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Crossing out sermons and crossing in
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A pastor in Lincoln, Mo., was sitting on his patio, drinking iced tea with his wife as he worked at the table on his Sunday sermon.

Their 5-year-old son came outside and asked, "Daddy, what are you doing?" The pastor looked up from his Bible, put down his pen and paper, and said, "I’m preparing my Sunday sermon."

Not satisfied, the boy asked, "Daddy, how do you know what to say?" The preacher smiled and answered, "God tells me." Still not satisfied, the boy replied, "Oh ... well how come you keep crossing things out?"

This humorous story should remind us of two truths: 1) God is perfect, and 2) Pastors are not. It’s amazing, really, that God entrusts His perfect gospel message to imperfect people to share it.

The apostles Paul explains why this is, saying, "Now we have this treasure in clay jars, so that this extraordinary power may be from God and not from us" (2 Corinthians 4:7, HCSB). In other words, God has allowed the treasure of the gospel to be preached by flawed humans (clay jars), so that when people’s lives are changed by God’s grace, God will get the glory for it, because it will be obvious that it wasn’t because we preachers are so great!

So pray for God to speak His exciting gospel through your preacher, even if your preacher seems less than exciting. Even if the preacher has to cross out notes, God can put the cross in your heart by faith in Jesus.

(Copyright 2011 by Bob Rogers. Email: brogers@fbcrincon.com. Read my blog at www.holyhumor.blogspot.com.)

Is there a church for a big woman with an itch?
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A pastor was called to be guest preacher at a church. He knew this church was different when the congregation ended every line of the hymn with the shout of “yeehah!”


As he stood to preach, he noticed that people were spread out on the pews. He would see a person, then a space, then another person, and another space. He wondered why nobody sat next to another person, when he noticed on the pew beside each person was a cowboy hat.


Another time this same preacher was invited to a new church in the city. He was surprised to see that everybody there looked like they had fallen face first into a tackle box, because they had piercings and earrings on every part of the body imaginable. A rock band was playing alternative music on the stage.


As different as these two churches were, they were both growing and reaching people for Christ.


Years ago I was pastor of a small country church in the backwoods of Mississippi. There was another Baptist church just five miles away in the town (population 600). The pastor’s wife at the town church asked me, “Why don’t our two churches merge?” I said, “There are people in my church who would not feel comfortable or fit in at your town church.” She said, “Oh, come on. We’re a small town church. What could be so different?”


I said, “Well, I got one really big woman in my church who, when she gets to feeling an itch, she pulls her dress halfway up and she scratches herself.”


The eyes of this pastor’s wife got really big and she said, “I see what you mean.”


I forgot to tell her about another woman in my church who saw a roach running across the wood floor, so she stomped on it with her bare foot, laughed and shouted, “Aha! I got him!”


Yep, the culture was definitely different where I was pastor.


Jesus upset the religious establishment because He crossed cultural barriers. He loved to eat with tax collectors and Gentiles and other strange people. Jesus walked into the land of Samaria, full of half-breed Jews who worshiped in weird ways and talked different and smelled different.


Jesus walked right up to a Samaritan woman at a well and started talking her language. He accepted her culture, but he let her know her sinful lifestyle had to change. Soon she had the whole town following Jesus (see John 4).


So what cultural barrier is keeping somebody in your community from hearing the gospel? If you tear down the cultural barriers to share Christ in your neighborhood, you may hear the angels shouting, “Yeehah!”


Copyright 2014 by Bob Rogers. Email: brogers@fbcrincon.com. Read this column each Friday in the Herald. Visit my blog at www.bobrogers.me.