July 25 Morning After (Megan)

So, this summer I (Megan Boggess) have been interning with Alan too learn a bit more about ministry and the behind-the-scenes work that happens. It has been a lot of fun, and a lot of work too. Early on, Alan told me that he would be out of town at the end of July and asked if I would speak in youth. I was pretty game, though I didn’t know quite what I was getting myself into. All was going well and I was thinking about some things I could talk about, when Alan said that he would like me to kick off our money series, About The Benjamins. That freaked me out a bit, seeing as I didn’t know much about money and the bible. But all turned out fine, as Alan helped me narrow down my scripture and topic.

Sunday night finally rolled around, and in the midst of a busy weekend, I found myself preparing to preach, from memory and without notes. I was really nervous, but with the encouragement of Alan, the staff, and some of the kids, and the Holy Spirit (of course), I was ready to be used by God – knowing He would help me remember what He wanted to get across to the students. And now, reflecting back on that evening, I started out full-force, didn’t play out a joke about Alan’s iPad very well, and paced somewhat nervously. From what I’ve been told, I only lost someone once during an example but by the time it was over it made sense again and overall the message seemed to go over well. I was just so thankful that the Holy Spirit gave me an unintended pun in the middle of the message – while talking about a bobcat trying to get a chicken baiting a live trap, I said that the bobcat thought that this one way would be “no harm, no fowl”. The laughter around the room and the moment it gave me to pause and laugh out some of my nervousness was a huge blessing.

Though I was wordy and repeated myself a few times and moved a point around here or there, God helped me remember all my “key” points. So it wasn’t perfect, but I don’t know how much better my first time speaking to that many people with only my bible in hand could have been. I am very thankful I had this opportunity to speak and help do some of the background work for the series. All in all, I would say that this series has started out nicely.

Thanks!
~Megan Boggess

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