Since I’m a pastor, Sunday mornings are a bit…busy…for me. They start early, and all my attention centers on the teaching and preaching responsibilities coming in the next few hours.
A couple of Sundays ago, I got up with my stomach rumbling a little. “Growling,” I told myself. I was just hungry and needed breakfast.
Ever since our children were tiny, I helped out on Sunday morning by preparing breakfast—just part of the routine that’s carried on for more than 35 years. This Sunday was no different. I fixed the usual scrambled eggs and fruit with yogurt.
Took care of the grumbling.
Someone else has been teaching the adult Bible study for me the past several weeks, so I didn’t have to teach that Sunday. I sat through the class, and all was well.
Few people who attend church on a typical Sunday morning realize how physically challenging it is for the preaching minister—especially in a church like ours. The service lasts about an hour and fifteen minutes, and I generally preach for about 45 minutes.
I don’t know how “they”—whoever they are—measure things like this, but I’ve been told that preaching a 30-minute sermon is equivalent to a full 8-hour day’s work. Whether or not that’s true, I do know that by the time I get home on a Sunday afternoon, I’m ready to crash for a while.
On this particular Sunday, about halfway through the sermon, that subtle grumble returned. It passed quickly, and I plowed on ahead. Happened three or four times and was only slightly distracting. I really didn’t think much of it. After all, I’m a healthy guy. In the nearly twenty years of ministry in Sterling, I’ve only missed two services because of sickness. So, I’ll be OK. Surely, I’ll be OK.
Then came the closing hymn.
After the hymn, we were supposed to welcome a new member to the church, and I was looking forward to introducing her to the church family.
That’s when things got a little weird.
During the first stanza, I was feeling a bit lightheaded. Took a few deeper breaths and carried on.
During the last stanza, some lights or stars were added to the lightheadedness. I couldn’t continue singing.
When the song ended, I explained, “We were supposed to receive ____ into membership today, but we’re going to have to put that off. I’m feeling a bit badly.…”
Pause.
“So…you’re dismissed,” I said.
I remember leaning over a bit and looking at the pianist, waiting for her to begin playing. I heard the first note or two.
Next thing I knew, a voice was saying, “Pastor, can you hear me?”
My vision cleared, and I could see half a dozen concerned faces looking down on me. They said the paramedics were on the way…did I want to try to sit up. I did.
I felt fine. Really, I did. Well…tired, maybe, but nothing new there. “The paramedics don’t need to come,” I tried telling them—to no avail.
Someone explained I had passed out, but held on to the pulpit so tightly, that it came down with me! I later learned that my daughter could tell when I was trying to close the service that things weren’t right. She was already on her way to the platform and caught me as I was falling backward, so at least I didn’t crash to the floor!
My wife missed all the excitement, though. We were having an after-church meal, and she slipped out as the closing hymn began. Didn’t take her long to get to my side! I tried to reassure her that I was fine, but the tears and fear in her eyes told me I was getting nowhere with that.
As I looked out over the auditorium, no one had left; all eyes were focused on the platform. I could see the concern, and perhaps fear, on many faces.
About that time, one of the men—a nurse—asked if I wanted to try sitting up in the chair on the platform until the medics arrived. Two or three of them helped me up, but I really didn’t feel I needed the assistance. People looked on, wondering.
“OK,” I said, “like when an injured player gets up off the field—this is when you’re supposed to clap!” Hmmm….no one seemed very amused. Hey, I tried.
The medics arrived—one of them a member of our church!—and people filed out of the auditorium, headed for the meal while I got checked over.
Heart rate was a bit fast. Blood pressure, a bit low. They quickly concluded my had suddenly BP dropped, so I did, too! Blood sugar slightly elevated. Heart monitor indicated no problems.
The medics suggested they take me to the hospital.
“No, I’m OK. Really, I am…I think” I replied. I didn’t want to be chauffeured to the ER, thank you very much. Besides, I added 2 + 2 and came up with a fairly confident “4.”
There had been a lot of flu junk going around in our area lately. A touch of it in our household in the past week, even. That, coupled with the rumblings I felt earlier, led me to the reasonable conclusion that I was coming down with the flu. I wasn’t going to take out a second mortgage on our home to fund an ambulance ride and endless poking and prodding and testing for the flu!
Now, lest the wives reading this roll their eyes and remark, “Typical man!!” Ok, maybe a little, but I don’t think I was being stubborn about it. If the nurse and my wife and the church-member medic insisted, I would’ve relented. I did promise to call the medics if things went south again, also to get bloodwork done the next day and send the results to the nurse for analysis.
As it turned out, I went home, went to bed, got a fever, etc.—the flu. Next morning, fever was gone and felt a little better. Went to get the bloodwork done and slept some more. And the bloodwork came back fine.
I’m pretty confident my “4” was correct. Nevertheless, our church leaders insisted I needed to take some time off, which I did, and it was very refreshing. The rest has done the body good!
Reflecting on this experience, I realize it could’ve been so much worse. Lots of scary possibilities come to mind, to be sure.
What struck me, though, is that something was wrong—the rumbling told me so—yet I pushed it out of my mind, allowing other things to distract me from the messages my body was sending me.
- “I’ll squelch it with breakfast!”
- “I have to go to church! I’ve got a job to do!”
- “It’s nothing. Press on!”
Until I couldn’t push anymore, and I was lying on my back, out like a light!
I’m confident I’m not the only one guilty of this.
But what’s also concerning is if we do this to the messages telling us all is not well with our souls! Or with our relationship with our spouse. Or with our children.
We live in a distracted age, and there is no end to the options for distracting us from listening to these important messages.
In Romans 1, for example, Paul laments man’s propensity to “suppress the truth” by their unrighteousness (Rom. 1:18). In other words, deep down I may know something is morally or ethically wrong, but I squelch that deep-down message. What I want is more important—I think.
Jesus, too, lamented the spiritual conditions of 1st century Jerusalem:
“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! See, your house is left to you desolate.
— Matthew 23:37–38 (ESV)
Again, people were more interested in carrying on as they were rather than submitting to God’s law. Seems so much more enjoyable…free…unrestricted! So instead of listening to the messages, they took some extreme measures to squelch them.
We can, too. O, certainly we would never literally kill the messengers. Don’t have to go to such extremes—we just turn them off, shut the page, click to a different site, avoid church, etc.
We kid ourselves if we think our tactics of distraction will succeed in preventing desolation.
There are other examples of this kind of thing, but I’ll not belabor the point. Just want to encourage us to listen…pay attention…make the needed change…now.
No sense lying flat on our back, out like a light.
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