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Day’s Verse:
He will recompense the evil to my foes; destroy them in Your faithfulness.
Psalm 54:5
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I offer a direct quote from our pastor at church to illustrate one slightly annoying aspect of First Alliance. He said:
“That was not in the thinking in this point in time of Naomi.”
I ask you: what could possess somebody to use such a long phrase to say such a simple thing? One simple rephrasing could say “Naomi didn’t think that way then.” This pastor has the most amazing ability to speak in passive voice of anybody I’ve encountered so far. He loves the phrase “that point in time” and throws it in at least 50 times each sermon. He also has a fantastic tendency to say the exact same thing three different ways, then repeat the list again for emphasis. Don’t get me wrong; I’m a fan of emphasis, and even repetition as a tool. It’s just that the pastor muffles his perfectly fine sermon ideas in such impenetrable verbosity that I end up filling my notes with doodles. Ian reads whole books of the Bible during the sermons, so at least he gets something out of it.
Am I selfish or something for wanting to hear well-spoken sermons? Is it wrong to want to sing songs from after 1985? Is this too much to ask?
I’m sure he’s doing the best he can and doesn’t realize the way that he repeats things. It takes some courage to get up in front of an entire congregation each week and present your own written work to teach people and reach out. I wouldn’t be quite so critical.
That’s true, actually. I never thought about the fact that pastors might get nervous speaking, too.
And you’re right, I am way too critical of many things. Thanks for reminding me, so I can keep working on that too.
i want to take you to my home church, im pretty sure youd fall right in love with it.
I agree with you but he probably isn’t even aware he’s doing it. If I could think of a loving way to clue him in, I’d suggest it, but I doubt there is one.