Pastor's Notes

High Tide

May 18, 2022

In 1687 Isaac Newton theorized the ocean’s tides were affected by the gravitational pull of the moon and the sun. This is now the standard teaching in earth science courses. Amazing that a moon and a star from so far away can have such daily effect on a part of the earth’s natural rhythm!

Often I hear people say that many things like climate change or evolution are just a “theory.” Strictly speaking from a science perspective, gravity is still in the theory stage. Yet no one has ever thrown something heavy upward that has not come back down. There is a lot of evidence to support this “theory.”

One of our alumni has a theory. Jake Roselius, who graduated two years ago is now a doctoral student in Hamburg Germany. On a recent trip from Hamburg to his home in Fairbanks, Alaska, Jake stopped off here to say hello. When I thanked him for coming to see us, Jake became a bit thoughtful for a moment and then said, “This place has a gravitational pull to it.” Jake had noticed during his four years here how often alumni, sometimes from many years ago, would show up for a Sunday worship service.

I am not sure Jake’s statement is a theory. If so, like gravity itself, I have seen it play out so often. I remember meeting a couple one Sunday who came here to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary. They were students here in the late 1950’s and were married in our sanctuary. They have been back two more times since that visit. Frequently I hear from alumni who came through here long before my time. I have also met many former church members from long ago who also feel a need to return for a visit.

Gravitational pull. Not a bad image for how memories of college and campus ministry can affect someone even many years later. I think it also a great image for faith. Sometimes we can’t articulate why we come to worship Sunday after Sunday. Sometimes we just can’t explain our connection to a faith community or faith itself. There just seems to be a certain pull. We are drawn to faith and drawn to a faith community.

So it is with God. Some have dramatic experiences. Some don’t think about it much, they just keep praying, worshiping, and serving. Many, on the other hand also keep praying, worshiping, and serving, but also spend some time wondering and even wandering, asking questions, and trying to analyze their faith. It’s all good.

The tides need both the moon and the sun to go in and out each day. We need God’s pull whether through experience, intellect, emotion, or some combination of these. God is not afraid pull us toward God’s self, and each other. Like tides, God can use more than one way to pull us. God knows we can’t do it on our own, so God keeps tugging. Like the tides, sometimes we go in and sometimes out. Sometimes for us it is also a daily thing. This, however, is not a theory. It is how God works.

The Buck Stops Close to Home

May 10, 2022

“The buck stops here!” So read the sign on President Harry S. Truman’s Oval Office desk. I don’t think this slogan was coined by the 33rd President of the United States. I think he just liked it, agreed with it, and decided to let all know that as the one at the top of the US political food chain, responsibility began and ended with his office, and therefore with him.

Most would agree, would we not? Leaders at the top are responsible for what happens from top to bottom of whatever people, organization, or group which they lead. I have experienced this as a pastor. Numerous times, in churches with multiple custodians, I have been approached by someone in a huff who says to me, “Pastor, there is no toilet paper in the women’s restroom!” Over the years I have learned to respond,” That’s funny, there was plenty last time I was in there.”

It has become politically popular lately to not talk about race. Laws have been and are being passed essentially forbidding such conversation and dialog in school rooms. One might be able to mention slavery, even say it was “bad”, but don’t get into the horrid details, to say nothing of the cruelty of Jim Crow and segregation which followed. Reconstruction? One has to leave out any talk of race, despite the fact it was often at the heart of such reconstructing of the US following the Civil War. Such talk, it is said, will lead to more racism.

It would seem the buck is not stopped; instead it is buried. Who has been in power of our nation and culture from the day the Pilgrims landed, and the time of Jamestown’s founding? White men, mostly. Somewhat under the protection of this umbrella of power were white women and children. Left out in the elements were those of color, particularly African-Americans and Native Americans.

Check the stats. Many things have improved, but racism persists. We see it in employment statistics and housing numbers. The very schools prohibiting such conversations are often in well to do predominantly white areas with much better academic success often due in part to better funding. Many more numbers in various other areas continue to bear out the racism endemic to our culture.

Why would it not be endemic to our culture? Like the stereotypical ostrich, if our heads are in the sand on this issue, what improvement can we expect? Will we continue on until demands are made of us, or are we willing and able to dialog, question, learn, and grow?

The buck stops with us. That is, with white Americans. It is time to stop passing the buck and time to make it cease, acknowledge our responsibility and deal with it. Why are we afraid to claim any or very little responsibility?

The Bible, actually, does not seem to know anything about race. Those who are different and those considered enemies are those of different faiths, not races. Traditions have sprung up over one of Noah’s sons, Ham, tradition says, was black. Yet there is no biblical evidence for this. Likewise one of the three Magi (Matthew doesn’t even say there were 3…that too is tradition) in Matthew is said to have been black. Again, no evidence within or without scripture for this. Whatever their race, scripture doesn’t care.

Yet the Bible has much to help us with racism. The Bible is big on repentance, a jubilee year of debt forgiveness and more, loving one’s neighbor, loving and including those different, loving the enemy, and forgiveness and love. We read of Samaritan’s doing good. We just see them as other than Israelites. Those listening to Jesus praise the Samaritan’s deeds had to be seething that he made their most hated infidel neighbors into heroes.

Mistrust of others, suspicion, blame, cruelty and prejudice are not new to humanity. What would be new is to acknowledge and own them. Only then can something be done about them. Time to make the buck stop.

Make Us Servants Again…And Again…

May 3, 2022

The Old Testament has many references to a promised Messiah and a better age. Really, it is not a major thing in the Old Testament and Jewish writings. It would be held out and emphasized as promise mostly when things were getting tough for Israel and Israelites. Exile in Babylon, Roman occupation to name a few difficult instances.

Today Reform Jews are looking less for a Messiah and more for a Messianic Age. Many Christians are as well. Some fundamentalists think if Israel takes over the entire Holy Land and rules as they once did, Jesus will return. Therefore these folks support just about any and all forms of aggression by Israel while simultaneously having any genuine concern for Israel and Israelis.

Along came Jesus. Born in a barn, followed and rejected by many, eventually crucified, dying the death of a criminal. On the third day he was raised. Yet in both the life of Jesus and in the resurrection period after crucifixion, the job description of Jesus was not that of the Messiah long promised by prophets.

Israel thought the Messiah would be a king…a politician with armies to fight the Romans and surrounding neighbors like the Samaritans. The Messiah would politically and militarily make Israel a dominant force in the region once more. No more persecution, no more second class citizenship, no more paying token homage to Roman gods and emperor. God was to restore Israel. To use a phrase from today, “God was going to make Israel great again.”

In Jesus God did not make Israel or the church great or great again. Certainly not in the ways the world sees as great, that is, not in terms of strength, power, and might, stomping out all enemies and restoring Israel’s power.

God actually has a different definition of great. We see it in Jesus. The world may see Jesus as weak. The disciples and followers of Jesus, the church, view Jesus differently.
Jesus was strong…not mighty with armies and worldly power, but with God’s way, loving, caring, exercising compassion, and, above all serving. Jesus’ power and might was in the ability to change lives, not dominate them.

The church is not great when it dominates. The church is not great when it excludes those seen as lesser and those understood to be different or weak. The church is great when it sees value in the least, the last, and the lost.

The church finds greatness in Jesus. That is, the church and followers of Jesus are to find greatness in lowering oneself and serving. Often we provide welcome to members and students who do not find such welcome in other churches. We provide welcome to those unfamiliar with the story of Jesus but find themselves intrigued and have questions…lots of questions. The strength and power is not found in us and our excellent or clear faith and works. God is not out to make you and I great again. That would result in failure. We weren’t great in the first place and cannot do what we need to do in regard to God without God and without Jesus.

Neither pray nor hope to be made great again. Not for us, the church, or any gathering of Christians. Pray and work to be made servants again…..and again….and again.

Stonehenge or Bust

April 26, 2022

I have never seen Stonehenge. It has long been on my list of places to go and things to see. I wonder now if London and Windsor are as close as I will ever get to Stonehenge. So many things I had once hoped to do, see or be have been cast along the side of life’s road. Others have come and gone. Some were as great or better than anticipated, others just a brief blip on the radar screen, and, of course, some disappointed.

Many in older age look back and reflect upon both what they have done and what they have left undone. Young adults instead look ahead to what they hope to do in the years ahead. I wonder how often our looking ahead ends up matching, at least to some degree, our looking back.

I notice for myself I spend more time looking in the rear view mirror now than I once did. For many decades it was eyes on the road ahead with only an occasional glance behind to see if any of life’s traffic was catching up to me.

People, and it seems, Americans in particular, are all about goals and accomplishments; about doing. One of the things those of us who have had some time of living have realized is that life is not all about what we have done or might yet do. Important as where we have gone and what we have seen may be, that, even coupled with what we have done, is not enough to summarize a life. We are more than what we have done and where we have been. And we are more than our potential.

Every time I meet with a family to talk about their recently deceased loved one as we plan a memorial service or funeral, I am struck by the person’s life. I am often struck by what God was up to in this person and how God used a very unique person and personality to touch others. After about 250+ of these experiences over the years, I have yet to find a formula to share that would be helpful to anyone as to how to use their life so God may touch others. I have yet to discover a step 1,2,3 program to follow so one might have maximum impact and God have optimum opportunity to work through a person.

There may be, however, one thing I have seen in common among those many saints before us that is useful: be yourself. Be the person God has created. Use the gifts God has given you. Don’t worry about gifts you do not have. Sleep well in spite of things left undone or places and experiences not had. God didn’t create any of us to be like some other. Nor did God create us to check off deeds or places on some scoresheet. God created us to be like us.

I smile sometimes listening to people talk about teachers or family members. Often they poke some fun at little quirks or, shall we say, unique habits some other has. Yet as they speak, their mouth curls up into a smile. Somehow even the quirks and strange habits of those around whom they spend time seem to mean something to them too. There is an appreciation for people as they are or were. God can even use our oddest characteristics to touch others.

In this Easter season the scriptures proclaim new life. The old is put to death and the new rises. Yet God does not raise up some new strange person. God raises up the same person, gaffes, quirks, head shaking moments and all. God raises up unique persons to continue to be a unique person however new.

Many times talking about someone’s strange ways is a way to say we care about that person. That person and their life means something or meant something to us. It means so much we even, and perhaps especially, recall the strangeness as well as the more expected way someone touched us. God doesn’t simply smile at our strange ways, God jumps in and makes use of them. God will jump in and make use of them. What matters most is not what we have done or might do, but whose we are. What matters most is that we are children of God. God will use us, God does use us.

Inspiration, Motivation, Perspiration

April 19, 2022

Who has inspired you? Who has motivated you? These words are not interchangeable. That is, they are not synonyms. One can be inspired while not at all motivated to change or to take something on. One can be motivated without inspiration. In fact, motivation can come from a negative experience. We can, for example, become angry and then become motivated to act without any inspiration.

Too often the church sees its role as an agent for inspiration. It can be that as inspiration certainly has its place. Sometimes all you and I can do in regards to God is be inspired and awed. Many times there is no adequate response except to stand there and drop our jaw in amazement. I suspect many are inspired by their first view of the Grand Canyon. It can be overwhelming to try and take it all in. It can be the same for God as well.

The Christian faith as proclaimed and taught by the church, is to be more than inspiring. It is also to be motivating. It is to bring newness and change, lift up the downtrodden and work for justice. It can be challenge and strength so we might love even to the point of loving the stranger and the enemy. It can push us to working hard to sin less and to live as God would have us live.

The Christian faith is not meant to leave us inspired. It is intended to motivate us to become a follower of Jesus Christ and reflect this Jesus in our own words, works, and lives. The Christian faith is intended to create in us a new person and to have such creation be an ongoing, life-long work.

Easter Sunday has come and gone. The Easter season is now upon us. The season of gospel stories reporting appearances by the resurrected Jesus. Doubting Thomas missed the first such encounter in Luke, but was there for the second. Two travelers on the road to Emmaus walked with Jesus but did not immediately recognize Jesus. On a beach, Jesus grills fish and instructs his fishing disciples where to cast their nets. The resurrected Jesus was busy! Resurrection, new life was more than just escaping death. There was work to do!

I wonder if many of these gospel accounts were written so we would not leave Easter Sunday and the empty tomb armed only with inspiring thoughts and feelings. The resurrected Jesus is present and forgives, sends, and commissions. Easter is to be both inspiring and motivating. We stand in awe and we go forth to proclaim and serve.

Who knows? Maybe you and I can motivate a few folks long life’s discipleship journey. That’s how the resurrected Christ works now. That is how the resurrected Christ is present and continues to send and commission. Dropped jaws are fine but we can’t say much when they remain in that pose. Busy hands, listening ears, and mouths at work proclaiming good news motivate. Careful! But we need to be careful: inspiration combined with motivation may lead to perspiration!