Hello,
Tuesday night the red and blue lights of a police car lit up the street
in front of our church. A criminal
had been nabbed. The criminal:
me. I was coming to church for a
meeting, when just a couple of blocks away from the church someone cut me off
having pulled out in front of me from a parking lot. Not only did the person almost hit me, whoever was driving
the car didn’t seem to know where the gas pedal was once they were in front of
me. Driving half the speed limit,
the car plodded ahead of me…..aggravating me.
Not that it would have helped, I tried peering through the back window
of the snail paced car to see just who could have been such an inept
driver. Since it was dark, I had a
hard time seeing through the window, but as we approached in intersection the
streetlight illuminated the interior just enough to catch a glimpse of the rear
of the driver’s head. I focused my
eyes on the shadowy head, hoping to make some sort of identification, but even
with the streetlight, I couldn’t make out much. So half way through the intersection, my anger
stewing, I turned my eyes back to the street, just in time to see that the
traffic light above me was scarlet red.
I took a quick look to my left and right in order to see if there was
any cars coming my way, and I caught in my glance a car just about to enter the
intersection on my right….a car with an apparatus on its roof…a bar of lights.
I didn’t even have time to hope that the light bar would stay darkened,
when the red and blue lights lit up and began to spin, and the car…the police
car…jumped on my tail. I turned
off the main road and stopped my car, stopping it right next to the church. The police car pulled up right behind
me, its flashing lights announcing a crook had been nabbed.
I sat in my car, mad at myself for “breaking the law” and embarrassed by
the attention that I was sure I was attracting. The police officer stepped out of her car and made her way
to the driver’s window of my car.
She didn’t have to tell me why she had stopped me. I knew, and I pleaded guilty of my
crime even before she spoke.
Politely, she took my license and went back to her car. Hoping for undeserved grace, in a few
moments she returned to my car, handed back to me my license, and saying,
“You’ll get your ticket in the mail.”
I started up my car, turned into the alley just ahead of me, parked my
car and entered the church…entered the church as one who had broken the
law. Not something of which to be
proud, but clearly true. Fortunately,
my crime did not hurt anyone, but none the less, I had committed a crime,
throwing me into the pool of all criminals….and so the thought occurred to me,
being the law breaker that I was, maybe I should not have entered the church.
But therein lies the rub….the
misinformation that has somehow made itself into the world. Somehow the word has been circulated
that only “good” people should go to church. People who do not squabble. People who do not gossip. People who do not lie.
People who are not prejudiced.
People who do not find themselves in the sheriff’s log in the
newspaper. But that is not
true. The church was never
supposed to be a place for perfect people, rather Jesus created the church to
be a place for imperfect people. A
place where God’s forgiveness frees people from the prison of their sins, and
where God’s love is at work transforming them into new people.
I got my fine in the mail today. $112.00. I will pay my fine, as I should, and eagerly I will go to
church this week…where I belong….not because I am perfect, but because I am the
very kind of person Jesus wants in the church….a sinner who stands in need of his
transformational forgiveness.
So, let me on Jesus’ behalf, invite you to church this week. There is nothing you could have done,
felt, or said that should keep you away….because the church isn’t made for
perfect people. It was made for
sinners, breakers of the law, like you and me.
Have a great week.
God’s grace and peace, (ggap)
Pastor Jerry Nuernberger
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