The Bungee Cord. 3-12-23

Hello,

There are several significant events in the Bible in which the number 40 is involved. The Bible says that it rained 40 days and 40 nights after Noah built the Ark. The Israelites were said to wander in the wilderness for 40 years. Jesus was tempted by the Devil in the wilderness for 40 days. Interestingly, many Biblical scholars believe that when the Bible uses the number 40, it is not meant to be taken literally. Rather, the number 40 is used as a figure of speech for another way of saying “a long, long time.”

Modern English also has ways of saying “a long, long time”. “It took me forever to clean my room.” “I studied all day for that test.” “I haven’t seen her in eons.” Or as Jed Clampet said, “I haven’t seen you since you were knee high to a grasshopper.”

Last week, I went to visit a friend of mine that I haven’t seen for 40 years, literally 40 years. He and I were college fraternity brothers, and when college ended, we went different directions in life. I went to the cold of Minnesota to go to Seminary. He went to the balmy shores of Hawaii to be an accountant. We have kept minimally in touch through Facebook, so I knew what he would look like when we met last week, but other than that there were a lot of blanks to fill in over the years. It was great fun to share our ventures. Neither of us had led boring or uneventful lives.

He had posted on Facebook that he was coming from Hawaii to Indianapolis to visit his father, and now that I am retired, I figured that I should grab the opportunity to go there and see him. After all, it was only a 6-hour drive from my house in Pennsylvania (from my days in South Dakota, a 6-hour drive is nothing at all!). It was worth the drive.

When I started writing the Bungee Cord over 25 years ago, my main aim was to provide a rendezvous with God for those whose lives and God had gone in different directions. And haven’t we all done that. Some of us have figuratively wandered off as far as Hawaii, and the rest of us who may not have distanced ourselves as far as that have certainly and regularly turned our backs on God and looked in other directions. I called this weekly writing “The Bungee Cord” because God has shown me that God’s love holds onto us no matter how far we might distance ourselves from God, and nothing can sever the bungee cord of God’s love that is always drawing us back to him.

In Jesus, God has shown that God will go as far as it takes to rendezvous with us…6 seconds, 6 minutes, 6 years, 60 years, 66 years and if need be, even to the den of the devil who in the figurative language of Revelation wears the number 666. And in Jesus, God has shown us that whether our ventures have taken us away from God for 40 seconds, 40 minutes, 40 days, or 40 years…a long, long time….God delights in the rendezvous….catching up on our ventures, filling in the blanks….and saying to us, “Beloved, know this: neither time nor space will ever be able to separate us from one another in Christ Jesus. Nothing!”

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

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