So we got to the building last night for Bible Study and I was making the rounds trying to get everything where I needed it before we started. As is my custom I started back to the foyer and made a quick stop by what we call the “Old Man Pew,” a pew at the very back of the auditorium where four or five of the older men sit and talk before every service. I was standing there talking to a couple of them when one of them asked, “How much weight have you put on since you started here?” I thought for a second said, “About twenty five pounds,” to which he replied, “You can really tell it!”
Ouch! Now don’t get offensive; hearing that didn’t bother me in the least outside of the fact that it was true. See, I had lost a lot of weight in the two years before we moved to Phillips St. – eighty-three pounds to be exact. However, in the midst of having a new baby, moving, and then getting acclimated to a new work I just did not make the time to continue exercising and dieting like I had before so some of the weight came back quickly. The only reason that comment stung to any degree is because I was guilty.
People sometimes complain about having their toes stepped on from something said during a sermon. That’s their “Ouch!” moment. But more often than not they blame the teacher/preacher for offending them. What is really the reason that that comment stung? Guilt. The truth is designed to comfort the afflicted but also to afflict the comfortable. In fact, the Hebrews writer declared “the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart” (Hebrews 4:12). When I’m not embodying the truth, the truth is supposed to cut me to the core. That guilt is meant to be a motivating factor, because when the truth hurts…its time to change!
-Andy Brewer
I’m glad there is another fat boy in the congregation! Maybe I can lose some with you. Great thought.