The Bungee Cord  11-25-13

Hello,

     Even though this week is Thanksgiving, we served a Thanksgiving dinner last Wednesday to our guests of the weekly noon meal that we provide at our church.  Our usual crowd is between 80-100, and that is about the number who took their seats on Wednesday.  I don’t know if I have written about this ministry that was started at our downtown church years before I arrived, but just in case I haven’t here’s a picture of what happens in our fellowship hall every Wednesday.

     A crew of about 10 women….ranging from 50 years old to 97 years old, show up every Wednesday to prepare a home cooked meal for anyone who needs a good meal or some good company.  No questions are asked about a person’s need.  If they show up, we are glad to feed them, and the food that the women set before them is … well….the best lunch in town…home made soup, glazed chicken breast, ham and scalloped potatoes, and this past week all the Thanksgiving fixin’s…turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, corn,  cranberry sauce, pumpkin cake!

     The meal always begins at noon, and before we eat we take a few moments to talk about things…the Steelers, the Penguins, the weather.  We sing “Take Me Out to the Ball Park” on baseball’s opening day, patriotic songs on the 4^th of July, Christmas carols, and last week we sang a couple of Thanksgiving songs before our prayer.  As I was about to begin the singing one of the guests came up to me and told me that we had a person celebrating his birthday, and so I said, “Well, we’d better sing “Happy Birthday” then, too.”  Our crowd is not a gathering of trained singers, and we don’t sound like it.  But those who sing sing with gusto and delight….and that is all that matters.  So, we launched into “Come Ye Thankful People Come” and “Sing to the Lord of Harvest”, and then I said, “Hey!  I hear it’s someone’s birthday today….It’s Bill’s (not his real name) birthday!”

     Bill happened to be sitting at the table right next to where I was standing, and when I looked over at him there was a gleam in his eye carrying a look of “how did you know that?” 

     “Okay,” I said, “Let’s sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to Bill!” 

     “Happy Birthday to you.  Happy Birthday to you.  Happy birthday dear Bill….”

     And as we sang that phrase, I looked over at Bill and was surprised at what I saw.  Bill had pulled out his handkerchief and was wiping tears from his eyes.

     I don’t know much about Bill.  I know that he lives in a senior citizen residence by himself.  My guess is that he is in his 80’s.  I don’t know if he has family.  When I have eaten with him we have talked of the Pirates and Steelers.  He’s a quiet, soft spoken person, and he eats with us almost every week.  So, I don’t know what brought his tears.  Was it that he had thought no one would remember his birthday?  Was it that no one had sung  “Happy  Birthday” to him in years?  Was it that he had gotten used to being seen as invisible by the world, and he was moved by our notice of him and singing a spotlight of importance upon him?

     This Thanksgiving I am thankful that I was able to be part of a group who brought tears of joy to Bill…tears of joy that I find welling up in my eyes when I feel so small and insignificant, lost and confused, forgotten and lonely and someone reaches their hand out to me with a piece of bread saying, “This is the body of Christ given for you,” and then follows with a chalice saying, “This is the blood of Christ shed for you.”

     Remembered.  Noticed.  Loved………Grace!

Have a great week. 

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord  11-18-13

Hello,

As I have written before, my commute to my church is a 23 mile ride along a squiggly road over the ridge where there is not even one inch where passing is allowed.  It takes me about a half hour to travel, and generally behind the wheel of my Mini Cooper the ride is fun and the scenery is beautiful.

Once in a while I find myself caught  behind someone who is in no hurry and is captivated by the scenery extending the time of my journey 10 minutes or so.  This past week, though, it was not a tree gazer that slowed my pace and it wasn’t just 10 minutes that was added to my commute.

As I started my way over the ridge, I soon came up upon an appliance service truck that was travelling at a speed that made me think he was looking for an address.  “Be patient,” I told myself.  Then around one of the bends, we came upon warning signs telling us of a work area where a flagger was managing the traffic for the one lane road that was created.  Sure enough, the signs told the truth, and I found myself sitting behind my appliance truck friend at a site where the electric company was trimming trees away from its lines.  “Be patient,” I told myself as I waited permission from the flagger to pass.  Still creeping behind the service truck around a couple of bends, again we were greeted by a work zone sign, and again I found myself awaiting permission to pass tree trimmers.  “Be patient,” I told myself.  When the flagger flipped the sign from “stop” to “slow” we moved past the trimmers, but this time it seems that my appliance friend deemed to take the flagger’s word literally for now he was setting our pace at 15-20 miles an hours (in a 45 mile an hour zone).  “Be patient,”  I told myself as I assumed he was nearing his stop.  Riding my brakes down the slope, I painfully felt my brake pads eroding away, and when my appliance buddy took the fork in the road at the bottom of the hill, erasing my assumption that he was looking for an address, I felt the steam begin to accumulate in my ears.  “Be patient, “ I told myself.  Having lost my lumbering escort, I took a deep breath to calm  down, and set off to finish the last third of my commute.  But wouldn’t you know it, after a couple of more bends….there it was again…a orange work zone sign…..more tree trimmers!  “Be patient,”  I told myself.  Given my luck thus far, I guess that I should not have been surprised that within a mile of my third tree trimmers, I found myself behind a school bus making numerous stops gathering in the children who made their way onto the bus with the speed of a tree sloth.  “Be patient,” I told myself.  And then….as if someone was tracking me….every time I came upon a stop light, it turned red….5  of them.  “Be patient,” I told myself.  And when I finally arrived at work, I found the access to the parking lot blocked by a parent dropping their child off at our preschool (it’s where the parents are supposed to drop their kids off….).  “Be patient,”  I told myself.

By the time that I parked my car, my half hour commute had doubled in time.  As I walked into my office, a strange tune popped into my mind…a song from my youth.  “Slow down, you move too fast.  You gotta make the morning last.  Just kickin’ down the cobblestone.  Lookin’ for love and …..  feelin’ Groovy.”  Although Simon and Garfunkel sang it…..maybe it was a word from God that I needed to hear.

“Lord, soothe my soul with patience….grant me “grooviness.”

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord   11-11-13

Hello,

Paul Bunyan, Big Joe Mufferaw, and now……me.

Some years from now when the annuls of western Pennsylvania are written there will be stories of the mighty lumberjacks that cleared the way for civilization….Paul Bunyan, Big Joe Mufferaw……and me.

When we built our house a couple of years ago, we situated it at the western edge of  the tree stand on the top of our hill.  During the summer the Maples trees, the Cherry trees, the Locus trees, and the Sasyphras (sp?) trees shelter our house from the heat of the sun and the gust of the wind.  In the fall they wrap it with a patchwork quilt of autumn colors.  In the winter they act as a break for the horizontally falling snow, and in the spring they bud up with life anew announced by the chirping of the birds who rebuild their nests in them.

The trees that surround our house are wonderful in many ways, but when one of them is hollowed out by ants and begins to slump toward our garage…..well, then it isn’t so wonderful.  Such was the case with a large maple tree that stood near our garage.  Over the years, the ants had dined on its core, turning the bottom several feet of it into a gigantic straw.  “This tree’s gotta come down,” said our friend Ralph who knows a thing or two about trees, “or it’s gonna come down….on your roof.”  So, promising to bring the cables over soon, he left the tree above our garage in hopes that we would not wake up some morning with a nature made sky light in our  garage.

Wouldn’t you know, a couple of days later the gusty winds of autumn hit our hill, pushing the air through the trees at 60 miles per hour.  Thankfully the tree stood stubborn against the wind….but not wanting to count too heavily on its hollowed out core, Ralph and his brother came up to our house on Saturday, ready to take the tree down.  The plan was to attach cables to it in order to have it land away from our garage and in a narrow opening between some other trees.  Ralph attached the first set of cables to the tree that we stretched to another tree in the direction that we hoped it would fall, and I (lumberjack that I am) climbed the ladder to attach the second cable to the tree to keep it from plopping down on my garage.  When everything was attached and taught, Ralph took his chain saw in hand and cut a notch in the base of the tree.  His brother and I began clicking the hand winches, causing the tree to lean and crackle.

“Click…click….click.” and the tree slowly began to lean away from vertical and away from my garage.  “Keep on clicking,” Ralph instructed, “I’m going to ‘tickle’ the tree.”  A bunch of clicks and tickles later, and although the tree was leaning, it wasn’t falling, being held up by branches from neighboring trees.  Putting his chainsaw down and walking toward his brother, Ralph leapt up like a gymnast reaching for the high bar and took hold of the cable, “Sometimes if you grab hold of the cable, the tree will come down.”  His brother of 60 years plus, joined him, and as they swang on the cable like monkeys on a vine,  and with a final crack the tree came crashing down.  As it did, Ralph and his brother immediately morphed into gazelles and ran for their lives, landing the tree within inches of where they had hoped.

     Mission accomplished.  Go ahead, wind, and blow.  That tree has lost its power to chill me with fear as it did when it loomed over my garage.  Thanks to three apt lumberjacks…Ralph, his brother….and me (!) I can lay my head down with ease at night, and wake up without looming fear.

     Got any looming trees hovering over you?  Every Sunday when we begin worship a trinity of divine lumberjacks stands ready to bring them down….not with chainsaws….but with forgiveness.  “In the mercy of Almighty God, Jesus Christ has been given to die for you, and for his sake, God forgives you all of your sins (looming trees).  As a called and ordained minister of the Church of Christ, and by his authority, I therefore declare to you the entire forgiveness of all of your sins, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  AMEN”

     Thanks to these triune lumberjacks who wield the power of forgiveness….The Father, The Son and The Holy Spirit….you can lay your head down with ease at night, and wake up without looming fear.  Come on Sunday and marvel at the grace with which the divine triune lumberjack can bring peace, hope and joy to your life.

Have a great week….TIMBER!

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

Bungee Cord 11-4-13

Hello,

     Oskeewowow!

     For those of you who do not follow college athletics, this odd word is the battle cry for the Fighting Illini of the University of Illinois.  I spent the first two years of my college career at the University of Illinois, and although I transferred out as a junior for career reasons, my heart stayed at the University of Illinois and with the friends that I had while I was there.  Even to this day….more years later than it seems….my U of I friends are still amongst my best friends even though I don’t see them very often.

     This weekend, thanks to the generosity of my brother-in-law who got some tickets, two of my Illinois friends came to my house to go to the Penn State/U of I game with Kate and me. We rendez-voused  at my house, here in enemy territory, on Friday night, laughed and joked with each other as if no time had passed since we had last been together, played ping-pong in my Illini Man Cave, and prepared ourselves to represent our team at the game.

     We woke up with the sun on Saturday, pumped!  Expecting a clog of traffic on our way to State College, Pa., we donned our orange and blue and left at 8:00 for the noon game.  The sun shone bright on the dimmed, but still beautiful colored ridges on our drive.  The drive didn’t seem like the 2 hours that Google had predicted for us as the four of us chatted all the way there like a bunch of squirrels gathering nuts.  Although the crowds of blue did not part like the Red Sea for us as we made our way onto the parking grounds, the trek to our parking space was not as arduous as we had planned.  Surprisingly enough, when we emerged from our car, the natives wearing blue and white greeted us with warmth and welcome.  And when we took our seats in the stands and the tide of blue began to rise all around us, we remained unscathed among the enemy.  There weren’t many wearing orange and blue at the game, but we did our best to cheer for our team when it made first downs, tackles and even a couple of touchdowns.  It was amazing the quiet that fell upon that stadium of 100,000+ when the Illini did something good, and somehow we hoped that our three voices filled the stillness of those moments.  We sang “Oskeewowow Illinois” when we scored, we groaned when our team fell apart (which it did far too often), we “questioned” the ref’s calls….we had a great time….a time just like we had years ago when we sat side by side in “Block I” in Memorial Stadium at the University of Illinois.

     Friends are a wonderful gift from God, often a gift from God that seems not to be effected by the passing of time, the paths life takes us on, or the bumps and bruises that we all gather along our separate ways.  I thank God for the blessing of friends.

     To spend time with dear friends magnifies, to me, the wonder of the blessing of the friendship that God has made with me in Jesus.  It magnifies the joy of joining our voices with Jesus, our friend,  in singing “Alleluia”.  It magnifies the hope in my heart when in my prayers I bring my successes and failures to Jesus’ ears, and sense the cheers and groans that we share.  It magnifies the despair that we, my friend Jesus and I, share at the injustice that goes uncalled, and the determination to make sure that it does not go un-noticed.   “What a friend we have in Jesus…..”, may not have the rousing tune of a college fight song, but it sure rings true to the depth and wonder of the friendship with Jesus that knows no passing of time, that remains no matter what path life takes, and doesn’t disappear when we become scarred by the battles that our sins stir up.

     Spending this past weekend with dear and long-time friends was wonderful!  And it opened my eyes again to the wonder and blessing of spending every moment of this life….and every moment of eternity….with one whose friendship is the greatest of all.

     By the way…..we lost the game….in overtime.  Ugh!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord  10-28-13

Hello,

     Saturday night as I was getting ready for bed, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror, and I noticed a small black dot resting on the side of my Adam’s apple.  I tried to flick it off, but it didn’t budge.  I gave it a couple of good scratches, and still it did not move.  I leaned closer to the mirror, and under closer examination, it looked as though it might be a lone black hair in my otherwise gray stubble beard.  But it didn’t feel like a hair.  Too crunchy.  Little hair like follicles seemed to be emanating from it….and that is when I realized that it was a tick.  It had buried its head into my skin, and what I was seeing was it’s body and legs protruding out.  Apparently it had not been there long, as it was still quite small, and it didn’t take much of a yank to pull it out.  I think I got it just moments before when I put my head on my dog, Duncan, using him as a pillow.

     They say that the ticks are going to be bad this fall, so I wasn’t surprised to find one embedding itself on my neck.  Ticks, as you know, live by sucking the blood from their unsuspecting host, ala Dracula of legendary vampire fame.  This particular tick that hoped to feast on my blood seemed to have been emulating the legendary Count by virtue of its choice of blood-drawing location.  Maybe the tick was engaging in an early Halloween stunt.

     As I said, once I realized what I was dealing with, it didn’t take much effort to free myself from this blood drawing tick, and in plenty of time before it could do me much damage.  Unfortunately, this tiny tick is not the only pest that seeks to live by sucking my blood, and thereby my life, from me.  Far more hungry and damaging are the things that I have done that have brought pain to me and others, the pressures of work and life that clamp down on me daily, the failings and failures that won’t let go of me.  Unlike that little tick seeking my blood, these things that seek my life-blood can dig themselves so deeply into me that they attach themselves to my heart with vice-like fangs, drawing the life right out of me.

     But Sunday morning an amazing thing happened.  I walked into church, as I do every Sunday morning, and someone saw the trouble I was facing.  Someone saw the blood sucking, life sucking parasites that had leeched onto my life.  Someone saw the waning strength, the darkening hope, and my labored steps.  And that someone said to me, “Take and drink.  This is my blood shed for you.”, and as I found myself kneeling at the altar, drinking in a sip of wine carrying the promised presence of Christ’s blood, something new took a hold of me and my heart: a transfusion of God grace and mercy.  In a world that had sought to bring me to my knees by sucking the life-blood right out of me, I found myself being lifted from my knees by one who gave his life for me.  Carrying a poison of divine forgiveness, this transfusion of Christ’s blood brought a deathblow to all those parasites that had come to the altar clinging to my heart, and a shot in the arm of courage and strength.

     Forecasters seem to be right.  This is going to be a severe tick season….little black ones and big invisible ones.  But thank God, there is one whose eyes sees those ticks, and when he, Jesus, sees them they don’t stand a chance, and we stand with more than a chance….we stand with the power and life of his blood.

     Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord 10-23-13

Hello,

     There are many beautiful places in this world, but among the most beautiful are the hills of Western Pennsylvania in the fall.  It is here where the green hills of summer are slowly and softly donned with a quilt patched with every shade of red, orange, gold, and brown.  Stitched to the roads, when one drives along these patches the leaves flutter to the ground like goose down from a pillow.  The sun sinks lower in the south softening the pinks and the oranges of the sunset.  The coats of the deer darken to match the drying golden rod and grasses, and the geese clear the clouds out of their way with their honking.  It is beautiful.

     But the gusting wind that snaps at your skin with a biting chill is a stark reminder that these days are soon to be taken from us.  The leaves will all be gone from the trees, and the forests will look like lifeless sticks.  The sky will darken earlier, and the sun will hide in the southern skies and the cold will rush in.  Snow will soon blanket the hills, covering what was warm earthy colors with monochromatic white.  Even the animals will virtually disappear as they take cover from the harsh conditions ahead.  There is a beauty to the hills of Western Pennsylvania in the winter, but it is not a warm and welcoming beauty.  It is a chilling and stark beauty.

     It is at this cusp of seasonal change that I am reminded of an important tenant of life and faith, and that is: enjoy the beauty while it is here.  So often I find myself anticipating the future, which in some cases surely will come with the coldness of winter, and in so doing, I rob myself of the joy of the beauty that is all around me…the beauty of the people in my life with which God has blessed me….the beauty of the peace that comes with a quiet and warm star-filled night….the beauty of my health that still propels me up steep hills as I walk my dog…the beauty of the place I work that gives me a chance to impact people’s lives with God’s love (remember, that is the Christian view of every occupation)…there is beauty all around me!

     Beauty, it seems to me, is a gift from God to be taken in and slowly savored.  It is at these times of great beauty that I get a glimpse of the wonder and grace of God, wonder and grace that the cold world tries to hide from my eyes.  And if I have savored the beauty of the wonder and grace of God, I find that the taste of that beauty lingers….lingers into the cold and harsh seasons of life…carrying the reminder of the wonder of grace that is still with me though the winds blow harsh.  It is this lingering taste of beauty that transforms the ugliness of a man, Jesus, hanging on a Calvary cross, turning that ice cold day into a day that we have named “Good Friday”.  And with lingering beauty that sticks to our bones, the clammy, musty, flesh-rotting stench of every grave is overpowered by the marching of Jesus feet on a day that we have named Easter.

     Surrounded by nearly unparelelled beauty, I am reminded to soak it in while it is here…..and reminded that when the cold weather hits, there is one who will be there …still warming me with the wonder and awe of his love and mercy….and that, too, is beautiful.

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger

The Bungee Cord 10-14-13

Hello,

     The first egg has arrived. Brown. Smaller than a grocer’s egg.  Kate found it in one of the laying boxes about a week ago, and since its discovery there hasn’t been another egg yet.  The egg sits in our refrigerator, and when people come to visit, it isn’t too long after their arrival that Kate asks, “Do you want to see the egg?”  No one has of yet said, “No.”

     With the arrival of our first egg, there is an innate promise of more eggs.  An egg a day per hen, so we are told.  Also, those who know about these things tell us that the size of the eggs should increase.  Four eggs a day.  Four hens.  28 eggs a week!  A virtual avalanche of eggs soon to come our way.  What will we do with all these eggs?  We will probably find more and more ways to place eggs in our diet, as will our friends.  Egg salad sandwiches….deviled eggs….eggs on salad….hard boiled eggs for lunch…egg nog to drink (there are eggs in egg nog, aren’t there?)…  Who knows what feast of eggs lies in front of us.  A promise of things to come, all held in one small egg that sits in our refrigerator.

     The Christian message finds its heart in a different arrival.  The messiah has arrived.  Brown skinned.  A simple man, smaller than the mighty rulers of the world.  Discovered in a manger by mere shepherds, along the sea shore by hard working fishermen, in towns and villages by hated tax collectors, and in an Easter garden by lowly women.  Those who know of things messianic tell us that the increase of his dominion is without end….leading to the day that “ at the name of Jesus
 every knee should bend, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 
¹¹ and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, 
to the glory of God the Father.”  A virtual avalanche of grace and mercy to come our way.  And what will we do with all this grace and mercy?  We will probably find more and more ways to place it in our lives and in the lives of others…grace and mercy to spur on hope when we have failed….grace and mercy to transform guilt when we have sinned….grace and mercy to bind enemies as friends…grace and mercy to feed the hungry, cloth the naked, and visit the outcast…grace and mercy to bring death to life, wipe away the tears from every eye, and have us dwell in the house of the LORD forever… Who knows what feast of grace and mercy lies in front of us.  A promise of things to come, all held in one small man named Jesus who lay in a manger, hung on a cross, rose from a tomb and is seated at the right hand of the Father.

    So, as I make my way the church doors on Sunday morning, let me ask, “Do you want to see the messiah?”  I hope you will say “yes” and follow me in!

Have a great week.

God’s grace and peace,

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger