Bungee Cord 12-30-13

Hello,

     Merry Christmas!  As is my custom, I write a story for my Christmas Eve sermon.  So, for all of you who weren’t at the 7:00 service at First Lutheran of Greensburg (and even for those of you who were)….here’s this year’s story.            

                                   

‘Do not be afraid; for see—I am bringing you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, who is the Messiah, the Lord.

     Four 12 years Billy Johnson had lived in the same town, the same house, went to the same church, had the same friends, but when he turned 13 he moved.  His mother got a new job, a good job, so after a family conference around dinner one night, the family decided that although it was going to be hard to leave, the right thing to do was to move to the town where his mom’s job was going to be.

     So, in the middle of the summer they packed up everything that they had, went to a whole bunch of farewell parties and set off onto a new adventure.  When they drove out of town, it really was farewell, because his mom’s new job was clear across the country.  It was a bit scary for all of them, so when their old town was out of sight they passed a Bible around the car and everyone read a verse from Psalm 23….”The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want……he leadeth me by still waters, he restoreth my soul…..surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever.”

     It took several days to drive to their new town, and even though they were still in the United States when they hopped out of the car to get something to eat at the MacDonalds, it felt like they were in a foreign land.  Everything was so much older.  The streets were so much tighter.  The houses were so much closer together.  The people talked funny, at least funny to them.  There were people wearing clothes the likes of which they had never seen before, and some of their favorite TV shows came on so much later than they did in their previous town that he knew that they would never be able to watch them.

     The transition to the new school was tough.  It wasn’t that the kids and teachers were mean to him, it was just that it felt like the kids and the teachers didn’t even notice him.  When he walked into the classrooms, the kids would wave a quick “hi” to him, but then quickly turn and talk to their friends.  Plans were made by them to hang out, but those plans never included him.  Some of the subjects in school were new to him, and he felt like a cycler going up a hill trying to keep up with the rest of the pack.  Other subjects were old hat to him, and sitting in class was like taking a sleeping pill.  It wasn’t that things were bad with the move to this new town, it was just that it was like trying to jump into a train that was speeding by, and as the days passed by he just felt lost … a fish out of water, a ship without a sail.

     The one place where he felt a little different was in church.  They located a Lutheran church not too far from his new home, and every Sunday he would go to church and feel a little less lost.  The worship liturgy was the same as the church he grew up in, they just sang it a lot faster here.  Communion was still the body and blood of Jesus given in bread and wine, but instead of a continuous flow of people past the bread and wine, you had to kneel around the altar and wait for everyone to get done.  Some of the hymns he recognized and could sing, others he had never heard before.  And even though the kids were a little warmer to him, they still seemed to stick tight with their old friends, kind of leaving him out.  It wasn’t the perfect place to begin to feel at home in this new town, but unlike everything else, it was at least a beginning.

     So, when Christmas came, it came to Billy with an extra measure of excitement, a chance for him to really feel at home.  He could hardly wait to hear the familiar story of Jesus’ birth, just like he had heard it over and over again before he moved.  He could hardly wait to sing “Away in the Manger”, “Silent Night”, and “Joy to the World” and know that they were singing them back at his other home on that night, too.  He couldn’t wait to watch the candle light get passed through the congregation, just like it did in his old church.  After feeling so lost for the last several months, Billy could hardly wait to get on the solid and familiar ground of Christmas eve worship.

     Christmas Eve morning not only ushered in Christmas, but it also ushered in a Christmas snow storm, the like of which had never been known in his new town.  Of course where he used to live, it was just one of those winter storms that you lived through, so he had no idea of the surprise that was coming before him. Playing video games all day as the snow kept on falling, he had a harder and harder time concentrating on the video game knowing that the time to go to church, to feel at home, was coming near.

     “We’re not going to church tonight,” said Billy’s mother.  “The weather is too bad, and the roads have not been plowed.  We’ll never get there, and if we do, we’ll never get home.”  When he heard it, his heart sank…..(to be continued next week)

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace,

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord 12/22/13

Hello,

Merry Christmas!

Wednesday evening I was driving into Greensburg to a meeting at church, and as I came up Otterbein Street to turn south on Main St, my eyes caught a woman across the street waving a sign, as if in protest, which said, “KEEP CHRIST IN CHRISTMAS!”

As I scanned the corner on which she stood, the corner where the county courthouse stands, I noticed that behind her a live manger scene was being set up.  A simple stable had been constructed, and in it were adults portraying Joseph, Mary, shepherds, angels and wisemen.  On occasion throughout the year you will find various church groups gathering on the grounds of the courthouse to publically pray and entreat people to follow a cause for which they believe the government has gone astray.  Apparently on this evening this particular church group had reserved the public square to assert their concern that someone (The government? Society? Commercial interests?) was attempting to take Jesus Christ out of Christmas.

Although I applaud this church’s zeal, I think their message a bit misleading, misleading in that it seemed to imply that anyone could take Christ out of Christmas.  Remember, from the very beginning there were those who tried to take Christ out of Christmas…..the Romans demanding that a pregnant young woman travel 70 miles over rough terrain could have caused a miscarriage and kept Christ out of Christmas…the citizens of Bethlehem whose cold welcome of that same pregnant woman sending her to a cow’s home to give birth could have brought disaster to Christ’s birth…..King Herod whose determination to rid himself of any threat to his throne could have brought a quick end to Christ’s part in Christmas.  But none succeeded then, and none will succeed now because it was God who placed Jesus Christ in Christmas, and anyone who wants to take on God in a tug of war to take Jesus Christ out of Christmas will find themselves soon exhausted, their hands blistered with rope burns, and in humiliation giving up.

Romans 8:38,39 says, “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”  I’ve never heard this verse read at a Christmas service, but maybe is should be.  After all, isn’t the unstoppable love of God for his children what Christmas is all about?

So, maybe I should find out which church was providing that live nativity on the courthouse square, see if they plan on doing it again next year, and offer to give them a different sign to wave….. “FEAR NOT.  GOD KEEPS CHRIST IN CHRISTMAS! (and in every other day too!)”

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 12-16-13

Hello,

     I put snow tires on my car this year, and it has made all the difference in the world.

     Last winter I tried to traverse the winding, hilly roads of western Pennsylvania with regular tires.  They were high performance tires designed to carry my Mini Cooper with handling ease on dry roads, which they did well.  But they lacked the grip when trying to weave around snow covered corners or when facing a icy hill.  More than once last year when the daytime snow blanketed the dry roads on which I drove to work, the travel home was precarious at best and the lane up to our house was not passable.  So, I would have to park my car on the bottom of our hill and trudge through the snow in my suit and dress shoes, leaving my car there until the snow melted.

     But this year things are different.  With my snow tires gripping the road under my front tires nothing seems unconquerable.  My car holds the turns as I serpentine my way over the ridge, and up my lane I go as if I was going downhill instead of up.  It is an amazing thing that has happened to my little car, now clad in snow tires.

     The Bible says this in Galatians, “⁷As many of you as were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ.”….I don’t know if the Apostle Paul would be offended if I changed slightly his image a bit, but it certainly seems apropos to do so as I look out my window and see fields of snow, “As many of you as were baptized into Christ have been equipped with Christ-gripping snow tires.”

     So, slick icy turns over which you would slide out of control with regular tires, need not cause you to turn around in defeat, for Baptized into Christ and therefore equipped with Christ-gripping snow tires you can take on those turns confidently and carefully.  When you come upon a snow blanketed hill you don’t have to cry uncle to the hill’s slippery incline, but instead equipped with Christ-gripping snow tires you can turn onto the lane and victoriously yell, “Charge!”

     In the wintery days of life when the travelling is treacherous and nail biting, remember that you do not run on high performance tires, for as the Bible says, “As many of you were baptized into Christ have been equipped with Christ-gripping snow tires.”  It makes all the difference in the world.

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord  12-9-13

Hello,

     Regular readers of the Bungee Cord know that each week it is formed by the events of my life, some trivial….some significant.  Today it is significant.

     Woke up this morning, turned to my Facebook page and saw that a very dear and old friend of mine had placed a post, a post to let his friends know of the unspeakable tragedy of the death of his 29 year old daughter in a car accident last night.  He and his wife, whose death to cancer in her early 50’s still stings sharply, enveloped us in their arms of friendship when my wife and I took our first steps into our adult lives.  They lived a short two blocks from us and we wove our lives together for the first four years of my career as a pastor thirty years ago.  We shared dinner.  We often shared a glass of wine.  He and I hunted a squirrel that had snuck its way into their basement, and he came over to our house to install a dishwasher in our kitchen (is that supposed to involve smoke coming from a circular saw?).  They gave birth to their daughter in the same year that our oldest son was born, and together we learned by experience the challenges of being a first time parent.  They invited us to their cabin in the north woods of Minnesota, and in the company of newborns, mice, mosquito’s and M&M’s our lives were sealed together.

     When I read his post…all I could post back was, “Oh no!”

     I don’t know how he found the strength to type the horrible news.

     To try and make any sense of such a tragedy seems to me to trivialize the pain and the anguish in a father’s heart, or in the hearts of any of us who love him and his daughter.  Although the news that greeted me this morning was shocking, those of us who have trudged our way through life know all to well that none of us is immune from this sort of thing befalling us and shredding our hearts, too.

     I don’t know when it was, maybe it was in those first four years of my ministry that I shared with these dear friends, when I stumbled onto a verse in the Bible that I call my focus verse – it stands before my eyes every time the phone rings, every time I do something that magnifies the wretch that I am, every time I do something that waters the weeds of presumptuous pride, every time that I see the blessings in my life that are well beyond my deserving, every time that I walk into the lives of others whom tragedy has tackled with unrepentant roughness…my focus verse: 1 John 3:1, “See what love the Father has given us, that we should be called children of God, and that is what we are.”

That is what we are….period.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 12-2-13

Hello,

     Driving home from church today, my wife and I got behind a rather beat up, old, silver Toyota.  Because we were making a small grocery pick-up we took the route that led us through Greensburg and Latrobe, Route 30…..four lanes with lots of stoplights.  Traffic was relatively light, but somehow we got stuck behind the well-worn car in front of us.  As we putted along behind it, I noticed that it bore reflectors bookjacketting the rear license plate.  When I saw them, I said to my wife, “Maybe I should get those for my car.”  She snickered when she also noticed them, matching reflective silhouettes of a reclining woman (I have seen them before on the mud flaps of semi-trucks.).  Somehow I don’t think those reflectors are what I would want to reflect to the world.

     Seeing them led me to remember some years ago when our high school youth were doing an evangelism project (i.e. getting the message of Jesus out), and the person in charge of the high school youth asked me if I had any ideas for a magnet that we could have made to put on the kids’ cars and give to the adults of the congregation to display on theirs.  I thought a moment…mom….what would I want to people who got caught behind me to catch their eyes?  “THERE IS HOPE”…..that is what I told her.  Who knows….maybe the person behind me may have just lost their job….maybe they dug a hole for themselves that has gobbled them up….maybe the person just left the doctor’s office carrying an ominous prognosis….maybe death has clamped down on them like a spring-rigged trap….maybe they feel their family crumbling apart in their hands….maybe they have been treated like dirt by the kids at school….maybe…..”THERE IS HOPE”.  No matter what the person in the car behind me might be dealing with, I would want them to know that THERE IS HOPE.

     So, that was the magnet that we had made, and around Sioux Falls people saw a round magnet with a blue silhouette of the earth, encompassing a cross and the words THERE IS HOPE written in a large prominent font affixed to the cars of the youth and adults of our church. 

     It is not an accident that the Christian church that was centered in the Northern Hemisphere decided to place the date of Jesus birth (the Bible does not give us a date) at a time of the year when the shortening days brought more and more darkness.  It was placed at this time of the year as a perpetual reflection to the world of what Christianity is about….THERE IS HOPE.  When the Bible, in the Gospel of John,  speaks of Jesus’ place in the universe it says speaking of Jesus, “and the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

    I don’t know if those magnets are still catching the eyes of drivers in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, but no matter where you are in these darkening days of December I hope that this Bungee Cord has recreated those magnets and placed them in your vision.  And when you are caught behind some car or truck and all you can see is the trunk of the vehicle in front of you that amid whatever hopeless reflectors the driver has placed there you will see what God would want to be reflected into your vision…THERE IS HOPE.

     Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord  11-25-13

Hello,

     Even though this week is Thanksgiving, we served a Thanksgiving dinner last Wednesday to our guests of the weekly noon meal that we provide at our church.  Our usual crowd is between 80-100, and that is about the number who took their seats on Wednesday.  I don’t know if I have written about this ministry that was started at our downtown church years before I arrived, but just in case I haven’t here’s a picture of what happens in our fellowship hall every Wednesday.

     A crew of about 10 women….ranging from 50 years old to 97 years old, show up every Wednesday to prepare a home cooked meal for anyone who needs a good meal or some good company.  No questions are asked about a person’s need.  If they show up, we are glad to feed them, and the food that the women set before them is … well….the best lunch in town…home made soup, glazed chicken breast, ham and scalloped potatoes, and this past week all the Thanksgiving fixin’s…turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, corn,  cranberry sauce, pumpkin cake!

     The meal always begins at noon, and before we eat we take a few moments to talk about things…the Steelers, the Penguins, the weather.  We sing “Take Me Out to the Ball Park” on baseball’s opening day, patriotic songs on the 4^th of July, Christmas carols, and last week we sang a couple of Thanksgiving songs before our prayer.  As I was about to begin the singing one of the guests came up to me and told me that we had a person celebrating his birthday, and so I said, “Well, we’d better sing “Happy Birthday” then, too.”  Our crowd is not a gathering of trained singers, and we don’t sound like it.  But those who sing sing with gusto and delight….and that is all that matters.  So, we launched into “Come Ye Thankful People Come” and “Sing to the Lord of Harvest”, and then I said, “Hey!  I hear it’s someone’s birthday today….It’s Bill’s (not his real name) birthday!”

     Bill happened to be sitting at the table right next to where I was standing, and when I looked over at him there was a gleam in his eye carrying a look of “how did you know that?” 

     “Okay,” I said, “Let’s sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to Bill!” 

     “Happy Birthday to you.  Happy Birthday to you.  Happy birthday dear Bill….”

     And as we sang that phrase, I looked over at Bill and was surprised at what I saw.  Bill had pulled out his handkerchief and was wiping tears from his eyes.

     I don’t know much about Bill.  I know that he lives in a senior citizen residence by himself.  My guess is that he is in his 80’s.  I don’t know if he has family.  When I have eaten with him we have talked of the Pirates and Steelers.  He’s a quiet, soft spoken person, and he eats with us almost every week.  So, I don’t know what brought his tears.  Was it that he had thought no one would remember his birthday?  Was it that no one had sung  “Happy  Birthday” to him in years?  Was it that he had gotten used to being seen as invisible by the world, and he was moved by our notice of him and singing a spotlight of importance upon him?

     This Thanksgiving I am thankful that I was able to be part of a group who brought tears of joy to Bill…tears of joy that I find welling up in my eyes when I feel so small and insignificant, lost and confused, forgotten and lonely and someone reaches their hand out to me with a piece of bread saying, “This is the body of Christ given for you,” and then follows with a chalice saying, “This is the blood of Christ shed for you.”

     Remembered.  Noticed.  Loved………Grace!

Have a great week. 

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord  11-18-13

Hello,

As I have written before, my commute to my church is a 23 mile ride along a squiggly road over the ridge where there is not even one inch where passing is allowed.  It takes me about a half hour to travel, and generally behind the wheel of my Mini Cooper the ride is fun and the scenery is beautiful.

Once in a while I find myself caught  behind someone who is in no hurry and is captivated by the scenery extending the time of my journey 10 minutes or so.  This past week, though, it was not a tree gazer that slowed my pace and it wasn’t just 10 minutes that was added to my commute.

As I started my way over the ridge, I soon came up upon an appliance service truck that was travelling at a speed that made me think he was looking for an address.  “Be patient,” I told myself.  Then around one of the bends, we came upon warning signs telling us of a work area where a flagger was managing the traffic for the one lane road that was created.  Sure enough, the signs told the truth, and I found myself sitting behind my appliance truck friend at a site where the electric company was trimming trees away from its lines.  “Be patient,” I told myself as I waited permission from the flagger to pass.  Still creeping behind the service truck around a couple of bends, again we were greeted by a work zone sign, and again I found myself awaiting permission to pass tree trimmers.  “Be patient,” I told myself.  When the flagger flipped the sign from “stop” to “slow” we moved past the trimmers, but this time it seems that my appliance friend deemed to take the flagger’s word literally for now he was setting our pace at 15-20 miles an hours (in a 45 mile an hour zone).  “Be patient,”  I told myself as I assumed he was nearing his stop.  Riding my brakes down the slope, I painfully felt my brake pads eroding away, and when my appliance buddy took the fork in the road at the bottom of the hill, erasing my assumption that he was looking for an address, I felt the steam begin to accumulate in my ears.  “Be patient, “ I told myself.  Having lost my lumbering escort, I took a deep breath to calm  down, and set off to finish the last third of my commute.  But wouldn’t you know it, after a couple of more bends….there it was again…a orange work zone sign…..more tree trimmers!  “Be patient,”  I told myself.  Given my luck thus far, I guess that I should not have been surprised that within a mile of my third tree trimmers, I found myself behind a school bus making numerous stops gathering in the children who made their way onto the bus with the speed of a tree sloth.  “Be patient,” I told myself.  And then….as if someone was tracking me….every time I came upon a stop light, it turned red….5  of them.  “Be patient,” I told myself.  And when I finally arrived at work, I found the access to the parking lot blocked by a parent dropping their child off at our preschool (it’s where the parents are supposed to drop their kids off….).  “Be patient,”  I told myself.

By the time that I parked my car, my half hour commute had doubled in time.  As I walked into my office, a strange tune popped into my mind…a song from my youth.  “Slow down, you move too fast.  You gotta make the morning last.  Just kickin’ down the cobblestone.  Lookin’ for love and …..  feelin’ Groovy.”  Although Simon and Garfunkel sang it…..maybe it was a word from God that I needed to hear.

“Lord, soothe my soul with patience….grant me “grooviness.”

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord   11-11-13

Hello,

Paul Bunyan, Big Joe Mufferaw, and now……me.

Some years from now when the annuls of western Pennsylvania are written there will be stories of the mighty lumberjacks that cleared the way for civilization….Paul Bunyan, Big Joe Mufferaw……and me.

When we built our house a couple of years ago, we situated it at the western edge of  the tree stand on the top of our hill.  During the summer the Maples trees, the Cherry trees, the Locus trees, and the Sasyphras (sp?) trees shelter our house from the heat of the sun and the gust of the wind.  In the fall they wrap it with a patchwork quilt of autumn colors.  In the winter they act as a break for the horizontally falling snow, and in the spring they bud up with life anew announced by the chirping of the birds who rebuild their nests in them.

The trees that surround our house are wonderful in many ways, but when one of them is hollowed out by ants and begins to slump toward our garage…..well, then it isn’t so wonderful.  Such was the case with a large maple tree that stood near our garage.  Over the years, the ants had dined on its core, turning the bottom several feet of it into a gigantic straw.  “This tree’s gotta come down,” said our friend Ralph who knows a thing or two about trees, “or it’s gonna come down….on your roof.”  So, promising to bring the cables over soon, he left the tree above our garage in hopes that we would not wake up some morning with a nature made sky light in our  garage.

Wouldn’t you know, a couple of days later the gusty winds of autumn hit our hill, pushing the air through the trees at 60 miles per hour.  Thankfully the tree stood stubborn against the wind….but not wanting to count too heavily on its hollowed out core, Ralph and his brother came up to our house on Saturday, ready to take the tree down.  The plan was to attach cables to it in order to have it land away from our garage and in a narrow opening between some other trees.  Ralph attached the first set of cables to the tree that we stretched to another tree in the direction that we hoped it would fall, and I (lumberjack that I am) climbed the ladder to attach the second cable to the tree to keep it from plopping down on my garage.  When everything was attached and taught, Ralph took his chain saw in hand and cut a notch in the base of the tree.  His brother and I began clicking the hand winches, causing the tree to lean and crackle.

“Click…click….click.” and the tree slowly began to lean away from vertical and away from my garage.  “Keep on clicking,” Ralph instructed, “I’m going to ‘tickle’ the tree.”  A bunch of clicks and tickles later, and although the tree was leaning, it wasn’t falling, being held up by branches from neighboring trees.  Putting his chainsaw down and walking toward his brother, Ralph leapt up like a gymnast reaching for the high bar and took hold of the cable, “Sometimes if you grab hold of the cable, the tree will come down.”  His brother of 60 years plus, joined him, and as they swang on the cable like monkeys on a vine,  and with a final crack the tree came crashing down.  As it did, Ralph and his brother immediately morphed into gazelles and ran for their lives, landing the tree within inches of where they had hoped.

     Mission accomplished.  Go ahead, wind, and blow.  That tree has lost its power to chill me with fear as it did when it loomed over my garage.  Thanks to three apt lumberjacks…Ralph, his brother….and me (!) I can lay my head down with ease at night, and wake up without looming fear.

     Got any looming trees hovering over you?  Every Sunday when we begin worship a trinity of divine lumberjacks stands ready to bring them down….not with chainsaws….but with forgiveness.  “In the mercy of Almighty God, Jesus Christ has been given to die for you, and for his sake, God forgives you all of your sins (looming trees).  As a called and ordained minister of the Church of Christ, and by his authority, I therefore declare to you the entire forgiveness of all of your sins, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  AMEN”

     Thanks to these triune lumberjacks who wield the power of forgiveness….The Father, The Son and The Holy Spirit….you can lay your head down with ease at night, and wake up without looming fear.  Come on Sunday and marvel at the grace with which the divine triune lumberjack can bring peace, hope and joy to your life.

Have a great week….TIMBER!

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 11-4-13

Hello,

     Oskeewowow!

     For those of you who do not follow college athletics, this odd word is the battle cry for the Fighting Illini of the University of Illinois.  I spent the first two years of my college career at the University of Illinois, and although I transferred out as a junior for career reasons, my heart stayed at the University of Illinois and with the friends that I had while I was there.  Even to this day….more years later than it seems….my U of I friends are still amongst my best friends even though I don’t see them very often.

     This weekend, thanks to the generosity of my brother-in-law who got some tickets, two of my Illinois friends came to my house to go to the Penn State/U of I game with Kate and me. We rendez-voused  at my house, here in enemy territory, on Friday night, laughed and joked with each other as if no time had passed since we had last been together, played ping-pong in my Illini Man Cave, and prepared ourselves to represent our team at the game.

     We woke up with the sun on Saturday, pumped!  Expecting a clog of traffic on our way to State College, Pa., we donned our orange and blue and left at 8:00 for the noon game.  The sun shone bright on the dimmed, but still beautiful colored ridges on our drive.  The drive didn’t seem like the 2 hours that Google had predicted for us as the four of us chatted all the way there like a bunch of squirrels gathering nuts.  Although the crowds of blue did not part like the Red Sea for us as we made our way onto the parking grounds, the trek to our parking space was not as arduous as we had planned.  Surprisingly enough, when we emerged from our car, the natives wearing blue and white greeted us with warmth and welcome.  And when we took our seats in the stands and the tide of blue began to rise all around us, we remained unscathed among the enemy.  There weren’t many wearing orange and blue at the game, but we did our best to cheer for our team when it made first downs, tackles and even a couple of touchdowns.  It was amazing the quiet that fell upon that stadium of 100,000+ when the Illini did something good, and somehow we hoped that our three voices filled the stillness of those moments.  We sang “Oskeewowow Illinois” when we scored, we groaned when our team fell apart (which it did far too often), we “questioned” the ref’s calls….we had a great time….a time just like we had years ago when we sat side by side in “Block I” in Memorial Stadium at the University of Illinois.

     Friends are a wonderful gift from God, often a gift from God that seems not to be effected by the passing of time, the paths life takes us on, or the bumps and bruises that we all gather along our separate ways.  I thank God for the blessing of friends.

     To spend time with dear friends magnifies, to me, the wonder of the blessing of the friendship that God has made with me in Jesus.  It magnifies the joy of joining our voices with Jesus, our friend,  in singing “Alleluia”.  It magnifies the hope in my heart when in my prayers I bring my successes and failures to Jesus’ ears, and sense the cheers and groans that we share.  It magnifies the despair that we, my friend Jesus and I, share at the injustice that goes uncalled, and the determination to make sure that it does not go un-noticed.   “What a friend we have in Jesus…..”, may not have the rousing tune of a college fight song, but it sure rings true to the depth and wonder of the friendship with Jesus that knows no passing of time, that remains no matter what path life takes, and doesn’t disappear when we become scarred by the battles that our sins stir up.

     Spending this past weekend with dear and long-time friends was wonderful!  And it opened my eyes again to the wonder and blessing of spending every moment of this life….and every moment of eternity….with one whose friendship is the greatest of all.

     By the way…..we lost the game….in overtime.  Ugh!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord  10-28-13

Hello,

     Saturday night as I was getting ready for bed, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror, and I noticed a small black dot resting on the side of my Adam’s apple.  I tried to flick it off, but it didn’t budge.  I gave it a couple of good scratches, and still it did not move.  I leaned closer to the mirror, and under closer examination, it looked as though it might be a lone black hair in my otherwise gray stubble beard.  But it didn’t feel like a hair.  Too crunchy.  Little hair like follicles seemed to be emanating from it….and that is when I realized that it was a tick.  It had buried its head into my skin, and what I was seeing was it’s body and legs protruding out.  Apparently it had not been there long, as it was still quite small, and it didn’t take much of a yank to pull it out.  I think I got it just moments before when I put my head on my dog, Duncan, using him as a pillow.

     They say that the ticks are going to be bad this fall, so I wasn’t surprised to find one embedding itself on my neck.  Ticks, as you know, live by sucking the blood from their unsuspecting host, ala Dracula of legendary vampire fame.  This particular tick that hoped to feast on my blood seemed to have been emulating the legendary Count by virtue of its choice of blood-drawing location.  Maybe the tick was engaging in an early Halloween stunt.

     As I said, once I realized what I was dealing with, it didn’t take much effort to free myself from this blood drawing tick, and in plenty of time before it could do me much damage.  Unfortunately, this tiny tick is not the only pest that seeks to live by sucking my blood, and thereby my life, from me.  Far more hungry and damaging are the things that I have done that have brought pain to me and others, the pressures of work and life that clamp down on me daily, the failings and failures that won’t let go of me.  Unlike that little tick seeking my blood, these things that seek my life-blood can dig themselves so deeply into me that they attach themselves to my heart with vice-like fangs, drawing the life right out of me.

     But Sunday morning an amazing thing happened.  I walked into church, as I do every Sunday morning, and someone saw the trouble I was facing.  Someone saw the blood sucking, life sucking parasites that had leeched onto my life.  Someone saw the waning strength, the darkening hope, and my labored steps.  And that someone said to me, “Take and drink.  This is my blood shed for you.”, and as I found myself kneeling at the altar, drinking in a sip of wine carrying the promised presence of Christ’s blood, something new took a hold of me and my heart: a transfusion of God grace and mercy.  In a world that had sought to bring me to my knees by sucking the life-blood right out of me, I found myself being lifted from my knees by one who gave his life for me.  Carrying a poison of divine forgiveness, this transfusion of Christ’s blood brought a deathblow to all those parasites that had come to the altar clinging to my heart, and a shot in the arm of courage and strength.

     Forecasters seem to be right.  This is going to be a severe tick season….little black ones and big invisible ones.  But thank God, there is one whose eyes sees those ticks, and when he, Jesus, sees them they don’t stand a chance, and we stand with more than a chance….we stand with the power and life of his blood.

     Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord 10-23-13

Hello,

     There are many beautiful places in this world, but among the most beautiful are the hills of Western Pennsylvania in the fall.  It is here where the green hills of summer are slowly and softly donned with a quilt patched with every shade of red, orange, gold, and brown.  Stitched to the roads, when one drives along these patches the leaves flutter to the ground like goose down from a pillow.  The sun sinks lower in the south softening the pinks and the oranges of the sunset.  The coats of the deer darken to match the drying golden rod and grasses, and the geese clear the clouds out of their way with their honking.  It is beautiful.

     But the gusting wind that snaps at your skin with a biting chill is a stark reminder that these days are soon to be taken from us.  The leaves will all be gone from the trees, and the forests will look like lifeless sticks.  The sky will darken earlier, and the sun will hide in the southern skies and the cold will rush in.  Snow will soon blanket the hills, covering what was warm earthy colors with monochromatic white.  Even the animals will virtually disappear as they take cover from the harsh conditions ahead.  There is a beauty to the hills of Western Pennsylvania in the winter, but it is not a warm and welcoming beauty.  It is a chilling and stark beauty.

     It is at this cusp of seasonal change that I am reminded of an important tenant of life and faith, and that is: enjoy the beauty while it is here.  So often I find myself anticipating the future, which in some cases surely will come with the coldness of winter, and in so doing, I rob myself of the joy of the beauty that is all around me…the beauty of the people in my life with which God has blessed me….the beauty of the peace that comes with a quiet and warm star-filled night….the beauty of my health that still propels me up steep hills as I walk my dog…the beauty of the place I work that gives me a chance to impact people’s lives with God’s love (remember, that is the Christian view of every occupation)…there is beauty all around me!

     Beauty, it seems to me, is a gift from God to be taken in and slowly savored.  It is at these times of great beauty that I get a glimpse of the wonder and grace of God, wonder and grace that the cold world tries to hide from my eyes.  And if I have savored the beauty of the wonder and grace of God, I find that the taste of that beauty lingers….lingers into the cold and harsh seasons of life…carrying the reminder of the wonder of grace that is still with me though the winds blow harsh.  It is this lingering taste of beauty that transforms the ugliness of a man, Jesus, hanging on a Calvary cross, turning that ice cold day into a day that we have named “Good Friday”.  And with lingering beauty that sticks to our bones, the clammy, musty, flesh-rotting stench of every grave is overpowered by the marching of Jesus feet on a day that we have named Easter.

     Surrounded by nearly unparelelled beauty, I am reminded to soak it in while it is here…..and reminded that when the cold weather hits, there is one who will be there …still warming me with the wonder and awe of his love and mercy….and that, too, is beautiful.

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord 10-14-13

Hello,

     The first egg has arrived. Brown. Smaller than a grocer’s egg.  Kate found it in one of the laying boxes about a week ago, and since its discovery there hasn’t been another egg yet.  The egg sits in our refrigerator, and when people come to visit, it isn’t too long after their arrival that Kate asks, “Do you want to see the egg?”  No one has of yet said, “No.”

     With the arrival of our first egg, there is an innate promise of more eggs.  An egg a day per hen, so we are told.  Also, those who know about these things tell us that the size of the eggs should increase.  Four eggs a day.  Four hens.  28 eggs a week!  A virtual avalanche of eggs soon to come our way.  What will we do with all these eggs?  We will probably find more and more ways to place eggs in our diet, as will our friends.  Egg salad sandwiches….deviled eggs….eggs on salad….hard boiled eggs for lunch…egg nog to drink (there are eggs in egg nog, aren’t there?)…  Who knows what feast of eggs lies in front of us.  A promise of things to come, all held in one small egg that sits in our refrigerator.

     The Christian message finds its heart in a different arrival.  The messiah has arrived.  Brown skinned.  A simple man, smaller than the mighty rulers of the world.  Discovered in a manger by mere shepherds, along the sea shore by hard working fishermen, in towns and villages by hated tax collectors, and in an Easter garden by lowly women.  Those who know of things messianic tell us that the increase of his dominion is without end….leading to the day that “ at the name of Jesus
 every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 
¹¹ and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, 
to the glory of God the Father.”  A virtual avalanche of grace and mercy to come our way.  And what will we do with all this grace and mercy?  We will probably find more and more ways to place it in our lives and in the lives of others…grace and mercy to spur on hope when we have failed….grace and mercy to transform guilt when we have sinned….grace and mercy to bind enemies as friends…grace and mercy to feed the hungry, cloth the naked, and visit the outcast…grace and mercy to bring death to life, wipe away the tears from every eye, and have us dwell in the house of the LORD forever… Who knows what feast of grace and mercy lies in front of us.  A promise of things to come, all held in one small man named Jesus who lay in a manger, hung on a cross, rose from a tomb and is seated at the right hand of the Father.

    So, as I make my way the church doors on Sunday morning, let me ask, “Do you want to see the messiah?”  I hope you will say “yes” and follow me in!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace,

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 10-7-13

Hello,

     For the last week there has been a four story yellow rubber ducky floating in the river alongside the Pittsburgh skyline.  It is not an oversized practical joke.  It is “art”.  I was listening to the public radio station out of Pittsburgh the day the ducky was to paddle in Pittsburgh’s river, and they were interviewing the “artist”.  He is from a Scandinavian country, and his duckies have been landing alongside skylines throughout the world.  Pittsburgh has the distinction of being the first plopping place in the United States for this piece of artwork.  The artist in telling the artistic meaning of this towering ducky said that he believes that the rubber ducky is an international symbol of the joy of life.  “Remember the bath times you had as a child,” he said, “and how much fun it was to share your tub time with a rubber duck.”  All around the world, he said, the same thing happens.  Children sit in their bathtubs, playing with their rubber ducky, and the burdens of life get lost in the bubbles and splashes.

     I can resonate with this “artist”, because as I sit in my hot tub, I am always joined by two rubber duckies that my son gave to me as a hot tub present.  As I sit in my hot tub I watch them spin around, dancing atop the whirling water.   They “swim” wherever the jets propel them, and they don’t care where their dance takes place.  To watch them is enlightening.  It is a visual reminder of the wonderful gift of life, a gift that can be overshadowed by responsibilities, job and bosses, life’s daily struggle, and tragedy.  So, between gazing at the stars or the sunset, I splash my rubber duckies trying to steer them.  I take them under the water and wonder where they will surface.  I turn them right side up when they are swimming up side down.  And when I do these things a childhood delight sinks into my soul, and in some small way I become aware of the wonder and blessing of life…the wonder and blessing that daily comes my way that often I am not able to see…..the wonder and blessing of every breath of which not even one do I deserve… “Rubber ducky, you’re the one.  You make tubby time so much fun…”

     But there are times, real times, when a rubber ducky floating in your life falls short of addressing the pain and suffering in one’s heart, and the burden that one carries on their shoulders.  Throwing a rubber duck into your tub at those times of life works as well as saying, “Oh, it will all be okay.” or “Don’t worry.  Be happy.”  A rubber ducky might be able to cut through the gloom of daily life, but when life crumbles the power of a rubber ducky evaporates and it becomes what it really is…a bunch of rubber.

     It is at times like this that my eyes catch another symbol that often is set four or more stories high – a cross – not just any cross, of course, but the cross of Christ.  The sight of the cross takes me back to a Golgotha hill on which Jesus suffered and died, taking with him to death every thing that tries to push us through the shredder of life: our failures, our blunders, our shortcomings, our evil deeds, and  the judgment of others.  It fills my ears with a yell that spans all time and space, “It is finished.”  It sends me back to a baptismal font when Jesus staked his claim on me when I was “sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked with the cross of Christ forever.”  It clears out the junk of my life and I see the banner that Jesus has strung across my life, “I have called you by name.  You are mine.”

     A rubber ducky may be a universal symbol of joy.  The cross is a universal symbol of hope….hope that springs eternal from a Golgotha hill and an Easter garden tomb… “Lift high the cross.  The love of Christ proclaim!”

     Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace,

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 9-30-13

Hello,

I was just finishing locking up after worship yesterday when I heard my name being called from the landing near the doors to our educational building.  I followed the call of the voice down the stairs to find one of my parishioners standing next to a young man who had indicated to her that he needed to talk to the pastor.  The thin young man wore cut off camouflage pants, a hoodie that was printed with countless number of skulls.  His hair was dyed yellowish/blond, his fingernails were painted black, tattoos covered his arms, and he had a piercing halfway between his lip and his jaw.  He had the smell and look of showerlessness, and over his shoulder was a black backpack.

The reason he was in need of talking to me was that he had come to Greensburg to present some papers to the court in order to gain custody of a 1-year-old daughter that had been placed in the foster care system.  His buddy brought him to Greensburg, but then abandoned him, and stranding him.

These sorts of encounters are pretty commonplace for me and other pastors, and over the years I have developed some personal rules for dealing with them.  One of those rules is that we are not in a position to help people with transportation.  With limited funds we have to focus our efforts on life and death issues, like hunger.

“I am sorry,” I told the young man, “but I cannot help you with transportation.  We just don’t have the funds for that.”

“Oh, I don’t need money,” he said, “I have 20 dollars to give someone for gas to take me back home.”

“Where’s home?”  I asked.

Ready to hear “Pittsburgh”, I was surprised to hear a town of which I had never heard before.  “Where’s that?”  I asked.  Turned out it was the opposite direction from Pittsburgh, about 20 minutes east of my house.  So, I thought for a bit, and seeing it was a nice day for a ride into the mountains, I did what my rules tell me I should not do:  I told him I would give him a lift.  I never give people rides anywhere for safety concerns, but as I appraised this situation, and knowing that my wife would be travelling with us, and it was in the middle of the day…well, I decided that it might be worth the risk to help this young man out.

So, Kate jumped in the back seat of my Mini-Cooper, and he took his seat in front.  I had him sit in front for two reasons: I wanted to keep my eye on him, and I wanted to talk with him on our eastward ride.

Having dealt with thousands of folks coming off the street seeking help, I have become very skeptical of every story that I hear, this young man’s included.  But, I thought that if his story was true, I wanted to support him in his efforts….and if it wasn’t true, I hoped that he would discover that there was someone who actually cared about his station in life.  As we drove I kept the conversation going…where did he grow up?  What did he like to do?  What music did he listen to?  What was the progress in getting his daughter back?

I thought it was a good conversation.  He told me about the death of his sister, his struggle with heroin, his love of “death metal” music, his enjoyment of tattoos, his hopes for getting a job laying granite countertops, his search for a spiritual higher power (he had been raised a Catholic and it was obvious that Christianity was not the direction of his search)….on and on…45 minutes of conversation.  As we talked I knew in the back of my mind that none of what he was saying might have been true, but just in case it was I tried to engage him with caring concern.

I dropped him off at a gas station, where he said he could get a friend to pick him up.  As he got out of my car, I shook his hand and said, “God bless you.  I hope things work out for you.”  He walked away from my car, and I set my car back on the road, westward, back toward my house that I had passed 20 miles ago.  As we headed home, I said to Kate, “Well, I don’t know how much of what he said was true, but I hope that he found out that someone cared.”

Later in the afternoon, as I was relaxing in my hot tub, I thought about this young man, wondering if he taken me for a ride.  Was he laughing with his buddies about the gullible pastor who bought his story hook, line and sinker?  It all left me second-guessing my decision to give this young man a lift.

But as I considered it all, it seemed to me that such is the risk of being a Christian…the risk of being had.  I had judged rightly that he had not been a physical risk, a risk that I do not believe is worth my taking.  But I don’t know…I had risked being played for the fool…and it may have just been the case that I was.  But for the sake of showing this young man the love of Christ that was concerned about him and the life that he was living…I guess that the risk of being played the fool is just part of being captivated by Jesus’ unconditional love for me.

He may be laughing about my perceived naïveté, but maybe….just maybe….he discovered a care for him in Christ that he had never known before.  I will probably never know, but my words to him still remain true, “God bless you.  I hope things work out for you.”

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 9-22-13

Hello,

I am a graffiti artist.  I guess that I have been one for a long time, but I didn’t realize it until this morning.

On the way home from worship I passed under an overpass that I have passed under hundreds of times, never noticing what I noticed this morning.  On each of the overpass’ wide pillars were large white squares painted on them, covering up the graffiti that someone applied there.  I don’t know why I haven’t noticed them before, but maybe the thing that drew my attention to these graffiti covering boxes was the fact that I just finished a bit of my own graffiti artistry.

No less than an hour before I placed the mark of a cross on the forehead of a little girl just after she was baptized.  I admit it.  I am a graffiti artist.  My canvass is not overpass posts, building wall,  or privacy fences…..mine is the forehead.  Mostly the forehead of little children held in their parents’ arms, but every once in a while on older children and adults.  Having been splashed in simple water from the tap, and having the stake of God’s claim on them spoken amid the splash, I take my thumb and inscribe with the oil of my skin a cross….”you have been sealed with the Holy Spirit and marked with the cross of Christ forever.”

The problem is that graffiti artist are considered to be vandals and pests.  Having spent some time in an inner-city neighborhood, I learned that the best way to discourage graffiti artists is to paint over their artwork as soon as they spray it on, which is what the city of Greensburg had done on those overpass posts.  It is based upon the theory of least resistance…..with plenty of places to display their craft, graffiti artists give up on the places that resist their work.

But not this graffiti artist.  I know that the moment that little child that bears the cross that I drew on her forehead left our church the world was fast at work to cover it up…covering it up what the world claims is important…hoping that she won’t see the claim that Jesus has made upon her…to love her, to forgive her, to walk with her, to break down the gates of death for her.

Call me a fool, a fool for Christ, but I won’t be deterred.  Every time that I will see that little girl…every time I see everyone who has been washed in the waters of Baptism, sealed with the Holy Spirit, and “marked with the cross of Christ forever” … I re-etch that cross over the world’s cover up.  I re-etch it by greeting each one with the love of Christ.  I re-etch it by marking young children with that very same cross on their foreheads when they come to the Lord’s table.  I re-etch when older children and adults come to the Lord’s Table and the cross of Jesus bleeds through.  I re-etch it when I raise my hand over a casket and ensign a cross.  I re-etch it when I hit the send button and the Bungee Cord makes its mark on you.  I won’t let the world cover up my graffiti.

The world might think that I am a pastor, but that is just my cover.  I’m really a graffiti artist with a Christ driven determination to never let the world cover the cross of Christ up.

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace,

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Graffiti Artist in Residence, First Lutheran Church