St. Laurence of Steven – Patron Saint of Long-Winded Speakers - February 18, 2018
(I’m Laurence Steven – and I approve this message, except “long-winded” should be “thoughtfully articulated”, which of course is necessary this day and age, when so much of life is like fast food, which goes through you without giving much nourishment, thereby depleting your resources to deal with the spiritual challenges so manifest all around us…and so on; and so forth.)
*****
My mom, aka Granny Marj, and I were chuckling about Laurence’s sermons the other day. She has actually never been at our church when my hubs gives a sermon, but what she does hear about is all the preparation that goes into it.
Times were simpler in Sudbury. At Waters Mennonite (Laur’s church) and occasionally at my church (All Peoples) he could pretty much speak on anything he wanted. Laurence loves John’s Gospel most of all and was an English teacher, so you could be fairly sure of the text – John 1:1. “In the beginning was the Word…”
And Laur had absolutely no time at all to prepare. He was working full time as a teacher, full time as the “owner/operator” of Scrivener Press, and as as-much-time-as-needed parent of four kids. (Wife-time was cleaning the house and doing the dishes, and I was very happy with that. Still am.)
As a result, he would start working on his sermon long about 2 pm on Saturday afternoon and be head-down on the computer table long about 4 pm. (Those were the days before portable computers. Now he can write in bed, and fall asleep there too.)
By about 10 pm at night he’d have a series of notes – but no formal sermon – and on Sunday morning he would speak not so much “from the heart” as “by the seat of his pants.” No matter – everyone loved Laur’s sermons. At Waters Mennonite, because they could hear him. And at All Peoples – were I was the regular lay preacher (voluntary) – because they loved having a man in the pulpit for a change.
But things changed where we moved to St. Catharines. First of all, we started going to the same church - Grace Mennonite. (First Grantham United would have been fine too – but it was too big. We are small church people.) Secondly, Laur had oodles of time on his hands. And thirdly, the speakers actually had “preachers’ meetings” where they planned overall themes for a particular set of sermons. Fourthly, they followed the common lectionary. There are four Biblical texts for every Sunday – and at Grace, the usual practice is to integrate all four passages into the sermon. (Gah!) AND, and this is the big one, they have a PowerPoint projector and a screen and a laser-pointer pen-light. Lions and lambs and bears, oh my!
Laur’s pattern of preparation is that things expand to fill the time he has to give them. So, if he is speaking two months from now, guess what he’ll be stewing about for two months. (OK, not stewing – reading and reflecting.) Not only that, he now has to find pictures on line to reflect pretty much every paragraph he writes. And there are many of them – both pics and paragraphs.
At All Peoples, when I spoke, the parishioners were pretty much assured that they’d only have to listen to me for about 10 minutes. When Laur visited – because he had less prep time in those days – about 20. And they could handle that – it just meant 10 less minutes of fellowship hour. (And possibly stronger coffee and drier cake slices.)
But now, what with the travelogue of slides that accompany his sermon and all the fun Laur has with the laser-pointer – this comes of many years of playing with cats - the good folks at Grace Mennonite Church know they have to settle in for at least 25 minutes.
Because there is an Anglican Church that has its service of worship in “our” sanctuary about a half an hour after we do, one way or the other, the service needs to end pretty much on time. This means all the other things in the service need to get shortened. This is where my mom and I started to chortle about the many ways the service could be shortened. Announcements? Read your bulletin. Hymns? First and last verse only. Lord’s Prayer? Our Father…Amen! The collection? Just dump it in your bucket on the way out. The benediction? “Just go, already!” And on we cackle.
Thankfully, Laurence has a good sense of humor about this. He says in his next sermon he’s going to tell people to “Settle in – it’s going to be a long flight!” And that my role will to serve as a flight attendant – bringing folks free coffee and packages of peanuts. And offering pillows and blankets for an additional charge. (Hey, we gotta pay for PowerPoint and laser-pointer light bulbs somehow.)
Lest you think I’m the only one who notices the length of Laur’s sermons, listen to this. The lad who tapes the sermons for our website can normally send them to me as a file on email. But when Laurence preaches, it requires a USB memory stick. (I am the web servant.)
And the best comment of all? A lovely elderly parishioner who has heard many sermons during his time, said to Laur and the end of his last sermon, “When you get to the end of your sermon, I could just about clap for joy!” (Laurence wants me to point out that this lad was smiling.)
*****
You can hear Laur’s most recent sermon at https://www.gracemennonitechurch.com/sermons.html . It’s called “World of Wonder” and it’s the longest one in recent history. But the PowerPoint you’ll just have to imagine. 😊
*****
My mom, aka Granny Marj, and I were chuckling about Laurence’s sermons the other day. She has actually never been at our church when my hubs gives a sermon, but what she does hear about is all the preparation that goes into it.
Times were simpler in Sudbury. At Waters Mennonite (Laur’s church) and occasionally at my church (All Peoples) he could pretty much speak on anything he wanted. Laurence loves John’s Gospel most of all and was an English teacher, so you could be fairly sure of the text – John 1:1. “In the beginning was the Word…”
And Laur had absolutely no time at all to prepare. He was working full time as a teacher, full time as the “owner/operator” of Scrivener Press, and as as-much-time-as-needed parent of four kids. (Wife-time was cleaning the house and doing the dishes, and I was very happy with that. Still am.)
As a result, he would start working on his sermon long about 2 pm on Saturday afternoon and be head-down on the computer table long about 4 pm. (Those were the days before portable computers. Now he can write in bed, and fall asleep there too.)
By about 10 pm at night he’d have a series of notes – but no formal sermon – and on Sunday morning he would speak not so much “from the heart” as “by the seat of his pants.” No matter – everyone loved Laur’s sermons. At Waters Mennonite, because they could hear him. And at All Peoples – were I was the regular lay preacher (voluntary) – because they loved having a man in the pulpit for a change.
But things changed where we moved to St. Catharines. First of all, we started going to the same church - Grace Mennonite. (First Grantham United would have been fine too – but it was too big. We are small church people.) Secondly, Laur had oodles of time on his hands. And thirdly, the speakers actually had “preachers’ meetings” where they planned overall themes for a particular set of sermons. Fourthly, they followed the common lectionary. There are four Biblical texts for every Sunday – and at Grace, the usual practice is to integrate all four passages into the sermon. (Gah!) AND, and this is the big one, they have a PowerPoint projector and a screen and a laser-pointer pen-light. Lions and lambs and bears, oh my!
Laur’s pattern of preparation is that things expand to fill the time he has to give them. So, if he is speaking two months from now, guess what he’ll be stewing about for two months. (OK, not stewing – reading and reflecting.) Not only that, he now has to find pictures on line to reflect pretty much every paragraph he writes. And there are many of them – both pics and paragraphs.
At All Peoples, when I spoke, the parishioners were pretty much assured that they’d only have to listen to me for about 10 minutes. When Laur visited – because he had less prep time in those days – about 20. And they could handle that – it just meant 10 less minutes of fellowship hour. (And possibly stronger coffee and drier cake slices.)
But now, what with the travelogue of slides that accompany his sermon and all the fun Laur has with the laser-pointer – this comes of many years of playing with cats - the good folks at Grace Mennonite Church know they have to settle in for at least 25 minutes.
Because there is an Anglican Church that has its service of worship in “our” sanctuary about a half an hour after we do, one way or the other, the service needs to end pretty much on time. This means all the other things in the service need to get shortened. This is where my mom and I started to chortle about the many ways the service could be shortened. Announcements? Read your bulletin. Hymns? First and last verse only. Lord’s Prayer? Our Father…Amen! The collection? Just dump it in your bucket on the way out. The benediction? “Just go, already!” And on we cackle.
Thankfully, Laurence has a good sense of humor about this. He says in his next sermon he’s going to tell people to “Settle in – it’s going to be a long flight!” And that my role will to serve as a flight attendant – bringing folks free coffee and packages of peanuts. And offering pillows and blankets for an additional charge. (Hey, we gotta pay for PowerPoint and laser-pointer light bulbs somehow.)
Lest you think I’m the only one who notices the length of Laur’s sermons, listen to this. The lad who tapes the sermons for our website can normally send them to me as a file on email. But when Laurence preaches, it requires a USB memory stick. (I am the web servant.)
And the best comment of all? A lovely elderly parishioner who has heard many sermons during his time, said to Laur and the end of his last sermon, “When you get to the end of your sermon, I could just about clap for joy!” (Laurence wants me to point out that this lad was smiling.)
*****
You can hear Laur’s most recent sermon at https://www.gracemennonitechurch.com/sermons.html . It’s called “World of Wonder” and it’s the longest one in recent history. But the PowerPoint you’ll just have to imagine. 😊