Breathe: A holy Week and Easter Survival Guide for Preachers

How are you feeling about Holy Week and Easter?

There are sermons to preach, worship services to lead, bulletins to proof. 

You probably have pastoral calls to make and maybe even a funeral to conduct...or two? 

Maybe you feel swamped and overwhelmed.

Maybe you feel in pretty good shape.

No matter how you're feeling, there are a lot of details to keep track of.

Through all the cares and occupations of our lives during Holy Week and Easter, this is my prayer for you, dear Preacher:

Breathe into the one thing you are to do in this one moment.

Breathe

Breathe slowly, deeply, intentionally. 

• Breathe in the Spirit. Breathe out ego.

• Breathe in peace. Breathe out anxiety.

• Breathe in love. Breathe out forgiveness.

Breathe at your desk. 

Breathe as you lead worship. 

Breathe as you enter the pulpit.

Breathe.

Breathing practices

There are many breathing practices and some are better than others for different purposes.

Below are a few you might try.

After you try one, spend a few seconds noticing how it made you feel.

If the practice adjusts your mood or energy even a notch or two, it’s probably worth doing again in the future.

Below are some practices when you feel anxious, overwhelmed, or don’t know what to do next.

Repeat them as many times as necessary until the anxiety eases and you’re able to focus again. (These can also be used for meditation or contemplative prayer.)

• Box Breathing: Inhale through your nose for a count of four, hold for four, exhale through pursed lips for four, rest for four.

• 2-2-4: Inhale through your nose for two, hold for two, exhale for four through your mouth. This one can also be used in conversation as a thoughtful pause when considering what to say next.

• 4-7-8. Inhale through your nose for four, hold for seven, exhale through pursed lips for eight.

• Cyclic sighing. Inhale a normal breath through your nose. Hold for one or two counts. Inhale again sharply until your lungs are full. Exhale slowly through pursed lips.

On the other hand, if your energy is low and your neurons need to get firing, this practice might give you a boost.

• 2×2 Whoosh: Purse your lips loosely. Inhale and exhale quickly through your mouth like this: in-out-in-out, pause, in-out-in-out. The breath will be audible with a kind of “whoosh” sound. If desired, wait a minute before doing it again so you don’t get dizzy.

Now that your feel more regulated and are able to hear the Spirit…

The One Thing

…Ask the Spirit what one thing you are to do right now.

• If it's to work on your sermon, work on your sermon and your sermon alone.

• If it's to proofread bulletins, then focus on each line, each word, each number, one...at...a...time.

• If it's to stand in the pulpit and preach, then preach with your whole being.

Do the one thing you are to do. And find the peace of Christ waiting for you therein.

This One Moment

It's all we have. 

Only this moment. 

This one moment that God has given us. 

We're no longer living a moment ago.

What is to come is not yet. 

There's only now.

In this one moment, breathe and focus.

Don't miss the holiness of God with you in this one moment. 

Don't miss the holiness of God with you in this moment because you're busy trying to make God show up in another one.

Don't miss God. Here. Now.

This week, during Holy Week, and through your Easter celebrations, breathe into the one thing you are to do in this one moment.

Preacher, thank you for sharing the extraordinary truth of being loved and forgiven.

Thank you for sharing that truth from the pulpit.

Thank you for sharing that truth in your life.