The Bungee Cord 3-26-18

Hello,

     Welcome to Holy Week.

     For Christians, the historical events of this week are the highpoint of our faith.  Thursday, Maundy Thursday, we gather around altars and join the first disciples in that “Last Supper”.  On Friday, Good Friday, we gather around the cross in our sanctuaries and join the first disciples as they stood under that Golgotha cross and watched Jesus die.  And on Sunday, Easter Sunday, we join the voices of all time in the feast of victory that God won over sin and death when Jesus rose from the dead, a resurrection that Jesus will one day march us through, too.  This is Holy Week.

     When I was in seminary, one of my professors helped me to better understand this week by unpacking the word “holy”.  Prior to that time, when I heard the word “holy” I thought it referred to something that was purely pure, splendidly splendid, and awesomely awesome.  Not that these descriptions of “holy” are inappropriate, but there is more to the word.  He said, that at the root of the word, “holy” means “functioning as God has intended”.  So, for example, in the commandment, “You shall remember the Sabbath to keep it holy.”, the main intent of holiness in remembering the Sabbath is to have it function as God had intended it (to be a time when the world is quieted to that God can be heard).

     So, in addition to the purely pure, the splendidly splendid, and awesomely awesomeness of the week ahead, this “holiness” of these coming days will also be found when they “function as God has intended”.  And what is God’s intention for this week ahead?

     That God’s love would change us, forever.

     That we would be changed from people who wonder if God loves us, to be people whose lives are shaped by God’s love.  That we would be changed from people whose deeds tell us who we are, to people whose God’s deed is the one thing that makes us who we are.  That we would be changed from people whose lives are turned inward by a drive for self-preservation, to people whose lives are turned outward by power of the grace of God that will never let us go.  That we would be changed from people who are tugged and pulled by our fears, to people who are solidly afoot in hope and peace. That we would be changed from people who are tormented by our failures, to people who are cheered on by God’s victory.  That we would be changed from people who are walking to the grave, to people who by the power of Christ have already left the grave behind.

     And here’s the best news of all, at least as far as I am concerned; that God is the one making the change happen, not me.  If such change was dependent upon my willingness to change, my power to change, my determination to change…the change would never happen.  But in the events of this upcoming week…the sharing of himself in his meal, the giving of himself on the cross, and the steps he took out of that tomb…I can clearly see that God, himself, is at work to bring about this change.  Will this change happen?  As another of my seminary professors said, “Do you really think that you can keep God from accomplishing God’s will?”

     So, as we enter this Holy Week, this week that God is at work to function as God has intended, let me invite you to engage yourself in this week….Thursday, Friday and Sunday….and experience the explosion of joy in your heart as you are swept up in the change that God is making in your life.

Have a great…and Holy….week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord 3-19-18

Hello,

     One of the things that I do as a pastor is to visit shut-ins, and as part of that visit bring them Holy Communion.  For many of us Lutheran Christians, Holy Communion is a very important part of our spiritual lives.  When we gather around the Altar, there is an experience of unity with God and with one another that is a “lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path”.  So, for those whose life circumstances keeps them from joining us around the Altar, we take the bread and wine from the Altar to them, thus including them in this highpoint of the Christian faith.

     I was at the home of a person who had become homebound, and after catching up on how things are going for them, I said, “I have brought Communion with me, would you like to receive?”  Enthusiastically, the person and his wife said, “We would love that.”  I broke out my home communion “kit”, a wooden box of sorts made for me by my internship supervisor decades ago that carries the bread and wine from the Altar.  As I was getting everything set up, their adult son walked into the house, having completed an errand that he had run for them.

     “This is our pastor,” the parents said, “He has come to bring us Communion.  Do you want to join us?”

     There was a look of surprise on his face, and stumbling over his words he said, “Well, I don’t know.  It’s been a long time since I have been to Communion.”

     “That doesn’t matter,”  I said back.  “If you would like to join us, you are more than welcome.”

     Again, he hesitated, and said, “It’s been a long time since I have been to church.”

     “Well,” I said with a smile, “God doesn’t keep an attendance chart.  If you would like Communion, you are more than welcome to receive.”  And he did.  Into his hands I placed a piece of bread with the promise of Christ, “This is the body of Christ, given for you.”  Then, I did the same with a small glass of wine, and spoke the accompanying promise of Christ, “This is the blood of Christ, shed for you.”  Along with his father and mother who had just received Communion, too, I spoke a post-Communion blessing and gave them a benediction to seal our visit with God’s grace.  It was wonderful.

     Two Sundays from now will be Easter, the high-point of the year of the Christian faith.  It is the anniversary of the day that Jesus rose from the dead, and in his rising opened a life that nothing could steal away…..nothing that we might do, and nothing that might come our way, even death.  So, as we bump into each other through this Bungee Cord, might I be as bold as the mother I was visiting said to her son, “Do you want to join us?”

     “Well,” some might say to my invitation, “I don’t know.  It’s been a long time since I have been to church.”

     My response, “That doesn’t matter.”

     “It’s been a long time,” might still roll from one’s lips.  “It’s been a long time because….I just got too busy with life…I don’t like being told what I have to believe….I don’t know how much of the Christian faith I really believe….I have made such a mess of my life, I am embarrassed to go….I don’t have the money to give to the offering….I have been hurt by Christians……….”

      Still my response, “That doesn’t matter.  God doesn’t keep an attendance chart.”

     What God does is to say to you and me, that each of us is so loved by him that he sent his Son to die to wrap us in his grace, and he walked his Son out of the Easter tomb to wrap us in his embrace forever.  God loves you…..that is what God does, and God loves it when God gets a chance to express his love to you, because you and I know that love, especially unconditional, divine love, has the power to give life.

     I don’t care how often you come to church, or how long it has been since you have come to church…and I am sure that God feels likewise…as I invite you to join us for worship on Easter.  I just hope you will.  I hope that you will because God loves you and wants to express his love for you, and just like the parent whose child’s seat is empty at the dinner table, a measure of sadness will brush God’s heart if you are not there.

     Easter is two Sundays away, and Christians will gather to celebrate the day that changed everything.  “Would you like to join us?”

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord  3-12-18

Hello,

     Another thing that I learned on my 3 week trip to China from which I have just returned: when you go out to eat, the first thing that you do is wash your dishes.  Everyone gets a small saucer, a bowl, a cup (without a handle), and chopsticks.  Everywhere we went, the dishes seemed clean, but nonetheless, they got a washing.  On the table was a pot of hot water into which one makes hot tea, then that tea is poured into everyone’s bowl, and in that tea filled bowl you wash your chopsticks, bowl, and plate.  When the washing is done, everyone dumps the tea in a large bowl that is in the middle of the table, and with that completed, eating begins!

     Since we are in the season of Lent, a time of personal reflection and washing, let me offer this “parable” that I wrote some time ago about dish washing.

     Imagine this, you have gone out to eat and when you sit down, you notice that the glass of water that sits in front of you must have 30 mouse turds floating in it.

     You summon the server over and say, “Pardon me, but there are a bunch of mouse turds in my water.”

     “Oh,” the server says in with a rather flat affect.  Next thing you know, the server picks up the glass of water, sticks his fingers in the water and pulls out a handful of mouse turds, and then sits the water glass back down in front of you, several mouse turds still afloat.

     Incredulously, you say to the server,  “Excuse me, but there are still mouse turds in my glass of water.”

     With a look of sort of being put off by your concern, he reaches down and picks up the glass again, sticks his fingers into the water again, swirls the water around and gathers in the rest of the mouse turds, and sets it down in front of you, again.

     A little miffed and amazed, you say to the server, “Hey, I can’t drink that water.”

     The server says back, “Why not?”

     “There were mouse turds in that water!”

     “There aren’t any more,” he impatiently responds.

     “But there was!  I can’t drink that water!”

     So, the waiter, with a huff under his breath, picks up the glass and pours the water out of it into a bowl, spits into the glass, “cleans” the inside of the glass with a cloth napkin, pours some new water in it from the pitcher, and says, “Here.  All clean,” and turns to walk away.

     “Hey, I can’t drink that water!”

     “Now what’s wrong?”

     “There were mouse turds in that glass, and you can’t call what you did ‘cleaning’!”

     “You know,” he says, his words dripping with condescendence, “We always get a couple of you fussy guys.”  So he walks away, and comes back with a bottle of dish soap, and a pot of steaming water.  He squirts a couple of drops of soap into the glass, pours in some boiling water, and with rubber gloves on his hands he sticks a clean rag into the glass and washes it out.  He dumps the soapy water out into a bowl, fills the glass full of boiling water again, swirls it around, dumps that water out, takes the pitcher of cold water, fills the glass, sets it in front of you, and says, “Hope that satisfies you!”

     Even though you have the memory of those mouse turds in that glass, you are able to convince yourself that the glass is clean, and worthy of drinking out of…..and so you drink the water.

     Sometimes, we Christians can fall into the trap of that server, thinking that it’s a matter how many mouse turds we have in our lives, making some of us worse than others in the eyes of God.  And continuing that trap, we think that even if we can get them all our, that we can with our own devises make our lives worthy of God’s delight, so we do all sorts of things to clean our lives up.  But fact of the matter is, we can’t do it.  We need boiling water….and that is what God gives us.  Boiling water, bubbling out of the Easter tomb with the grace of God, swirling around in our lives, making us clean.

     So, here’s the point of it all.  If you have mouse turds in your life, a glass full of them, a hand full of them, a couple of them,  or ever had (and don’t we all, dumping mouse turds into our lives every day), God is at work doing what needs to be done to make us presentable as vessels for his habitation.  Maybe you never thought of a church as a dish washer before, but that is what it is, and God doesn’t care how dirty the dishes are.  They all need to be washed.  So see you there next Sunday when God loads up his dishwasher and cleans his dishes….completely cleans them!

Have a great week,

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger