In-tense

It's enough to drive me crazy.

I may have written about this before, but it's a problem that just won't go away. Whenever I sit down and start writing a sermon, I usually start by mentioning something that Jesus said or did. This week, it's the parables of the lost sheep and the lost coin. Jesus told the crowds these parables.

Then, somewhere in the middle of the sermon, I stop talking about the parables Jesus told, and start talking about the parables Jesus tells. The shepherd who searched for his lost sheep becomes the shepherd who searches for his lost sheep. The woman who swept her house, searching for the lost coin, becomes the woman who sweeps her house, searching for her lost coin.

Yes, I confess the awful truth: I can't keep my tenses straight.

I offer my deepest apologies to Mrs. Gann and Mrs. Leonard, my high school English teachers; and to Myron Yeager, my college professor who, for some reason, thought I should major in English. Perhaps if I had become an English major, keeping my tenses straight wouldn't be quite so hard.

I wonder, though, if my tendency to shift from past to present tense--improper though it may be--is somehow appropriate to the task of sermon writing. After all, the things Jesus said, he says to us. The stories from scripture are our stories, too.

I guess there is some consolation for my inability to always write in proper English.