Fear and Phobia conquered

First off let me apologize for the lack of posts this semester.  It has to been for lack of trying.  I did something this semester that I thought would be challenging but never anticipated how crazy it would make me.  I am currently taking five classes and auditing a sixth.  What makes it crazy is that all six classes require me to do the work for each class.  This means that on average I am in class 16 hours per week and then doing an additional 40 hours of work outside of class, plus I am also working about 10 hours per week in my work study job on campus.  Needless to say, I am starting to feel burnt out.

I am taking six classes for a reason though.  It isn't just for fun.  Let me explain.

As a second year M.Div student, we are required to work in a parish for 10 - 12 hours per week.  During that field ed, I will be exposed to all aspects of life in a parish.  This includes preaching and I had never done that.  Typically, a student takes an intro to preaching (homiletics) during the fall term second year, but next year the homiletics professor is on sabbatical so there will not be a class offered.  I was concerned about not having a homiletics class so I looked around for something this spring.  I found a class on Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary.  This class is a 4000 level third year class but I asked the professor if I could audit the class.  She graciously accepted me with one condition, I would be required to do all the work.  After much thought, I said if I'm doing the work I might as well take it for credit and thus my sixth class was born.

But the story doesn't end there.  As many of you know, I love to get up on my soapbox and express my opinions on things, but in reality, I am deathly afraid of preaching.  I have never preached in front of a congregation before.  So I took this class to try to get over my fear of preaching.

I am glad to say that after this morning, I now have written and preached a sermon, not in front of a congregation, but in front of a class.  It is a start.

If you are interested, I will post the sermon shortly.