The Bungee Cord

Hello,

Jesus said,45 “Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls; 46 on finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it.” (Matthew 13)a

I spent the weekend with my son, his wife and my grandson. They live in an apartment in the concrete jungle of Brooklyn. We wandered out of the jungle on Sunday and went down to the river where there are parks for kids, trees for shade, and athletic facilities. After my grandson had dug in the sand at one of the parks, climbed playground equipment in another park, and walked on logs at still another park, we decided it was time for a treat, an ice cream cone.

I sat down at one of the picnic tables while my daughter-in-law and grandson went to get the ice cream. The picnic tables were located next to a bunch of soccer fields that jutted out into the river on what must have been a man-made island. As I was sitting there, holding our spots at the table, I heard a plopping sound next to me. I looked toward the sound, and there in the water that separated the picnic area from the soccer fields was a soccer ball afloat that had not been there before. Apparently, someone had put more juice into their kick than they had thought, and they kicked the ball over the 30-foot net that surrounded the soccer fields.

My hunch was right, because in a few moments from the entry slit in the nets came three young guys, older high schoolers, searching for their ball. The water was about six feet below the dock, so I watched these three athletically fit guys stand there in helpless disappointment. Their ball was right there in front of them, bobbing in the water, but it was beyond their reach. The water was dirty and smelly, and there was no way to get out if one jumped in. So, all those three could do was watch until the ball until they decided that it was a lost cause and they went back to the soccer fields and joined up with some other guys who were kicking their ball around.

Jesus tells us that God is not like those three guys who helplessly watched. When God sees you and me bobbing around in stinky, cold, and deep water, God does not just stand there and gaze. God does the unthinkable. God jumps into the water to retrieve us. That is what God did in Jesus. Why would God do such a thing? Jesus tells us why. It is because when God looks upon us, God doesn’t see a soccer ball that has been kicked around. God sees a pearl of unmeasurable worth, and so God jumps in feet first to take ahold of each of us that he might have us as his forever.

It may be that you and I might look in the mirror and question God’s judgment of us. Surely, day after day the world around us tells us that our worth is measurable. We hear it all the time in school, at work, in relationships, in our neighborhoods. Over and over again, we are told that we are not worth jumping in for….and some are not even worth the time to watch bob up and down. But beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and Scripture tells us that we are the apple of God’s eye, ones who a shepherd would leave an entire flock to go find when we are lost, ones that God cannot be without. That is the kind of God that we have.

So, when you find yourself kicked so hard that tall nets won’t hold you safely in and you are bobbing around in smelly, dirty water, don’t look up to see if God is there. No, look next to you and see the splash of the one who so values you that he’s jumping in to take ahold of you….forever!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

See less

 The Bungee Cord

Hello,

It was a beautiful day here in Western Pennsylvania, so after I delivered lunch to my 14 Meals On Wheels clients, I decided to go and play nine holes of golf. Golf, for me, is less sport than exercise. I don’t keep my score, and I generally walk and carry my clubs, thus my exercise. It’s been several years since I have had to buy golf balls, because on slow days I hunt golf balls as I play…often because my shots tend to wind where lost balls land. So, it was today, and as I walked my way along the course, I stumbled upon a ball. I was surprised that it was laying there as it was in plain sight. I picked it up, and I noticed something was written on it, “Prov 2”.

“Prov 2” may have been the chosen identifying mark for the player of the ball, but my suspicion was otherwise. Seeing how the ball was obvious to find, and the marking “Prov 2” was visible on the top of the ball, I think that it was placed there on purpose in hopes that someone would pick it up and read Proverbs 2 in the Bible. It seemed to me to be a unique evangelistic attempt by some Christian golfer.

Well, it worked. Although I think the hope of the “evangelist” was to have someone pick up this ball that knew far more about golf than the Christian faith, I put the ball in my pocket, brought it home, and looked up Proverbs 2. I know that many Christians are drawn to the book of Proverbs for its life guidance that they believe is divinely unique. As I read the book of Proverbs, I, too, find its wisdom helpful. Interestingly enough, many Biblical scholars would say that its wisdom was a wisdom that was shared by many in the day of its writing, and not particularly unique to the followers of the Bible. At its core, the book of Proverbs was meant to be wise instruction to growing boys to give them a good moral foundation for life, to make them good adults. Good rules to live by.

As I wrote last week, I don’t believe that Jesus came to pass on a bunch of moral teachings to us, to make us good people. I believe that Jesus came to transform us to be God’s people, children of God…people whose heart beats in rhythm with God’s, people whose eyes and ears see and hear the love of God abounding in every day of life, people who live free from the shackles of their deeds and who breath in the fresh air of forgiveness, people who are so infused with hope that they look at the grave and sing songs of victory. The book of Proverbs may give us God’s wisdom by which to structure our lives, which is good, but its goodness doesn’t do what Jesus came to do …. give us life, abundant life.

So, I thought to myself as I put that golf ball in my pocket, if I was to be a golf ball evangelist, what would I write on a ball that I would leave on the golf course for someone to find…a verse that would open the finder’s heart not with rules to live by but hope to live and die by. Well….here’s the verse that I would write on the ball…1John3:1.

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

See less

 The Bungee Cord

Hello,

Here’s a truth about Christianity that I think often gets misspoken: Jesus did not come to make people good people, Jesus came to make people God’s people.

Often times, I hear people say, “I am a good person. I don’t need Jesus,” and they are right. Being a good person is something that people can become by many other means. Like shooting a basketball, anyone can learn to do it to some degree. True, some people can be better basketball shooters than others, but is that not also true about being good? With the exception of maybe a few people, most people acknowledge that they are not perfectly good, just like no one can claim to never miss a basketball shot, but when they do speak of their goodness they tend to write off their imperfections as minor or compare themselves to those who are far worse. It seems to me that the goal of being perfectly good for anyone who lives in this world is a goal that even Jesus would say is a humanly impossible goal. After all, no matter how many feathers you put on an elephant, it is never going to fly. Jesus did not come to put feathers on elephants….that is make people good people.

Rather, Jesus came to make people God’s people. Over and over again, the Bible tells us that Jesus came, not to add feathers to elephants, but to transform elephants into something that can fly, like eagles. “So, if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; look, new things have come into being!” (2 Cor. 5:17) When Jesus takes ahold of us, he doesn’t just feather us up, he changes us. He transforms our hearts to beat with God’s eternal life. He gives us ears to hear things we could never hear before. He gives us eyes that pierce the darkness. When Jesus gets ahold of us, he doesn’t just put feathers on us, he gives us wings of faith upon which we can soar in the wind of the Holy Spirit. “Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” 1 Peter 2:10

Good people, as good as they might be, are still only as strong as they can be. They can find themselves shackled by chains that they cannot break. They can find themselves bearing loads that are too hard to carry. They can find themselves facing foes who can crush them like a bug. But God’s people are held in the power of God’s hand, and when Paul thought about the grip that Almighty God has, he said this, “For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Clearly, God’s people are formed to be good people, but they are formed to be far more than that. Regularly, God’s people find themselves encumbered with things that keep them from flying as they are able, things that the Bible calls “sins”. But daily as God takes God’s place in our lives through prayer, Scripture, Baptism, and Holy Communion, God tears those things off of us and sets us back on our way saying to us, “Fly!” Fly with “peace that surpasses all human understanding (Phil 4). Fly with hope that never disappoints (Rom 5). Fly with complete joy (John 15:11). Fly with love that bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things. (1 Cor 13). Fly with grace upon grace (John 1). And fly with life that conquers death (1 Cor 15).

No matter how many feathers you put on an elephant, it won’t fly. Thanks be to God that he transforms us into something new…that can fly!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

See less

 The Bungee Cord

Hello,

My five-year-old grandson brought his family to visit us this past weekend, and part of his visit was to learn how to ride a bike. The bike was shipped here because we have a lot of grassy areas that are more amenable to falling than the concrete of New York City. Soon after he arrived, he strapped his new helmet on his head and readied himself for the adventure ahead.

We held the bike upright while he took his place on the seat and gave him the needed instruction: keep pedaling! We aimed him southward on a gentle sloped part of our yard, and with the countdown…..ready….set…go….we gently shoved him and let him go! He made it pretty far, but his balance teetered and he took his first tumble. Back to the top of the slope we went, he took his place on the saddle, and off he went again. A little bit further this time but like before a tumble befell him. The next attempt went even better, so good that he came to the end of the slope and had to make a turn….tumble. With every try, he developed more balance, more speed with the pedals, and even learned to make the turns. By the time that his visit had come to an end, he had progressed to the church parking lot and discovered the thrill of gliding over the ground and feeling the wind brush across his face…still tumbling when he came to a stop and when he missed a turn and went headlong into the bushes. No pain….no gain.

As you might suspect, some of the tumbles were accompanied by a few tears, but they were never met with scolding. Instead, each time he tumbled, one of us was there to untangle him from his bike, hug him, applaud his efforts, and to say with encouragement, “Let’s try that again. You’ll get it.”

It occurs to me that learning to live in the grace of God is much like learning to ride a bike. When the grace of God is unwrapped for us, the thought of gliding along the path of our life brings a breath-full of exhilaration to our lungs. Rather than daily, slowly trudging on our way, weighed down by judgements, failures, and ever-increasing pressure, the grace of God, like riding a bike, brings a whole new dimension to life…an abundant one. One that is full of thanks, love, peace, hope and joy. Of course, as we are learning to glide along in God’s grace, we sometimes lose our balance, turn too sharply and we tumble. We condemn others and ourselves. We hit potholes of jealousy and logs of fear. We poorly negotiate turns and changes of direction….and we fall.

But here’s the good news of learning to glide in God’s grace: when we tumble and fall, God does not come to us with shame in his voice and scold us for tumbling. No, just like we did for my grandson, God hurries to us, untangles us, and with patient love says to us, “Let’s try that again. You’ll get it.”

And by the grace of God, we become more and more adept at riding the bicycle of grace that God has given us and on which he has seated us. Pretty soon, it becomes natural….loving others as we have been loved, seeing hope when the world darkens, finding peace even in the turbulence around us, and celebrating blessings that others receive. And maybe the best news of all is that, just like riding a bike, gliding in grace is something that once learned is always learned. It is something that no h-ill can take away from us, no doubts can steal from us, and no adversary can loot from us.

This week, enjoy the ride on God’s grace, and if you happen to tumble, this is what you will hear, “Let’s try that again. You’ll get it.”

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

See less

 The Bungee Cord

Hello,

It was called “the shot heard around the world”. It was the opening skirmish of the American Revolutionary War at the North Bridge in Concord, Massachusetts, on April 19, 1775 (google search). Just over a year later, the Declaration of Independence was signed, and thus marked the birthday of the United States which we will celebrate on July 4th.

I suspect that those who signed that document in Philadelphia on that day in 1776 could not have imagined what things would look like 250 years later. What began as a fragile gathering of colonies seeking independence has grown into a strong union of states discovering the opportunities that lie ahead of them. And what discoveries have there been! Although it is certainly true that we have not entirely lived out the ideals that were sown at this country’s birth, the freedoms that have been achieved, the hopes that have been fulfilled, the peace that has been formed, and the lives that have been change is a phenomenal sight to consider. The reverberation of that Concord shot still rumbles throughout the world.

It wasn’t a shot that rang into the world, but the ping of a hammer driving in one of four nails into the hands and feet of a man who was nailed to a Jerusalem cross just shy of 2000 years ago. I am certain that the eleven of the twelve disciples who had joined their lives together and were hiding three days later in that locked room could not have imagined what would grow out of those hammer pings. Their hopes that their small nation of Israel might be freed from the oppression of the Romans had crumbled, but out of those crumbs something far greater happened: people whose number exceeds billions, from every corner of the world would be freed from oppression far greater than any human could impose. As Jesus said in Matthew, “Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather, fear the one who can destroy both soul and body in hell,” and in Jesus’ death those fears were squelched as Jesus eternally took to the grave anything that might try to impose such deadly powers. Although it is certainly true that the vision of grace that exploded from that cross on Easter morning has not fully been accomplished, the peace, hope, joy, and love that has blossomed from that cross has proven to be greater than anything that has tried to destroy it. The reverberation of those Calvary pings still rumbles throughout the world.

So, as fireworks fill the heavens to celebrate the blessings of this 250 year old nation, know that those colorful explosions are only a twinkle compared to the party that is going on in God’s heaven….a party so full of joy that it matches the joy of a impoverished woman who lost a coin and then finds it, that matches the joy of a shepherd who so values each sheep that he leaves his flock to find the lost one and rejoices when he finds it, that matches a father’s joy when a lost son is drawn back into his arms and throws a party to beat all parties, and that matches the joy of finding a pearl of such great value in a field that the finder sells everything to have it. None of us knows how many more years that Concord shot will be celebrated in this country, but we do know this: that Calvary ping will continue to ring in celebration throughout the universe for eternity….and that is something to celebrate!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

See less