As we wind down our time here in Odisha, I spent a couple of hours yesterday recording four sermons that will be broadcast on Indian television.
(In case you’re interested, I did three from the “Fashion Statement” series and then one from “Christmas Lights” — a sermon from the Transfiguration scene (Matthew 17) with the one point of Jesus is NOT godly. He is God.)
As you might imagine, it’s a challenge delivering four sermons in a row, all without notes, all while looking into a camera instead of a congregation.
Yet the bigger challenge for me came before the recording even started: my session with the make-up man.
He blotted my face with rouge. He filled in my eyebrows. Most unnerving, he lined my lips. I was thinking, “is he after the Angelina mouth look?”
When I looked in the mirror afterwards, the almost ghostly hue of my face was a bit embarrassing. They tell me it will ensure that I will neither splotch nor shine when the sermons actually get broadcast.
My discomfort and self-consciousness will be worth it, however, if some of our new India friends can embrace the truth we drew out of Matthew 17: Jesus is not godly. He is God.