So I preached the sermon tonight. I didn't really talk much about shame. I did spend a lot of time talking about sin. Seeing as the Psalm talks about crying to God from the depths of sin, I thought I should first outline the depths of sin. That meant the first third of the sermon was spent hammering home the point "You are more sinful than you think you are." Which sounds bad, and it is, but I was talking about how we all deny God his glory and we don't really think our sin is as bad as it is. Rebellion against God, is not, in our opinion an offense that should be punished with and eternity in hell.

I spent the rest of the sermon hammering home "You are more loved that you can possibly understand." It was all about grace and God's non-condemnation of those who trust in him.

I got pretty nervous going into the sermon. Mainly because it was quite heavy, I didn't want to make people angry, and the sermon didn't have as many jokes or funny stories as normal. I was nervous only really for myself. It was silly but pride is a great motivator.

Finally I spent a few minutes having the church stand and wait on God. It was a bit charismatic, at least for our church. No one laughed or fell over, but that wasn't much of a danger. I felt like I wanted to get the church engaged in waiting to hear God speak. It may or may not have worked. But still, it was nice to do something different and a little out of the ordinary.

Anyway, I might post the sermon soon for anyone who's interested. You would be free to listen. And you'd be free not to.