I was in Toastmasters a few years back. It was interesting. I didn't make it very far, but it was still good practice. They had this person designated as an "Um Counter." Their job was to count "ums," and I kept them pretty busy when it was my turn.
Anyway, the other night we are in family worship, and we're trying to teach the kids how to be respectful in prayer by closing their eyes and bowing their heads. My 18month old is on my lap, and as I'm praying, we keep hearing these noises from him. When I finally say "amen," my wife says "guess he doesn't know when to say amen." And I replied, "No honey, he was saying 'um.'"
Yes, that's right. My son was mimicking my prayer, and his prayer went like this: "Um, um, um, amen."
Guess it's time to head back to Toastmasters...and maybe I should take my son with me.
5 comments:
Very funny. Thankfully, um's don't plague my writing they way they do my speaking.
um, I used to get annoyed when I heard people pray and say um a lot. What I hated even more was when people said "Dear Lord" before every sentence. I think I was still in the paradigm that I had a relationship with my "buddy Jesus" and I'd never talk to one of my buddies that way. While I still have a personal relationship with God, I believe it is different than a "buddy". Its the God of the universe who graciously wants to talk with me and there is power in invoking His name. (Something I think that gets lost in tranlation somewhere between ancient Judaism and now.) So whether invoking the Name as a verbal tick or on purpose I find those prayers sacred now rather than annoying.
I am the worst when it comes to leaving disoriented messages on answering machines. I sometimes think vocalized prayers suffer from the same sort of phenomenon: There often is no audible voice of God responding to our words.
That's pretty funny.
Ihave tha problem sometimes when I'm preaching. I am conciously trying to overcome it.
You were a toastmaster, too?! This might bring an interesting dynamic to our Wednesday night group. Our kids can be the "um" counters...our wives can be the timers...Jim will be the General Evaluator...
Praying for you as you prepare to be Toastmaster of the Day.
:)
I was just reminded of this post as we study 1 Corinthians 1 this week.
From verse 17...
"not in cleverness of speech, that the cross of Christ should not be made void."
Toastmasters = Clever Speech
Priorities = Cross of Christ
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