Wheat and Chaff

We had good services today. It was cooler, for one thing, and I know it makes me terribly superficial to say that such a thing matters to the quality of the worship of God. But let's just be real for a moment, and recognize the fact that the enjoyment of the service declines somewhat when one is busily fighting off heat stroke. I was rather ill for about a week and a half after my trip, and while the first Sunday was really just a blur of agony (mostly for my congregation, watching me struggle through a service the color and consistency of Mozzarella cheese, standing in a warm puddle of my own bodily fluids), the second Sunday I had mended enough to notice the ridiculous temperature. It was about ninety eight degrees, hot enough for me to swallow my pride and remove my suit coat. The second service that I preside over starts at about 12:30, so we really hit the peak right about ten minutes into the sermon. I don't really notice the heat much once the sermon starts. But there's a point about halfway through the preparatory Scripture reading when I feel like a small squirrel has made a burrow between my shoulder blades, and when it's hot like that it makes the squirrel bad-tempered.

I'd like to tell myself that the congregation doesn't notice the heat much once the sermon starts. But I'd like to tell myself a lot of things. The heart of man is deceitful above all things.

So when the temperature never broke 75 today, it made for a much more pleasant service, I thought. And the moisture puts the ranchers in a good mood too, so there's another plus. The fair went well, I'm told, beef is still high, so all is well in agriculture-land for the time being.