Rev. Jack was well loved by his entire congregation. I met him one bright and sunny September morning as he walked from the vicarage to his church for the morning service. He stopped to chat for a few moments and I welcomed him home from his month long summer holiday. He looked refreshed and relaxed and his face bore the glow of sunshine from days outdoors on his well deserved break.

As we chatted, a parishioner on her way to church stopped with words of welcome. “Morning Reverend! She said, adding “I am glad to see you back. That fellow we had while you were away waffled on forever; the dinner was burned every week. At least now we will have short sermons”. With that she went on her way into the churchyard.

“Not a very diplomatic lady”. I said

Smiling, Rev Jack looked at me and said “If I cannot say what I want, in 10 minutes; I am wasting my time, the congregation loses concentration and begins to shuffle about after that!”

I have often thought of those words when listening to speakers, be they clergymen, businessmen or politicians. Rev Jack is a very wise old man indeed!

While reading an epistle of a blog post the other day, I found myself struggling to keep up. I had the impression that the author was trying to use every word in the dictionary in his post. At least four times I had to go back and start over to make some sense of the piece on the screen. It made me think of Rev Jack’s words.

If that same author was restricted to a Post-it note, how would he deliver his message?

Are we writing for ourselves, or do we really have a message we want to share…..