Sunday, May 25, 2014

What I Learned Today

Today, in an effort to give our wonderful pastor a bit of time off, I offered to conduct the service and bring the message today. I learned a lot. Needless to say, I appreciate Charles even more after this experience. 

Historically, Memorial Day is a very "low" Sunday for our church. People are out of town and visiting family. To my great surprise, we had 10 people in the service today. One couple even came back from an event early to support me in this endeavor. I was truly blown away by this. 

I never realized what a juggling act it is to manage a speech, a bulletin, a hymnal, and, in my case, an extra book that I wanted to show to the congregation. I did a fair amount of praying that I would not drop anything, seeing as I dropped my hymnal, bulletin, and solo lyrics just last Sunday. 

I never realized how long Charles has to stand at one time. This is something I totally underestimated. My legs do not cooperate with standing for long periods, so I had to abbreviate some things so that I could get to my chair and sit during the special music. 

Part of my neuromuscular disease can also affect my speech when I begin to tire. Not sure I can really do anything about this one. 

I am getting off of steroids, so my vision is changing rapidly, and not for the better. I did not realize how different it was going to be looking at my notes and bulletin from a standing position. Especially if I looked up and looked back down! Double spacing might help this. Or not. 

Even with all this, I did enjoy the experience. Don't get me wrong, I would NOT want the job full time. But, it did reassure me that I can get through a speech and not have the congregation/audience fall asleep on me. I was not even really nervous. I felt the prayers, support, and love, not just from those present, but from those who were praying for me from other places. 

It is nice to know that I can talk when the need arises. But, I would much rather let Charles do the talking. 

And I'll just sing. 









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