Bungee Cord 1-28-13

Hello,

     Several years ago I was on a retreat with a bunch of 7^th,8^th, and 9^th graders.  We were in the dining hall, and I found myself seated at table with seven seventh grade boys.  Some would consider this a very dangerous place to be.  It was lunch, and although I don’t remember exactly what was served, I am sure that it had to be something akin to sloppy joes, chips, and sliced peaches….isn’t that what is always served for lunch at camp.

     As we awaited the hall to fill up and lunch to begin, I was pleasantly surprised by the lack of poking and jabbing amongst my table mates.  When all had arrived and grace had been sung and said, the “runner” (a dangerous name for kids carrying food) was selected by some random factor…the one with the longest hair?  Once selected, the runner walked to the serving station and procured our food and set it on our table, and that is where the pleasantries came to an end.  Like coyotes circled around a dead animal, my tablemates began lunging at the food, grabbing for sloppy joes and potato chips, fearful, it seemed that this food might take off and run away if not for their pouncing on it.  Once the flurry had subsided and most of the sloppy joes and potato chips were on plates and not on the floor, I said to my lunchmates, “Is this how you eat at home?”

     To my surprise every one of them, all seven seventh grade boys, said the same thing, “No.  We never sit down at a table and eat together at home.”

     “Really?” I replied back, startled.  At that time I still had my three boys at home, and we regularly, but not always, tried to eat at least one meal a day together as a family.  Probing further, I discovered that the universal practice of these seven seventh graders was to almost always eat by themselves….grab something out of the frig….heat it up….take a seat in front of the TV….and eat.  And even when they did eat with others in the family, it was usually sitting on the couch or easy chairs, focused on the TV.

     Although this may not be true for you, I have since discovered that this is pretty standard fare for meal time in our culture.  Tables are not used.  Families don’t gather, and the TV provides conversation.

     When I consider why many Christians do not find themselves drawn to Sunday morning worship, it seems to me that my seven seventh graders provided me an insight.  In a culture where mealtime is often solitary, often paired with individual entertainment, and the sole objective is simply to fill one’s stomach….it is no wonder that Sunday morning worship where we gather together at a pre-set time, where we share fellowship and a table with others, and where certain “manners” are observed seems an odd and almost repulsive idea to many.

     Gathering together for worship may be a relic from an age when people gathered together to eat, but maybe this is a relic worth holding on to.  For when people gather together for worship they develop friendships that are grounded in God’s self-giving love.  When people kneel side by side at the table, they experience the impartial, unconditional love that Christ gives to each of them.  When people join their prayers for loved ones and strangers they link their thoughts and hearts.  When people join their voices to those around them in song, they hear the sounds of harmony that is possible in spite of their difference.  When people sit side by side in worship together, they get to know each other better, and thereby are able to care better for each other in times of need.   When people converse and praise together, single notes are woven into rich and interesting chords of sound.

     It may be easier to eat alone in our fast paced world, and it may be easier to practice one’s Christian faith alone in this same harried world, but consider the monochromatic life and faith that such isolation creates and on the other hand the dynamism of being together brings to both life and faith.

     At First Lutheran of Greensburg where I worship and dine, the church bells ring at 8:00 a.m. and 10:30 a.m..  Those bells echo from a day that is passed, a day when dinner bells called children in from play to gather around a table and have their lives broadened as they joined for a purpose greater than just filling their stomachs with food.  If you hear our bells or not, know that the invite is sent  ringing out to you, no matter where you are.  There is a church whose doors are open to you telling you that it is supper time….time to gather around the table of the Lord with a far greater purpose than just filling our stomachs with food.

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace,

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 1-21-13

Hello,

     “If I could have a beer with Jesus….”

     I was driving back from Pittsburgh in the loaner car that was given to me while  my car was having major repairs done when I heard this song come from the radio that was playing on one of the preset stations.  “If I could have a beer with Jesus….”

     I am not a regular country western, or even a frequent country western listener.   But as it so happened, some previous driver of this loaner car must have been and decided that I should be, thus gracing my ears with a tune that I had never heard before.  I snickered as I heard it.  The image of a sandal shod, robe clad, ancient Israeli sitting down at a honky tonk bar tickled me. 

     Although the image may have been a bit too dog-dying, jilted-lover country western for me, it did get me to thinking.  Wouldn’t we all want to “have a beer with Jesus”, and ask him some of the deepest things on our minds?  Maybe ask some of the same things that Thomas Rhett Akins, the singer of this song, was wanting to ask: “How’d you turn the other cheek to save a sorry soul like me?  Do you hear the prayers I send?  What happens when life ends?  Is mommy and daddy alright?”  Or maybe we would ask, “Where are you when unthinkable tragedies strike?  Are you real?  Will I make it through the darkness of my life?”

     Well, we in the Lutheran Christian tradition believe that something of the likes of what Thomas Rhett Akins sings actually happens….happens over and over again.   We believe that Jesus does invite us to have a drink with (and actually of) him every Sunday morning.  He joins us as we lean on a communion rail, invited to come with all of our questions, our failures, and fears and he gives an answer, his answer: “Take and eat.  This is my body.  Take and drink.  This is my blood.” 

     To some it may seem an odd answer, and maybe even an answer that dodges the questions that we bring, but when you consider it, what clearer and more satisfying answer could Jesus give us: an answer that embodies his deep love for us, a love that does not fall upon us from afar, but unites itself with us from within.  After all answers are only as trustworthy and secure as the trustworthiness and security of the one giving the answers.  Will any question, doubt or fear cause Jesus to turn his back on us…..take and eat, take and drink…..the answer: no.  Will any question, doubt, or fear separate us from God….take and eat, take and drink…the answer: no.

     Let me…no hear Jesus invite you to his table to sit down and have a drink with him.  And when you come, go ahead and ask him any question that you might bring, and experience the direct answer that Jesus will give to you.

     Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 1-14-13

Hello,

     Tuesday night the red and blue lights of a police car lit up the street in front of our church.  A criminal had been nabbed.  The criminal: me.  I was coming to church for a meeting, when just a couple of blocks away from the church someone cut me off having pulled out in front of me from a parking lot.  Not only did the person almost hit me, whoever was driving the car didn’t seem to know where the gas pedal was once they were in front of me.  Driving half the speed limit, the car plodded ahead of me…..aggravating me. 

     Not that it would have helped, I tried peering through the back window of the snail paced car to see just who could have been such an inept driver.  Since it was dark, I had a hard time seeing through the window, but as we approached in intersection the streetlight illuminated the interior just enough to catch a glimpse of the rear of the driver’s head.  I focused my eyes on the shadowy head, hoping to make some sort of identification, but even with the streetlight, I couldn’t make out much.   So half way through the intersection, my anger stewing, I turned my eyes back to the street, just in time to see that the traffic light above me was scarlet red.  I took a quick look to my left and right in order to see if there was any cars coming my way, and I caught in my glance a car just about to enter the intersection on my right….a car with an apparatus on its roof…a bar of lights.

     I didn’t even have time to hope that the light bar would stay darkened, when the red and blue lights lit up and began to spin, and the car…the police car…jumped on my tail.  I turned off the main road and stopped my car, stopping it right next to the church.  The police car pulled up right behind me, its flashing lights announcing a crook had been nabbed.

     I sat in my car, mad at myself for “breaking the law” and embarrassed by the attention that I was sure I was attracting.  The police officer stepped out of her car and made her way to the driver’s window of my car.  She didn’t have to tell me why she had stopped me.  I knew, and I pleaded guilty of my crime even before she spoke.  Politely, she took my license and went back to her car.  Hoping for undeserved grace, in a few moments she returned to my car, handed back to me my license, and saying, “You’ll get your ticket in the mail.”

     I started up my car, turned into the alley just ahead of me, parked my car and entered the church…entered the church as one who had broken the law.  Not something of which to be proud, but clearly true.  Fortunately, my crime did not hurt anyone, but none the less, I had committed a crime, throwing me into the pool of all criminals….and so the thought occurred to me, being the law breaker that I was, maybe I should not have entered the church.

      But therein lies the rub….the misinformation that has somehow made itself into the world.  Somehow the word has been circulated that only “good” people should go to church.  People who do not squabble.  People who do not gossip.  People who do not lie.  People who are not prejudiced.  People who do not find themselves in the sheriff’s log in the newspaper.  But that is not true.  The church was never supposed to be a place for perfect people, rather Jesus created the church to be a place for imperfect people.  A place where God’s forgiveness frees people from the prison of their sins, and where God’s love is at work transforming them into new people. 

     I got my fine in the mail today. $112.00.  I will pay my fine, as I should, and eagerly I will go to church this week…where I belong….not because I am perfect, but because I am the very kind of person Jesus wants in the church….a sinner who stands in need of his transformational forgiveness. 

     So, let me on Jesus’ behalf, invite you to church this week.  There is nothing you could have done, felt, or said that should keep you away….because the church isn’t made for perfect people.  It was made for sinners, breakers of the law, like you and me.

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 1-7-13

Hello,

     Sunday was the celebration of the Day of Epiphany in our church and in churches around the world.  The day of Epiphany, 12 days after Christmas, marks the traditional day of the arrival of the Wisemen in Bethlehem.  I am not sure why centuries ago Christians decided to count twelve days as the passage of time for the Wisemen’s visit, but so it has been for years and years and years.  It is where the song, “The Twelve Days of Christmas” (…on the first day of Christmas my  true love gave to me) has its roots.

     Over the centuries there has been a fascination with these Wisemen.  In truth, the Bible really does not say much about them.  They only appear in Matthew’s telling of the Christmas story, and Matthew calls them “Magi”.  This name seems to indicate that they were connected in some way with non-Jewish spiritual life.  Most likely they were like medicine men in African tribes who through their “ability” to read the skies they could give guidance to people’s lives. 

     Other than that, we really don’t know much about them.  Where exactly did they come from?  Somewhere from the east, but exactly where, we don’t know.  How many of them were there?  Other than the Bible telling us that there was more than one of them, we don’t know.  How they travelled to Bethlehem?  We don’t know.  How they were able to discern the star’s direction?  We don’t know.  They brought gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, but how much of each and what Mary and Joseph did with those gifts, we don’t know.

     A lot of tradition has been built up around these Wisemen, most of it having no Biblical foundation.  In truth, the only thing that we know about them is that they were drawn by God to Jesus’ side, and they were welcome at Jesus side.  Although the focus of Epiphany is meant to be on the revelation of Jesus to be not just the king of the Jews, but much greater: the Lord of the nations…..I find great hope in taking a good look at these Wisemen and seeing what the Bible actually tells us about them:  they were drawn by God to Jesus’ side and they were welcome there (repeated…for emphasis).

     Just like all the tradition that we have slapped on the Wisemen, a lot of stuff has been slapped on people about who they should be before they come to Jesus side.  Are you welcome if you find some or a lot of the Christian faith hard to believe?….so it was with the Wisemen, and they were welcome…SO ARE YOU!  Are you welcome if your lifestyle doesn’t match the lifestyle that you have been told is expected of Christians?....the Magi’s lifestyle was far from what was expected of the Jews and they were welcome….SO ARE YOU!  Are you welcome if your customs and dress are unusual?.... so it was with the Wisemen compared to the rest of the people in Bethlehem, and they were welcome….SO ARE YOU!  Are you welcome if you have many things tugging on you and focusing your life on other interests?....so it was with the wisemen, but God didn’t count them out.  God drew them to Jesus side and they were welcome…..SO ARE YOU!

     So, the truth is that you and I don’t really know much about the Wisemen….the truth is that you and I don’t really know much about each other….but this we know about the wisemen….and this we know about you and me…..God is at work drawing all people into the love and mercy of Jesus, and all whom God has drawn in is welcome!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace,

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger