Oops!

We made too many of the wrong mistakes – Yogi Berra

I made a “wrong mistake” yesterday. One of the perils of public speaking is twisting words around, and I sure dropped a bomb in the middle of my sermon at Central Reformed Church in Grand Rapids. I was being clever at the time – talking about hell and about how passé the idea of hell has become in our world. I said, “Hell’s popularity ratings were at an all-time low this Spring when Time magazine ran a cover story asking ‘What if there’s no hell?’ Enlightened and sophisticated people were done with hell, until the last day of April when hell made a startling comeback. Do you remember what happened? Osama Bin Laden was killed. The next day the New York Daily News ran a cover photograph of Bin Laden with the words ‘Rot in hell’ in banner text over it. According to polls a great majority of Americans believed Bin Laden was there. Late night television hosts made one Osama’s in hell joke after another and the audience would laugh and applaud.”

So far so good. But then, I blew it. I looked at the next line in my text, which said “We happily consign Bin Laden and Hitler and Stalin to hell ….” For some reason I thought maybe I should say “Osama” instead of “Bin Laden” since I’d just called him Osama the line before. I bet you can guess what’s coming. I said “Osama” and “Bin Laden” at the same time … and it came out “We happily consign Obama to hell.” Ouch. This is why it’s always a bad idea to think when you speak. Seriously, my experience is I’m better off preparing my remarks ahead of time and then sticking to the script instead of trying to think and speak at the same time. Some people can’t chew gum and walk. I can’t think and speak.

Fortunately, the congregation laughed. A lot. Some of them even thought I did it on purpose to get a laugh. I guess one good thing you could say was at least I had everyone’s attention. I’m preaching at the same place this coming Sunday. Probably half the people will be there waiting for my next blooper. It’s an amazing thing, but sometimes I feel like the world pays me to go around and say stupid things. We’ll see what happens next.