Drawing on the Energy of the Crowd

The glory of the King is in the multitude of his people. This morning I preached in 2 services. It was my first time doing that in 5 weeks. But I felt unprepared somewhat. I had an incredibly busy week leading to Sunday. I had attended meetings at night from Tuesday until last night. I did not have a night free except my Monday day off. It was intense. Last night I preached in  family service of about 50 people. Half of them were unchurched people and I was pleased to have shared God's Word with the family and their clan, a reputable business family in Ranau. After coming back at 9pm I could not do much except to relax and watch a bit soccer on television. I got up just before 5am and waited on the Lord. By 6.30am I opened the church door and more than 10 students were waiting outside.

At 7.50am I told the elder to give the announcement early as many were already seated for more than an hour waiting for the service to start. The Secondary school students led worship on consecutive Sundays. It was amazing what a small gesture from the pastor could do to lift spirits. Before we only shook hands at the door and wished one another a happy Sunday. But since the event we held for the students last month, I had the pleasure of getting to know a few of them well and now they openly called me pastor. No wonder I never felt any attachment to the church I attended for 6 years in Singapore as the pastor there never bothered to ask my name though as a visitor I had tried twice to make contact. God forgive his wrong! So when I stood to preach and see 250 eager and joyful faces with every seat in the house taken my spirit soared in the Lord. I preached for 37 mins on the beatitudes from the Sermon on the Mount and I had to stop at beatitude no. 2, blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted. It took me 20 minutes to expound on this by discussing the OT context from Eccle 7,1-4 and Ezekiel 9,2-7. At the end we concluded at 9.35am and I went home to rest for 15 mins before the start of the 2nd service.