My Father's Sermon

        Every now and then someone will ask me if my father was a preacher.  No he wasn’t—he was a Sunday School teacher, a deacon, a faithful church leader, but he was not a preacher.  However, my father did preach a sermon one time and I remember it well.

        Our church had an annual Layman’s Sunday.  The men led the worship service, filled the choir, offered prayers and Scripture readings.  One man was selected to preach the sermon.  They asked my daddy to preach one year on that special day.  Even though I was very small, only seven or eight, I remember the sermon very well.  I remember it because he talked about me!

        He told the story of taking the family to an amusement park in Birmingham.  As we were leaving the park, I got lost.  I vividly remember that frightening experience.  I recall realizing that I was lost and crying hysterically.  A kind lady saw me and tried to calm me down, telling me not to worry because she would stay with me until I found my family.  My sister found me.  While I was fearful I would be in trouble for being lost, I remember my daddy picking me up and squeezing me with delight because of his joy. 

        When daddy told this story as part of his sermon that Sunday, I wasn’t very happy.  I was embarrassed by the incident and never expected it to be broadcast to the entire church.  I told my daddy I didn’t like him telling that story, but he said he did so to show how happy God, our heavenly father is when he finds his children who have lost their way. 

        The story had become a distant memory until last summer.  My mother is confined to a nursing home and my brother and I were cleaning out her house.  My brother found some old notebook paper and said, “You might be interested in this.”   There were sixteen handwritten pages, held together with a rusted paperclip.  I was holding the manuscript of my father’s sermon that he had written in cursive with a pencil. 

        My father started his sermon by calling out the men who convinced him to preach saying, “They will probably have to hold me up because I’ll be so afraid.”  He went on to talk about how he became a Christian saying, “I was brought to Christ through the influence of my Christian parents.”  I found this statement fascinating because daddy’s father died when he was six and he was raised by his aunt and uncle.  But he called them “his parents.”  He also shared what a positive witness the church had been in his life,  “This church has given me the opportunity to do something for God and thereby to grow as a Christian.” 

        He gave several examples of laymen who had made significant contributions for the cause of Christ.  Then, as his sermon came to a close---there it was---the story that I didn’t want my father to tell.  The story was almost exactly as I remember after all these years, but there was something in the manuscript that I did not remember at all.  I’m Ray III.  My daddy was Ray Jr.  But he often called me Buddy or Buddy Boy.  No one else ever called me by that name.  When my daddy called me Buddy, I knew that everything was all right.  It was a name of love and endearment. 

        When he told the story in his sermon, he called me Buddy.  He told the church that when they found Buddy, “I can’t describe to you the joy we felt. We were all tremendously happy.”  He closed his sermon by inviting people to come to Christ saying, “He will be even happier to have you come to him than we were to get Buddy back.”

        Daddy died 20 years ago. Sunday is Father’s Day.  I miss him.  But I know one day I will experience indescribable joy when I find him in heaven and hear him say “Buddy Boy” welcome home!  I know because I heard a sermon many years ago—and my daddy was the preacher.