Preaching in Uganda

Jerome translates into Luganda as Shauen preachesToday was my first opportunity to preach here in Uganda.  I have to admit it was pretty tough.  First of all, this weekend our Theological Education by Extension class met (I'll blog about that later) so I was in class all day Friday and Saturday and was preparing for the small parts I would teach on Thursday night and Friday night as well as building up a picture roster of the class and doing some other administrative stuff that needed to be done before Sunday when the students returned home.  This class stays in Kampala through Sunday morning worship so they can see some liturgical practices modeled and can participate in worship with each other and the community in Kampala.  On Tuesday the liturgy planning group decided to ask me to preach.  So I already knew I had a very limited time frame to get the sermon together and that I would not have the liberty of lots of practice time either.  The cherry on top was when Missionary Jacob mentioned that since this would be the very first time our TEE class came together and since we were modeling ideal liturgical practice in worship that I needed to preach the best sermon of my life.  And, of course, many of the idioms and examples I would use in America wouldn't work at all here.  Yeah.  No pressure, right?  So, since I'm going to be preaching I do all my normal prep work, which takes about 20 hours, and culminates in a full manuscript.  My manuscript, of course, uses more formal language and words not appropriate for a context where English is a 2nd (or 3rd, 4th, 5th, or 6th) language for everyone in the congregation.  So I decide that I need to do something I've only done in Seminary class before - preach from an outline instead of a manuscript.  This allows me to use appropriate language and explanations dependent on the feedback the congregation is giving.  BUT it makes me nervous.  Very nervous.  So I develop my outline and set aside my manuscript.  I plug the outline into my Bible and thank God for His work.  Sunday morning I'm grateful that there is only one service at Kampala Lutheran Church.  It takes enough energy and focus to preach a sermon from a manuscript at three back-to-back services (as I did in the US during our traveling) and I can't even imagine the effort it would take to preach from an outline in back-to-back services.  So I sweat my way through the first part of the service and finally it's time for the sermon.  I stand up and so does my friend Vicar Jerome, the Assistant to the Pastor and a vicar in the Lutheran Church Mission Uganda.  Turns out he's going to provide a translation of the sermon into Luganda while I preach.  Now I've been here a month and we've never done this before.  We had talked about a Luganda language service as a separate service and I thought Jerome was going to read a translation of the sermon text from 1 Corinthians.  But when it's time for the sermon and you're up front you don't have time to iron out little miscommunications.  So I went with it.  I would have written a different sermon if I knew I was going to have live translation but I have to admit that it worked out wonderfully.  Based on what people have shared with me, the sermon was appropriate and very well received.  Everything worked out so well.  I've never preached with a translator before but people said that they really, really, really appreciated the Luganda translation and that Jerome and I had a good natural flow.  God used my weaknesses - and I have to admit, even on Saturday night I was feeling like I had a pretty weak sermon - and He spoke to His people.  Kampala Lutheran Church's music director asked if I could preach again this Sunday.  I am humbled by the request but I'll have to wait a while before I am able to preach again.  Praise the Lord for delivering just the right message in just the right way - even through me.   -Shauen