Pastor Joe

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