Well, we've finally posted two more messages in the Romans series and today I got a message from one of our regular listeners that read --
Hey there,
Did we by any chance skip a Romans Message?
In #55 you cover Rmn 14.1-10,
In #56 you don't get to Romans at all,
In #57 you cover Rmn 15.1-6,
Thus skipping Rmn 14.11-23. Of course, you read through 1Cr 18.1-13 in #55, which is more-or-less parallel to the skipped bit of Romans; it just seemed odd is all - as you are usually more prone to read through a section several times rather than have them read it on their own and assume they 'got' it.
As I've repeatedly observed, I cannot get away with anything. :-)
Actually, he's right. The reason these messages have been slow to appear is that they were originally recorded on cassette back in the year 2000 [in fact, the last message I posted was dated April 20, 2000]. Back then the recordings were almost a secondary thought. We only began recording because someone in our group thought it might be a good idea, primarily for those folk who missed a week. We never gave any thought to someday posting them on the Internet for people around the globe to hear.
Sadly, some of the recordings weren't salvageable. And some were full of conversations and discussions about current events or personal situations among those then-present. So, I've had to upload each cassette to my hard drive, apply noise suppression and signal compression to the audio files, then listen through each message, cut out what is no longer relevant, and keep the teaching. And, as you know, cassettes have to flip sides. So, there's always a missing couple of minutes in each message where the person manning the recorder flipped the cassette. I've tried to cut around those dead spots in such a way as to create a seemless message (sometimes more successfully than others).
I love digital editing, but it's a slow, painstaking process.
The "R##" tags serve to keep the current series of mp3's in order, but a few weeks from the original series were missing, garbled, or broken. If (and when) you notice any section of the book of Romans I didnt' cover, that's the reason.
By the way, there's light at the end of the tunnel. There are only 7 more cassettes to transfer and post to close the book of Romans. This has been a labor of love, but I admit that I'm looking forward to reaching the end. The next lesson continues into chapter 15 and we'll delve into a bit of the history behind the various names listed at the end of Paul's epistle. It's interesting stuff.
Anyway, thanks to all of you who are keeping up with the series and keeping me honest. You make the effort worthwhile!
