The Bungee Cord 1-27020

Hello,

     As I have written on several occasions, my wife has a hobby of which I have become a participant: raising chickens.  Not necessarily a willing participant, but not opposed to being part of the “fun”.  Over the course of the last several years, her hobby has grown.  We started out as greenhorns in the chicken raising world. Kate built a moveable chicken coop, we ordered a small flock of chickens over the internet, and we were on our way. Since then, Kate’s mastery of chicken raising has grown….feeders, water dispensers, feeding mixtures, variety of chicken breeds, and……..an electric fence.

      Up until the electric fence, the chickens had the roam of our property.  This led to some disasters and inconvenience.  The disaster took its place in the disappearance of several chickens by the jaws of a fox.  The inconvenience being that when the chickens were out of their coop, my dogs had to be inside…..much to their torment and dismay.

     So, we bought a movable electric fence that could be replanted as the coop was moved.  100 feet of it, giving the chickens quite a bit of ground to stroll around in.  But apparently not enough ground, because recently a couple of the chickens have so developed the urge to find new ground to dig in that they have developed the muster to take flight over the fence, even with their wings clipped!

     I was playing fetch with my dog, MacMahon, about a week or so ago on the field below our house, and when he had had enough I said to him, “Ok, let’s go inside.”  Being a little quicker of foot than I, he reached the house before me.  As I neared the house, I was struck with terror.  A chicken was wandering about, outside of its fence!  I was shocked that it was still alive.  Had MacMahon not seen it?  He must have been too focused on getting back inside and it escaped his glance.

     I quickly herded him inside, shut the door, and took off to catch the over-venturous chicken. Believe it or not, chickens can be quite fleet of foot, but fortunately as I neared this chicken it did what scared chickens also do….they kind of spread their wings and cower.  I grabbed, and as I grabbed it I thought to myself with aggravation, “You dumb chicken!”, and I carried it back to the fence over which it had dangerously vaulted, and dropped it in…..not from a potentially harmful height, but because I could not bend over the electric fence far enough to reach the ground….without getting shocked!  “Dumb Chicken!”

     All this has made me thankful for the God that has claimed me as his own, because I, like that chicken have a way of venturing over the fence in which God has set up to keep me safe.  Drawn to what looks like greener grass.  Wanting to spread my wings.  Rebellious to things that fence me in.  And so I jump…jump the fence.  More often than my wife’s chickens, and every time that I jump that fence, I do so foolishly.  Placing myself in dire danger.  Creating havoc in my life and in the lives of those who love me.

     And every time that I take flight over the fence, I soon find God coming to gather me in.  Sometimes I scurry….but God is quicker of speed.  Sometimes I cower.  But either way, when God gathers me up, I don’t hear the words that ran through my mind when I gathered that chicken, “Dumb chicken!”  Instead, I hear, “Beloved, let’s go home.”  And as I feel myself being gently gathered up in God’s arms, I hear, as Jesus says, “more joy in heaven” over the wanderer who has been found.

     So, if you find yourself dangerously wandering in life with bird dogs and foxes hoping to devour you…..fear not….for God is also out to find you.  To find you, gently gather you up, and say to you, “Beloved, let’s go home.”

Have a great week,

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord   1-20-20

Hello,

     The summer after my junior year of high school, I and three of my friends became entrepreneurs and started up a lawn mowing company. WumpKripBergerBuns Precision Lawn Care. We found an old rickety trailer to tote around our family’s lawn boy mowers, had our parents put a hitch on each of our family cars, and we spent the summer roving around our suburban Chicago towns of Hinsdale, Oak Brook, and Clarendon Hills mowing about 50 yards per week. To say that we were highly disciplined workers would be a bit of a stretch.  One of my friends, Bill, was always late, and so if we started by 10:00 in the morning when he was driving we were lucky.  Two of us played baseball, so it was a bit tricky getting all of our lawns mowed in the spring, and often we were mowing until 10:00 at night, in the pitch black, not able to see rocks and stakes that banged up our mower blades  But all in all, it was a great way to spend the summer with my friends, and earn enough spending money to carry me through my senior year.

     That was the middle ‘70’s, and if any of you remember those days, those days were the days of short cut offs, long hair, getting a great tan from never wearing a shirt…….and this is the most important thing, wearing tennis shoes with no socks.  And that is what all four of us did all summer long.  Mowed lawns wearing tennis shoes with no socks.  On hot steamy days with our feet sweating as much as our brows, on damp early morning dew covered lawns, on days when it was raining but the grass was tall…..50 lawns a week…..from spring to fall, each of us wore the same tennis shoes with no socks.  My pair of shoes was a pair of suede converse all-stars that I had worn during the basketball season.  Not canvas, but suede.  They were cool on the court, but I am not sure that cool is the right word as lawn moving shoes, because they were hot.  They amplified the sweat.  They soaked up the dew, and they never did quite completely dry out.  And so…they stunk!  They stunk so badly that my mom demanded that I take them off before I came into the house, and leave them out on the back porch.  They stunk so badly that after a day’s work, the car that we had all been riding in was un-ridable for a couple of hours.  They stunk so badly that I could leave them safely outside overnight, for no critter would ever think about gnawing on them.

     Bout mid-summer, my  mom decreed that I needed to get something to deal with their stink, because it was wafting its way into our house from the back porch.  So, I went to the grocery store and got some Dr. Scholl’s shoe spray.  I liberally sprayed the shoes, and set them out in the sun to dry, but the relief of the smell was only temporary.  The spray didn’t take the smell away, it just tried to overwhelm the stink with a fresher scent.  The stink always won.

     Have you taken a whiff of your life lately?  Although it may not smell as rank as those suede Converse All Stars that I wore when mowing lawns, but I bet it doesn’t smell like roses. Anger at someone that keeps on festering.  Greed that is deeply ground into your heart.  The mess that you have made of your life.  The stench of betrayal that clings so deeply.  The lack of care for those who are suffering.  Take a whiff and see if you don’t smell a bit like fermenting cut grass.  Everyone does.

     And people, since grass has been cut, have tried to deal with the stench of their lives the same way that I tried to deal with the stench of my shoes.  We try and spray them with sweet smelling spray, hoping that the sweet smell will overwhelm the rancid smell, and the spray that we use is a can of Dr. Scholl’s of being good and being right.  It’s not a bad product, this Dr. Scholl’s can of being good and being right.  The help we give to our neighbor….the donations to the food bank….the visit to the hospital of a friend who is sick…the willingness to give the shirt off of our backs.   All good and good smelling.

But when patience gets thin….when money gets short….when fear grabs ahold of your heart…when you’re lost and confused…when your defenses weaken and your hopes diminish….the stench comes back.  We find out that that Dr. Scholl’s spray of being good and being right just covers up the rancid smell.  The smelly stuff is so deeply engrained, so completely absorbed, and so baked into our lives that the sweet smelling spray doesn’t take away the smell.  It just covers it up….for a while.  The stink always wins.

     Now, some 50 years later, I understand that Dr. Scholl’s has a shoe spray and inserts that do more than just try and sweetly cover the stink of smelly shoes up.  Their product is dubbed, “Odor Eaters”.  Supposedly, this new product doesn’t just cover up the stink.  It eats it up.  When the rotting grass and infused sweat start to smell, supposedly this new product….these odor eaters….actually takes the stink out of the air by eating it up. Supposedly these odor eaters have an appetite for stench that is never satisfied, and that which was smelly no longer is.  I don’t know if it would have worked for my Converse All Stars.

     But I do know this, that when it comes to the stench in our lives, God goes one step further than Dr. Scholl’s.  God doesn’t just give us a can of Being Good and Being Right spray. God doesn’t even give us a can or inserts that eat up the smell that the molding grass of our lives is making. God gives us one, the Lamb of God, who takes away…who takes away….the sin of the world.  God doesn’t just deal with the smell….God deals with the cause of the smell…the stuff that is rotten, the stuff that is rancid, the stuff that … well…the stuff that stinks….and he takes it away.  

    When God sent Jesus into this world, Jesus was the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.  He takes it away.  Removes it from our lives.  Gathers it upon himself.  On the cross takes it into the incinerator of death.  And turns it into ashes.  Ashes that stink no more.  Ashes that we wear on Ash Wednesday that tell us the powerlessness of our sins.  Ashes made in the sign of a cross that tell us the power of Jesus’ love.  Ashes marked on our foreheads where a cross was made when you and I were Baptized when you were washed in the waters of new life, fresh and clean life.

     Here’s the good news for you and me…and the good news for the world.  When it comes to people with smelly lives….God doesn’t just cover up the smell….God doesn’t just eat up the smell….God gets rid of the stuff that makes the smell.  “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.”  

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord 1-13-20

Hello,

     I was driving into work this morning, listening to the Pittsburgh sports talk radio show that is always playing in my car.  Being an aged player of sports….my current playing is pickle ball three or four times a week….I enjoy listening to the banter that goes on in the world of sports.

    Today, the banter was about the Football Hall of Fame inductions, and the radio folks were debating the merit of the inductees. Where they really of Hall of Fame level? How about ….?  And they listed folks who I knew and others I had never heard of.

     Sometimes, it seems to me, the church is seen as a Hall of Fame.  People look in its doors and expect to see folks who are on the top rung of the ladder of goodness and holiness.  They enter its doors hoping to rub elbows with and to be counted amongst those who have their lives together.  They believe that those with whom they are sitting and singing are the kind of people worth being around and to be counted in their number.  

     Evidence of this Hall of Fame image of the church is what people say about the church when they see the arguments that go on among church folks, and they see the lack of goodness and holiness in the lives of church-goers when they are not in church.  “Hypocrites, the church is full of hypocrites,” they say.  Like the sports radio hosts, people spend a lot of time critiquing those who go to church debating the worthiness of their place in the church.  And even more evident of the church being seen as a Hall of Fame is when someone who is part of a church does something truly awful.    When that happens people often judge the church as totally despicable, no longer worthy of attendance, participation, or affiliation.

     Well, fact of the matter is that Jesus never meant the church to be a Hall of Fame.  Just think about the folks that Jesus rubbed elbows with.  They weren’t Hall of Famers…tax collectors, prostitutes, greedy, weak, confused, burdens on society, fishers, and failures.  The truth is that Jesus ran into the most trouble with those who thought that the church should be a Hall of Fame: the Sadducees, the Pharisees, and the scribes.  These groups of people were shocked and astonished that Jesus spent time and ate with sinners.  And when a woman of ill repute came and anointed his feet, they said of him, “If he knew who she was, he wouldn’t let her do that.”  He knew who she was!

     I don’t know how the idea that the church is meant to be a Hall of Fame got started, but it certainly was not started by Jesus.  The church that Jesus started was much more of a hospital for the hurting, a place where broken people found healing, and when healed sent out into the world to be people of healing.  It isn’t always easy to be part of a church.  Ask any hospital worker.  Hospital work and life is often trying and hard.  People tend not to have a great deal of patience when they are really hurting.  People can be a bit self-focused when they are in pain.  People can be a bit hard headed when they are frightened.  As a pastor, I often have to remind myself that when the church is what Jesus meant it to be it is a bunch of sinners in need of forgiveness, not a bunch of angels perfectly playing their harps.

     So, let me invite you to receive Jesus’ invitation to gather with him this Sunday in church.  It is an invitation not to come and gawk at perfect Hall of Fame people, because you won’t find any of that sort there.  It is an invitation to come as you are…tired, broken, bruised, confused…just like the rest of the people who are there, and in the presence of the One who is famous for his dying love experience the healing, wholeness, and hope that only he, Jesus, can give.

     If the church was a Hall of Fame, you would never find me there. But because it is a House of Hope,  I am there every Sunday.

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord 1-6-20

Hello,

     Even though most Christmas pageants include the arrival of the Wisemen on the night of Jesus’ birth, the Biblical story does not have them arriving until sometime later.  How much later?  We don’t know, but to mark the span of time to their visit, Christians for centuries have celebrated the Wisemen’s arrival twelve days after Christmas, January 6^th.  There’s a name for this day, which is the day on which I am writing this Bungee Cord, and it is called “Epiphany”.  “Epiphany” means “making known”,  and it is on this day that Jesus is made known as the one whose saving grace extends to all people, because the wisemen were foreigners who were drawn to Jesus’ side.

     Over the course of the centuries, much speculation has been placed upon the Wisemen.  They have been given names.  They have been designated to be different races.  Their travel has been assigned to camels.

     In fact, though, from the Biblical witness we don’t know any of these things.  Truth is, we don’t know much at all about them.  We don’t know exactly where they came from.  We don’t know how many there were.  We don’t know how they travelled.  We don’t know exactly what they did for a living.  We don’t know if they had good reputations or if their past was a bit checkered.

     Other than the three types of gifts that they brought Jesus, the only thing that we really know about the Wisemen is that they were welcome at Jesus’ side.

     To me, that is the most important thing to know about them, because if the Bible does not place any descriptive details upon those first visitor’s to Jesus, then I can be confident that there are no descriptive details placed upon me when I come to Jesus side.  Nothing needed to be there.  Nothing possessed that would keep me away.  All we know about the Wisemen was that they …whoever, or whatever they were….were welcome at Jesus side, and so am I.

     Somehow that message has gotten lost, and people hear of limiting conditions.  If you struggle with believing in Jesus…if you have done something that the world has deemed absolutely shameful…if you are too busy to make time for Jesus in your daily lives…if you haven’t been to church for years, or decades…if you have a lot of money and you spend it all on yourself…if you have a temper that is hard to control…if you tend to gossip…if you are so confused in life about who you are………..on and on the list could go.

     On occasion there has been someone walk into a church that I have been a pastor, and when they walk in, you can feel the astonishment and you can hear the whispering (neither one of which apparently happened when the Wisemen came into Jesus’ presence), “What is he/she doing here?”  And when that person has taken a seat, you can see people making sure that they don’t sit to closely.

     That is not what happened on the first Epiphany.  Those Wisemen….no matter who or whatever they were…..were welcomed at Jesus side.  That is why in every church that I have been in I have worked hard to overcome the limits and conditions that people may place upon those who wish to draw near to Jesus.  After all, Jesus himself, didn’t just wait for outcasts (lepers, prostitutes, taxcollectors) to come to him…..he went to them!

    I know that there are lots of churches who work hard to be Epiphany people, people who place no limits or conditions to be welcome at Jesus’ side.  So, let me offer this Epiphany invitation…..no matter who you are…..no matter what you are….Jesus came to be with  you, and you are welcome at his side!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger