Pastor's Notes

Stop! Whatever you are doing right now, just stop and freeze for a moment. Now, imagine 2,000 years from now someone finds you just as you are sitting or standing there in a frozen posture. What might they learn from you?

Now, look around. What surrounds you right now? A computer? A desk? Or are you using a laptop in the family room or on a kitchen table? What else is in the room? A lamp? Photos? A defrosting roast? Imagine once more someone finds this room 2,000 years hence. What might they glean from their discovery about American life in 2022?

I wondered such things while watching a documentary concerning recent excavations in the ruins of Pompey, an Italian city destroyed by an eruption from Mt. Vesuvius in 79 CE. People and animals were found just as they were. Archeologists used to think the eruption was in summer. Now seeing the clothing worn by those entrapped in volcanic ash they think it most likely was fall as the clothing was a bit heavier than that worn in a hot, humid, Italian, summer.

A chariot was unearthed along with a horse hitched to it. Other horses were discovered. A hasty attempt to flea? Caught in the midst of being harnessed or unharnessed? It’s amazing what has been discovered. Even graffiti was found scribbled on exterior wall artwork.

I wonder if the biggest discovery was that we in 2022 are not that much different than those of 79 CE. People were just going about their day-to-day life when the monstrous volcano let loose. Some, like those refusing to make life safer for themselves and others during our pandemic, refused to leave. “They weren’t afraid of no stinkin’ volcano!” Or, on the other hand, some seemed to be running around looking for loved ones they didn’t want to be left behind, sacrificing themselves. We have seen similar responses in crisis of denial, great and heroic love, and common sense that made them decide to flee to safety.

So, it might be what someone might learn from you and I two millennia hence is that we were not so different from them and their time. We might be caught with smart phone in hand, looking down at it, or typing away on a keyboard. Perhaps one might be found loading or unloading the dishwasher or another slicing bread. Day to day tasks might differ over the centuries, but day to day tasks always seem to be around.

To my knowledge no one has yet to dig up God from the caked plaster of Pompey. But God was there. God was there buried in ash, choking out the dust and being crushed by its weight. God was where God’s people were. God always has been. God always will be. God chooses to be there with God’s people. God wants to be there and willingly takes on even the suffocating mantle of volcanic ash.

I am not sure what people might learn from any discovery of us in a distant future. I doubt they will even wonder about God much less find God in our kitchens, living rooms, or offices. It doesn’t really matter, does it? No, because find God or not, God is there. God is in our day to day, our high points and our low times. God is there when we recognize God’s presence or feel God to be absent. God is willing to choke or laugh, cry or rejoice. God is there when we are at our computers, checking texts on our phone, slicing bread, defrosting roasts, and emptying the dishwasher. The only freedom God seems to lack is that of abandoning God’s people.

In the 1950’s a popular book was titled, “Fear Strikes Out”. It was an autobiography of a major league baseball player, Jim Piersall, who struggled both privately and publicly with mental health issues. (The book was made into a movie, with Karl Malden playing Piersall’s father) After taking a time out to deal with his mental issues, Piersall had many more years as a successful, if still colorful, player.

We live in an age of great fear. Many fears are emphasized over and over by media and politicians alike. We fear terrorism, immigrants, the ending of democracy, global warming, inflation, and on goes the list. These fears then are compounded with some of our own personal fears of health, relationships, and family. What fears could you add to the list?

An honest appraisal of human history need not go very deeply into history to discover there has never been a time free of fear. Viktor Frankl, psychiatrist and psychologist, a survivor of a holocaust camp, and one who lost many family members in such camps, said about fear, “Fear makes come true that which one is afraid of”. When I read this quote, I was reminded of something similar from former Tonight Show Host, the late Johnny Carson, “Choose your enemies carefully, You become them.”

I have found both quotes to be true far too often in both my life and in the lives near and far of those I have witnessed over the years. All kinds of walls are built to protect us from some danger. In so doing as we hide in bitterness, fear, and anger behind our walls, we act and react and behave like those of whom we are afraid.

Christians ought to know better. “Fear not” says Jesus. It is not that there was nothing to fear in Jesus’ day nor that being a follower of Jesus insulates us from fear or protects us from fearful things happening to us. It is that fear can paralyze and change us into something other than a called follower and servant of Jesus.

I wonder if the reverse of Frankl and Carson’s quotes for the Christian might be something like, “Love makes true that which one hopes?” or “Chose your neighbors carefully, you will be cared in turn by them?” You can play around with either of these and no doubt improve on them, but the point is, if we want people to be a certain way, perhaps as followers of Jesus in behooves us to treat them in particular Christian ways.

Yes, there no doubt is a cost in such Christian treatment. Are we not called to pick up a cross and follow? That is, it seems a part of our living and serving as Jesus would have us do assumes some cost on our part. We may certainly fear such a cross, but do we fear it so much we spend more time protecting than we do serving? Do we spend more time insulating than engaging?

In some ways the Civil Rights walks and protests in the 1950’s and 1960’s were about even more than Civil Rights. They were excellent examples of a willingness to face clubs, firehoses, and police dogs as acts of love for the betterment of many. I have actually seen some scars of both black and white marchers in those days. They are scars not worn with great hubris, but instead worn with an attitude of having done what needed to be done.

Jim Piersall struggled with some mental issues his entire life, yet because of his willingness to admit to himself and his fans that mentally he was ill, Piersall was able to return to his life and go on in a way he could not have had he not been so forthright.
What might you and I do to make our fears strike out?

Recently I read that Russia has now made it illegal to teach or even talk about the discovery, some years ago, of mass graves in Katyn Forest, Russia. Buried were Polish leaders slaughtered by Soviet troops under Stalin’s orders after WWII ended. This made me wonder if we, too, have not learned many of history’s lessons taught to us in the 20th Century.

Just think of how many issues of the 20th Century seem to have arisen from the corpse of history to live once more in our time. In my early years I well remember air raid tests while at home and duck ‘n cover drills in school. I have yet to see either make their return, but now in the news most days are threats and counter threats regarding possible use of nuclear weapons. Will there be a Cuban Missile Crisis de ja vu?

European nations prior to WWI and WWI were mostly independent and competitive. Today’s European Union has warts and hiccups that seem preferable to the various issues leading to the starts of two horrific and deadly wars. Yet some appear to want to go back to failed models of the last century simply for points of pride and self-improvement. Can “Our Country First” lead once more into horrific conflict?

The NRA, once a leader in gun control and responsible gun use, has transformed into a mouthpiece for gun manufacturers accepting the deaths of school children as the cost of freedom. Have we become so used to such shootings they no longer motivate us to do something about them?

Think of the progress made in Civil Rights in the last century. Now we want to prohibit even talking about why such progress (and more) was, and is, needed. Do we actually believe progress can be made without talk about why it has been and is needed?

Air pollution, still a major problem made some progress in the last century due to emission restrictive devises on cars and smokestacks in addition to other environmental changes. I remember almost missing the chance to attend a Dodger game in Los Angeles in the late 60’s due to smog so thick and heavy it was hovering in the upper-level seats. The game was paused until a determination was made to resume play. Unfazed by progress made there is a move to roll back many emission requirements that have made vast improvements.

Democracy once a cultural value despite some of its complications, is under attack. As a child I was taught how different we were from the Soviet Union; now we seem to want to emulate its authoritarianism in the name of law and order.

Our Christian faith has a word for knowledge gained from history’s difficult stories: repentance. Martin Luther described the Christian life as a life of repentance. When we learn of a past wrong, we are to repent. The Greek word in the New Testament for repent means, literally, to turn around; that is to learn, change, and grow. Only those able to repent can learn the lessons of history to prevent their reoccurrence. Others remain in their ignorance and cover up or blame others leaving the lessons of history for the pages of books, not for the improvement of lives.

Of course, there is much need to celebrate the good events of history. There seems no shortage of praise for things done rightly. But without repentance for those events, people, and issues of wrong, history is simply a shallow, one-sided tale. Those with trust in a gracious God can repent. We can learn from all of history. Why are we afraid to admit, dialogue, and work together?

Scar is more than the name of the evil lion in Disney’s “Lion King.” A scar is something that remains on our skin or in our psyche from something painful. Scars are not all equal in visibility or pain.

What scars do you carry around? If those scars could talk, what stories would they share? A childhood fall? Some serious or some routine surgery? The loss of someone or something greatly cherished? A hurtful deed or word done or said to you? Sometimes a person’s life at a given moment is a scar. I think, for example of depression. Depression many times begins after a great loss, either real or imagined.

Some scars may make us chuckle a bit. When asked what that scar on one’s arm is, the response may be “I can’t believe I did that.” Another scar may be a mark of pride: “Oh, that little thing? I got that sliding into home with the winning run.” Some scars are from times when we remember only too clearly how we scarred another.

Scars can serve as a monument to some past or even present pain. They serve as proof that we have lived. We have been both victim and victimizer, we have been heroes and goats, careful and clumsy, healthy and ill.

I can’t help but wonder if we have no scars, does it mean we have not lived? That is, does it mean that we have not truly lived? Have we been so careful or so fortunate that pain has somehow escaped us? Were that the case, would ours have been thus far a wholly human life?

Scars are our reminder of the cost of living. We cannot forge strong and loving ties with people and not get hurt. Tears of grief are part of the price we pay for loving someone. To take away those tears would be to take away the love. Physical scars are the reminder of life being lived both by being immersed in life and by sometimes not being careful in life. Some physical scars from surgery can be a reminder of a fearful time and hard work to keep living.

It is no wonder Thomas in the closed room following Jesus’ resurrection, wished to see the scars of Jesus. Thomas wanted to make sure it was the same Jesus who was crucified; that is the same Jesus who once lived and walked the earth living a human life. Thomas wasn’t doubting. Thomas wanted to check Jesus’ credentials to make sure Jesus was still one of them. No doubt a completely heavenly Jesus would have had scars disappear.

We carry around our scars, we live and will no doubt acquire more. Can one live life without gathering scars? Perhaps the better question is this: “Ought one live without receiving scars?” That is, can we say we have truly lived if we have a life without scars?

In “Lion King” it is the evil one named Scar. For followers of Jesus it is not evil to carry around scars… They are simply signs that we have lived.