A First.

I just printed out my very first sermon (and prayers and liturgy information--all in the same booklet) which does not have to be checked over by someone. When I preached during my internship with Rev. Van Vliet, he checked all of my sermons, it was part of the requirements for me to be able to exhort in the churches. The ones I wrote after my internship were all checked by Dr. de Visser. But now I do not need to have them checked over, as I am an eligible candidate. It feels odd, though. Part of me would still like to have that extra confidence when I am up on the pulpit, knowing that an experienced minister has read through my sermon and found it to be sufficient (I won't say good...I've only written a handful of sermons. Good will come when I have more experience, I hope). But I also know that at some point I have to leave that oversight behind and do things on my own, or I will never be able to do it. I guess this is as good a time as any.

It did take me two tries. I wrote my sermon on Mark 2:1-12 last week, and was scheduled to write work on Mark 4:35-41 this week, but I was not satisfied with what I wrote last week. It was ridiculously long (4500 words or so!), and I was not happy with the theme and points. So this week I came up with a better theme and better points, and totally rewrote that sermon. And I mean totally...brand new theme and points, new outline, and a shiny new version emerged. One that I am much happier with, and one that is just over 1000 words shorter.

So, this coming Sunday afternoon, Trinity Canadian Reformed Church will get to hear my first un-checked sermon, one that took two weeks to get right. Hopefully it gets better the more I work at it...otherwise I'll never make it as a minister!

And I still plan on writing reviews of the two books that I read recently, I just haven't found the time yet.