How to try the experiment in church

You have a good chance of starting well if you begin in church—provided the sermon is about God.

When our congregation first tried it, we distributed slips of paper which read:

GAME WITH MINUTES 

Score Card 

During this hour I thought of God at least once each minute for _______________________ different minutes.

Signed ______________________________________________ 

     At the opening of the service the pastor made this announcement: “Everybody will be asked to fill this score card at the end of one hour. In order to succeed, you may use any help within reach. You may look at the cross, or you may leaf through your hymn book or Bible, looking for the verses that remind you of God.”

     The sermon that Sunday explained how to play the game. At the end of the hour, the score cards were collected. The congregation reported scores ranging from five to sixty minutes. The average was forty-four minutes, which meant 73 percent of the hour. For beginners this was excellent. Such an experiment, by the way, will encourage the congregation to listen better than usual, and will remind the preacher to keep his sermon close to God.

     If you score 75 percent in church, you can probably make a rather good score for the rest of the day. It is a question of being master of every new situation.

     Never use a score card more than an hour, and not that long if it tires you. This is a new delight you are learning, and it must not be turned into a task.