“Please make me good at this.”
I prayed those words in 1997. Exactly 20 years ago to the month. I’d just been hired as a student pastor. But my prayer was about public speaking.
I was terrified of public speaking throughout my college years. I would meet with professors and ask them not to call on me in class. I would beg them to let me do papers instead of presentations.
After college, August 1997, I was offered the position of student pastor at a church in Birmingham, AL. I almost didn’t take it. I would have to speak weekly in front of a group of high school students! But I held my nose and jumped in.
When I first began speaking to those students, I held a black folder in my hand with a complete manuscript inserted. I would stand before them, basically reading the content with an ever so brief glance up, and turn the pages as I spoke. All the while, my breathing was shallow, my voice shaky, and my hands trembling. Poor teenagers. They were a good lot to put up with me. And so was the pastor who hired me!
“Please make me good at this.”
I didn’t just pray though. I worked! I read anything I could get my hands on about public speaking. Ken Davis was huge for me. I studied my pastor. I studied the speakers at student conferences. I ordered audio tapes and VHS tapes to study communicators and comedians. My all-time favorite is Steve Martin. I study all the above to this today. Thank God for iTunes and YouTube!
I practiced “speaking” in my apartment bedroom. Even while afraid, I took every opportunity to speak in front of groups. I spoke at school FCA’s (Fellowship of Christian Athletes) in the early mornings before their classes began. I would drive over an hour for opportunities. Sometimes only one student showed up.
I spoke at nursing homes to the precious elderly who sat as a captive audience in their wheelchairs and sofa-chairs. I got my second taste of people falling asleep right in front of me. The first one was the students.
On Wednesdays before the students arrived for our Wednesday night service, I would go into the church gym three different times during the day and rehearse my talk. Eventually I graduated from the black notebook to a music stand for my manuscript.
I’ll never forget when my pastor invited me to preach to the entire church one weekend. I was scared out of my mind. I asked to pray about it. I didn’t want to do it. But made the decision that fear would not beat me.
“Please make me be good at this.”
And… I was terrible! I had worked so hard. But my nerves just go the best of me.
So back to the lab… and my prayers.
A year or so later the pastor graciously gave me another opportunity. I worked doubly hard this time. I had the message written weeks in advance. Twice per week I would rehearse the message in my apartment, in the church gym, in my office, and in the main auditorium when I knew no-one would catch me. The week of the message, I rehearsed it three times a day.
The Sunday I was to deliver the message, I got up at 4:00am (services started at 9:00am & 10:30am if my memory serves me rightly), got into the main auditorium, and preached that 30-minute message to a dark empty room four times.
Butterflies owned me still. As I walked onto that platform of both services my heart was pounding out of my chest. My voice shaky again, hands trembling, and shortness of breath to boot.
“Please make me good at this.”
Then I opened my mouth and just went for it… shaky voice and trembling hands be darned! I thought I did really well.
The folks and the pastor raved! They told me, “We see a gift in you!” Oh man. Was this God answering prayer? Or was it because of my hard work?
The rest, as they say, is history. In 2000, even as I began seminary, doors opened and I sort of stumbled into paying the rent though public speaking (see my “About” section). Today, I am the senior pastor of Grace Community Church. Every weekend I speak in front of thousands, with thousands more hearing across the world through the message podcasts.
Even in the last two years at Grace, I’ve gone from a podium and notes to a table and outline. I’ll never stop trying to improve. Not improve for public speaking’s sake, but so that I (by God’s grace) might more and more impact lives, generations, and eternities. I still have a long way to go. So I’ll never stop praying… and grinding.
“Please make me good at this.”
Am I really any good at public speaking today? Well, you’ll have to be the judge of that. But if fruit is any indicator, I think I’m holding my own.
So, what’s the lesson here?
Pray your passion. Then work your tail off.
