Broken Patterns

There is the wonderful story about a woman listening to her pastor preach a Sunday morning sermon about Simon Peter’s wife’s mother, ill with a fever. Not only was it an obscure text but also it was an insignificant sermon. The woman lasted through the experience, but left the Church feeling somewhat unfulfilled. Consequently, she decided to go to Church again that day, out in the country where she had grown up. When she arrived, she discovered to her dismay that her pastor had been invited to be guest preacher and again he had chosen to preach the sermon about Peter’s mother-in-law being ill with a fever. (Obviously, he was getting a lot of mileage out of that sermon.) Believing that there was still time to redeem the day, the woman decided to go to the hospital chapel in the evening. As you may have guessed, the same preacher, on hospital duty, was preaching the same sermon on Peter’s wife’s mother, ill with a fever.…