The Bungee Cord 9-3-24

Hello,

So, if you have been following the news at all, you, like I, heard of the killing of the six hostages in Gaza this past week. When I saw the pictures of those who had been killed, I was heart-torn. Each of them was a young vibrant person, many were people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time, a musical festival. Their faces reminded me of my kids, and I found myself unable to imagine the grief and terror their parents have been living with, and the pain that will now never leave them.

The news says that they were executed at close range. When I heard that, I thought to myself, “How much hate must have been in those captors’ hearts to do that.” It is hard for me to fathom the depth of hate it must take to look at a young person in the eye and pull a trigger. That is a level of hate I hope I never experience in my heart.

Yet, I can see the embers of such hatred astir there. I see them glowing with anger at someone who has wronged me without a bit of remorse. I see them glowing with vengeance when someone has stepped on me as they have climbed over me in life. I see them glowing with rage when someone I love has been hurt. I can’t imagine the hate that drives someone to shoot someone in cold blood, but I don’t need to imagine where it comes from. I know.

But I also know this: there are plenty of times when I have done things that could fuel to fires of hate in the heart of God for me. I have spit in God’s face. I have turned my back on God. I have hoarded love that is meant to share. I have brought dishonor to God’s name. I have poured enough fuel of pain into the heart of God that God would have every reason to let a bonfire of hate explode in God’s heart.

But it doesn’t. Instead of hate, the explosion in God’s heart is one of love. As a matter of fact, the explosion of love was so great that the whole universe shook when love was ignited in God’s heart. When God’s heart exploded with love, nothing in all of creation could escape its fury, a fury so great that when Jesus, God’s very self, took his place on the Calvary’s cross there began a meltdown of all hate that no measure of hate could escape. As if an exploded nova star whose pull is so great that it creates a black hole, when Jesus cried out, “It is finished,” hatred found itself being sucked down in oblivion, never to be seen again.

God does not, nor will God ever, hate me, or you. Not a single ember of hatred burns in the heart of God. It is gone forever! Only love remains, and so no matter what you and I might do, hatred has no ashes to be stirred up in God’s heart for me or you. God loves me and you. And it is that explosion of love that erupted out of the Easter tomb, also like a black hole, that is pulling you and me into the embrace of God with unmatched and eternal might.

And as that explosion of love reaches your heart and mine, those embers of rage, hate, and vengeance are doused with grace and mercy that turns their hurtful glow into steam to empower you and me with healing love. It may not be that the divine love that radiates from your heart might douse the hatred in the hearts of those who would shoot someone in Gaza but consider what it might do to the hatred in your home, your neighborhood, your workplace, your school. And who knows, maybe one of those embers of love that bursts from your heart might just cause a wildfire of love and mercy that empowered by the wind of the Spirit might land in the heart of someone in a Gazan tunnel.

“This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine….

All around the neighborhood, I’m gonna let it shine….

Hide it under a bushel, NO! I’m gonna let it shine….

Don’t let Satan blow it out, I’m gonna let it shine…

Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine!

Have a great week,

God’s grace and peace,

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

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