Bungee Cord 6-27-16

Hello,

     A fact that many may not know about me: I was a skate-boarder.

     In elementary school I owned a skateboard, as did many of my friends.  My skating was in the nascent years of skateboarding.  My skateboard did not resemble at all the long, wide skateboards of today.   Mine looked more like a flattened loaf of Italian bread with wheels underneath.  It was just big enough to get both feet on it, and it was not designed for all the trick-doing that modern skateboarders do.  It worked well to roll along sidewalks, but the main thing that we did with our skateboard was to find a paved hill…..a street, or such…..and bomb down the hill with reckless abandon.

     The best hill was the blacktopped walk that led from the elementary school, Madison School, down to the blacktopped play area that housed the basketball courts.  My recollection of that hill is that it was very steep, 60 degrees at least (well, maybe that is a bit of an exaggeration).  We would line up on top of the hill, sequentially set our skateboards down on the pavement, and with one foot on the board and the other foot providing propulsion, we would see who could keep balanced atop their skateboard while most rapidly bombing down the hill.  Those of greater skateboarding efficiency would serpentine their way down the hill, shifting their weight from side to side.  Many a time balance would be lost and someone would go tumbling off their skateboard….scraping their hands and knees on the pavement and rolling like a rolling pin on the adjacent grass.  Of course, no one had a helmet or pads…they didn’t exist in those days.

     Looking back on it, it seems a little crazy to plunge down those hills, almost inviting bodily injury.  Without knowing it them, with my adult-hindsighted evaluation now, I would say that for the sake of the thrill and challenge, we deemed the pain and suffering that could happen well worth the risk of taking.  Of course, we well underestimated the degree of pain and suffering that could actually occur.

     The Bible characterizes Jesus in images of his day: shepherd, sower of seeds, mother hen gathering in chicks.  I think it would be appropriate to update those images and add “Skateboarder”.  Reading the Bible, I see Jesus plunging headlong down steep hills, risking life and limb all for the sake of the thrill of bringing hope to the despairing, life to the lifeless, forgiveness to the outcast sinners, and peace to the fearful.  Many people thought him crazy to descend so recklessly into people’s lives, yet even after having been warned of the risk, he intently set his face down the hill.  Jesus was akin to the skateboarders of my youth.

     Not that caution and carefulness are all bad, but in our world today where  helmets, pads, seatbelts, and carseats are the norm, it seems to me that the image of Jesus as Skateboarder is a good one for us to remember.  When Jesus says to us, “Follow me.”,  he is saying that standing on top of a hill, one foot on his skateboard and the other propelling him on his way.  “Safety First” was not his slogan….and good thing it wasn’t, because if that was his slogan, where would I be?  Hopelessly despairing….lifelessly existing…..abandoned in my sin….shattered in fear….dying at the bottom of the hill which I had rolled down.

     So, if you’re down at the bottom of the hill, exhausted from the tumble that you have taken, here’s good news.  Jesus is already on his skateboard, and with the thrill and challenge of making his way to you with his saving grace, he is waving on those who bear his name (Christian) to join him….risking with him…to bomb down that hill and to share in the thrill of reaching you with God’s saving grace and mercy!           

     Have a great week!

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 6-20-16

Hello,

Let it be known that my wife went away for the weekend, and all of our chickens were alive when she returned home.

Yes, we are chicken farmers again.  As you may recall, in the fall our three surviving chickens became stew fodder, their egg laying days being over.  After a peaceful chickenless winter, eight new chicks took their home at our home.  We got them at only a day after they broke out of their shells, and now, some months later they have become nearly full-size chickens.  They have survived Duncan’s (our dog) drooling gaze.  They have survived chilly nights. They have survived the stalking of four fox pups that we discovered lurking in the brush……and they have survived Kate’s three day absence and my three day care-taking assignment. (You may remember that our previous flock of chickens were not so fortunate in all these cases.)

But, I have to confess that their lifespan nearly reached its culmination when my wife was away.  It happened when I went out to feed them Saturday morning.  Connected to their coop is a completely enclosed chicken-wire pen that has a door to the free world for the chickens to go in and out, and a hatch on the top that allows a person to reach in and get the water dispenser for refilling.  My plan for the chickens’ survival was to keep them in the pen during Kate’s absence.  Unfortunately, I did not know the chickens well enough for my plan to work.

I opened up the hatch and noticed their water dispenser needed to be refilled.  So, I took it off its hook and made my way to the house to fill it from the spigot.  When I returned with the newly fill water dispenser I was aghast at what I saw.  Two of the chickens had flown through the open hatch and were strolling around in the danger-filled world.  My attempts to corral them were unsuccessful as they took flight to get around me.  Being the chicken genius that I am, I thought that if I opened the door to the pen, they would hear their chicken friends calling them back and they would go back in…..wrong!  No, their chicken friends heard the call of the wild and they charged out the open door to join the two escapees.

Determined that I would not be guilty of chicken neglect, I took a seat on my porch and waited out their wanderlust, hoping they would return to the pen by themselves….and so they did after about an hour of scratching and pecking the ground.

With this experience behind me, I am glad, as a sort of rebellious chicken, myself when I read from the book of John; ¹¹“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. ¹²The hired hand, who is not the shepherd and does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them. ¹³The hired hand runs away because a hired hand does not care for the sheep. ¹⁴I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, ¹⁵just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep.”

Good thing that Jesus knows how to take care of his “chickens” better than I do!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 6-13-16

Hello,

     I didn’t hear the news yesterday morning when I woke up to get ready to go to worship/work.  So, I didn’t know about the shooting in Orlando.  One of my parishoners mentioned it to me as I greeted her outside, but the conversation was short and I didn’t capture the horror of the events.  When I got home after church I found out what happened.

What does one say….what does one do?

Interestingly enough, the appointed Gospel lesson yesterday was Luke 7:36-50, the story of Jesus’ encounter with two people: one person who was known as a “sinner”, and another person who was well known as one who was not.  As I studied these verses from Scripture, it became clear to me that the point that Jesus was making  as he interacted with these two people is that one of these people understood the truth of who they were and the other did not.  The one who was called a “sinner”  saw the pain that sin was bringing to that person’s life and the community, so that person went to Jesus to do something about that sin.  The other person, who thought himself to be sinless, didn’t see any pain emanating into the world from him, and so he didn’t go to Jesus in hopes of having his life transformed.  Instead he pointed his finger at others: Jesus and that “sinner”.  Jesus, in response, applauded the “sinner” and told the “sinless” man how blind he was.

Thus the point of my sermon: none of us is sinless and Jesus welcomes with transforming grace those who seek to do something about their sins.

Eventhough I didn’t know the depth of the tragedy which was inflicted in Orlando, I would say that my sermon is what I would have said to this horrific event, and what I would say what one can do.  Although the natural response might be to look at the sin in others (and certainly there is sin enough in everyone for us to see), a more productive and Christ-directed response would be to take an honest look at ourselves and seek to do something about the pain and suffering that our sins bring into our lives and the lives of others.

The pain that the Orlando shooter inflicted upon the world is far too clear and needs to be clearly addressed, and I will leave it to those who have the power and authority to address it to do so.  But here is what I am going to do:  I am going to shine the light of truth on my life so that I can see the pain and suffering that I add to this world.  My selfish thoughts.  My self-preserving fears.  My myopic vision.  My calloused skin and heart.  And I will go to the one who I trust will use the cross of Good Friday and the empty tomb of Easter to transform me into one who might be an agent of peace and compassion in my corner of the world, and as that one tosses me into the world that I might create a ripple of God’s transforming grace that will grow into a tsunamic wave of divine peace and compassion as all those who bear Christ’s name do the same.

I hope that what I am saying here is not seen capitalizing of an act of unspeakable pain to advance the Christian faith, as if to say that if everyone was Christian things like this would never happen.  In fact, I don’t believe that is true, for I know the sin that still resides in my heart, and the hearts of all people, that often escapes my heart….sin that will fester and grow lest I take an honest look at it and do something about it.  And so, that is what I will do, and invite all who are named Christian to do.  It is my hope and prayer that when we who are Christian do this we might be part of the balm of healing that my Christian faith tells me is why God sent his Son into the world and what God’s desire is for all the world.

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord   6-6-16

Hello,

     I am going to a new dentist.  My previous one retired.

     The door opened to the waiting area and a cheerful woman, who was to be my hygienist, called my name.  After a quick tour of the facility, she bid me sit down in her chair, pulled out her picks and scrapers, put a bib around my neck, and went to work excavating my teeth.

     I suspect that hygienists are taught to talk to their patient while they are working, because they all seem to do it.  I understand that the conversation might ease the anxiety of the patient.  After all, silence can be a rather awkward thing.  But no less awkward, it seems to me, is to try and carry on a conversation with someone while they probing and scraping with sharp instruments in your mouth.  Deep, gurgling “uh huh” (i.e., yes) and “uh uh” (i.e., no) is about the limit of what I can add to such a conversation.

     Just before she began her exploration into my mouth, she asked me, “And what do you do for a living?”

     “I am the pastor at First Lutheran Church, downtown.”

     “Oh,” she said, and as she asked me to open my mouth, she began to talk about the church that she goes to.  And then after filling the time of her scraping and probing with details about her church, she reached over and grabbed the “vacuum” and spray, sprayed my teeth with water, and then put the suction tube in my mouth, and gently pulled my lungs out of my chest as she said, “Please, close.”

     As I was recovering from my lung extraction, she said to me, “Is your congregation large?”

     That isn’t the first time that question was asked of me.  I find it often asked of me when someone finds out that I am a pastor.  Over the course of it’s asking, I have pondered why this particular question is of universal inquiry.  I can’t say that I know the answer.  I don’t think it is because folks wonder how hard I work, after all, everyone knows that I only work one day of the week. 

     My guess is that the question comes from a deep seated value in our society that is the measure of success and importance.  Bigness.  Big houses….big buildings….big companies….and…..big churches are given a judgment of success and importance.  That is the way the world thinks.

     But having been a pastor in all sizes of churches, from one of the biggest in Lutheran circles to one of the smallest, I find myself thinking differently.  The reason that I find myself thinking differently is that I find God thinking differently.  The Bible says that God is one who measures success not by the 99 safely in the flock, but by the one strayed sheep that has been found.  The Bible says that God is one whose heart did not beat in unison with those who valued themselves myopically fixated on their power and wealth.  No, the Bible says that God feels the pain tearing through the hearts of those whom the world of Jesus’ day had deemed worthless: lepers, prostitutes, and tax collectors.  The Bible says that though the world’s mighty lord their power over others, but Jesus said that in his kingdom the one who is mightiest is the greatest servant of all.

     In truth there is a danger in measuring success by the works of our hands, because such success then rests in the feeble strength of our hands.  I am quite willing, therefore, to measure success by the measure of strength of God’s hands….hands that were stretched out on a cross, hands that took the nails of death, and hands that took hold of me in an unyielding baptismal grip.

     The judgments of the world are powerful judgments, and I find myself prey to listening too carefully to the world’s evaluation of my success and importance.  But when I turn my ears to God’s judgment of me….finding me worthy of his dying love and mercy…I say to myself that if God uses me to bring new life to even just one person who has been likewise burdened by the world’s judgment of them…..then I consider myself very successful and important.  Of course, I hope that I am of use to more than one in God’s work of bringing new life, but if it is only one…….one is enough.  A congregation of one….that is big enough to be a success

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace (ggap),

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger