Pastor's Notes

Prepare Yourself

November 30, 2021

What if you are the one who is to come? When is the last time, if ever, you have put before you this thought: “What kind of person will I be 5/10/? years from now?” Perhaps we want to pad our pension, savings, and investments for those future years. Maybe get the kid(s) through college or get ourselves through college and/or grad school.
The movie, “City Slickers” dealt with male friends becoming middle- aged and struggling with a mid-life crisis, I think they had it all wrong. They kept looking back at what they had lost and were losing. Billy Crystal’s character in the movie said he would never look this good again, feel this good, or be able to do in the near future the kinds of things he could now do. Looking ahead at his future was based solely, it seemed, on the past he was losing.

In Advent we prepare for the baby Jesus, indeed the One who is to come. We prepare in our hearts, we prepare in worship with hymns, sermons, an Advent Wreath and Advent scriptures. Even in the midst of our cultural preparations for Christmas, we also occasionally see ourselves preparing for the arrival of the infant Christ child.

Might this season of Advent teach us something? Might it teach us preparation is good and necessary for desired outcomes? Baseball Hall of Fame manager, Casey Stengel, frequently said to be more lucky than good, was fond of saying, “Luck is the residue of design.” An overstatement to be sure. Yet a statement that affirms preparation.

While this pastor is fond of saying, “If you want to make God laugh, tell God your plans”, preparation generally speaking, delivers better results than no or little preparation.

So, can the One who comes push us a bit to look at our own life which, while it is happening, is also, at the same time, coming? What preparations do we need to make? What kind of person do we hope will be the one we become? Exercise and diet, among other healthy activities can prepare us to be a healthy person. What might help us become the better kind of person whom we hope to be? With what, and with whom, must we surround ourselves to become that person?

Personally I am a reader. If it has print, I read it. However, I must be careful with my choice of reading materials. Left on my own without much reflection, I continue to read the same kinds of books, periodicals, internet readings, and newspapers. All this can do is make me more of who I am. I need to go outside my interests and, at times, even outside my own values. I need to have my readings do more than reflect who I am, I need them to shape and impact me. Some of that impact needs to be an understanding of how those quite different from me think and react. What kind of different person might God want me to become?

What if you are the one who is to come? Prepare. Quoting the old Advent hymn, “Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord”, such needs to be paramount in our preparation. What kind of person might God be calling us to be? If Advent makes us look to the future both near and far, might we include ourselves in that future? Might we see the God calling us into this future is one who will be there both in our travels and in our arrival? Prepare ye! The God of Jesus knows something about coming.

Too Much Religion?

November 23, 2021

Imagine! Martin Luther had a problem with religion and with being religious! Writing in 1538 on Psalm 51 (A psalm for cleansing & pardon: “Create in me a clean heart O God…”) said “A person may be pious and not Christian.” In a sermon on Matthew 21:1-9 he warns against “too much religion” lest we “lose Christ.”

What might Luther mean here? Luther’s point is in synch with his theology of grace; a theology that says our faith is all about Christ, not us. Any kind of saving done is by Christ and Christ’s work, not ours. Not our deep emotions, not our pious and even good works, not our right belief, but God’s grace granted to us in Christ….not even our right stances on important issues of life and living.

“Too much religion, but no Christ.” What does that mean in 2021? It means, to paraphrase author and professor emeritus of Boston University, Carter Lindberg, we too often use our feelings of faith to “baptize” other areas of life we affirm. Our country becomes a godly country never in need of repentance. Protestantism is never in need of reformation. You and I are “all right” after all. Often there is little to guide or correct us other than our feelings, intuition, politics, or tradition.

Luther himself asked he be judged not on his person. If you have read very many of Luther’s works you would be glad of that. He asked to be judged by his writings, many of which in his later years, are also problematic to say the least. Luther hoped others would be able to say of himself, “Whether Luther is a rascal or a saint I do not care; his teaching is not his, it is Christ’s.”

Perhaps the first step to shedding our religion and pious ways is to come to accept a level of comfort with this same wish Luther had for the judgement of his followers. Can we come to not care if others consider us rascals or saints? Can we hope instead in some of what we do and what we leave behind others catch a glimpse of Christ?

Pieties are interesting. Growing up where I did I was able to witness a vast array of ethnic groups: Italians, Germans, Slovaks, Poles, Ukrainians, Hungarians, Russians, and even quite a gathering of Tiroleans. All of the same Roman faith but with such different and differing pieties! I also noticed those Lutherans and German Reformed more recently descended from Germans had entirely different pieties than those called Pennsylvania Dutch who had been settled in this country far longer. German piety, for example, said, “No swearing, ever!” Pennsylvania Dutch were known to swear freely in church.

There are reasons for piety, our heartfelt, sincere response to God and God’s grace. Many of us have our own unique individual acts of faith. Perhaps a special prayer or action before or after receiving Holy Communion. For some, crossing oneself is a personal piety, for others refraining from doing so is such. In themselves they are not the issue. Luther left the safety of the Wartburg Castle where he had been hidden, to chastise his followers for destroying church artworks including stained glass, crucifixes, and statues. He demanded to know why someone would destroy something that might aid in the expression of a person’s faith.

Our pious expressions are not the issue. The problem is too often we hide behind them so we don’t have to deal with the real “me”. The one God knows and sees and the one we try to cover up a bit before others if not before God. In the midst of all our faithful feelings we need to also remember not to lose Christ in the actions. The sign of the cross is about baptism….into Christ’s death and resurrection. Standing for the gospel is not simply ritual, but a sign of honor and respect for Christ, proclaimed in the gospels. Repentance is not a quid pro quo; it is trust that Christ is who Christ said he is and God’s forgiveness is as promised.

So, bend, bow, repeat certain words, cross or not, stand, kneel, close your eyes in prayer or keep them open; do your own thing or not. Fight for your just cause, but remember it is not about us…it is about Christ, the one who calls not for our religion but for our faith and trust.

To Become or Not to Become

November 16, 2021

Has anyone ever become a Christian before they were a Christian? Some may, as adults or adolescents, consent to becoming a Christian, but the becoming then takes a lifetime. Author and speaker, the late Maya Angelou, was once asked if she was a Christian. Her response: “Not yet!” Indeed.

One of the things I share in pre-marital counseling especially with those whose parents have not yet had the experience of being in-laws, is that it is the couple’s job to break them in. Their parents have never been here before. Their little girl/boy has really grown up and become independent. How to act and relate? It is a learning process for both newlyweds and newly made in-laws. The newlyweds will have to let the in-laws know what they consider proper and improper behavior in their relationship. It is all new ground. How to handle holidays? Visits? Are they to be drop by anytime or call first? As time moves on with children and aging, the issues become larger.

So far you, dear reader, are most likely nodding in agreement at such profundity. Well, maybe not. However, most likely I have not said anything feather-ruffling. Okay, here I go. Be ready for your plume to be ruffled. If the above is true, why then do we seem to think immigrants new to America should arrive as Americans? That is, they should have the same language, culture, values, and belief systems as do we. What if we viewed becoming an American as also a process? The culture by its warm embrace of new arrivals can establish both American value #1 and American culture # 1. We believe our history is one of immigrants and that over all immigrants…those arriving NOT as Americans…are a large part of what makes this a great country.

I remember my 5th or 6th generation American and great-grandfather. The last of his family arrived in 1740. He was born shortly after the Civil War. English was still his second language. Pennsylvania Dutch was his primary form of verbal communication. Yet the nation had been patient with him and the ancestors who bore him. He worked on the railroad and lost his leg in an accident with a caboose. He was a truant officer in his township. Two histories of the town list him and his family as “a prominent family in our town”. Thick accent and all, someone seen as very much one of them…an American.

As Christians, much less as Americans, we get into great trouble whenever we think someone ought to begin as already accomplished at whatever it is they might be starting. Do we really think Babe Ruth hit a home run the first time he grabbed a bat as a child? As Christians we begin as a child of God claimed by God in baptism. We have yet to be molded by beliefs, values, and morals held dear by Christianity and Christians. But we were and have been held by a community of believers. Such is a process and it takes time. I know for me, it continues to take time. Like Maya Angelou, I am not quite there yet. I will have to wait for after this life when God takes me there.

Such an insight ought to give us all a little patience with any on a journey to becoming. I confess to being as impatient as any on such matters. Living in the West there are always so many new people. Often they are also new at their jobs and need time and more experience to better learn their tasks. As someone who still wonders how my first congregation put up with all my greenhorn mistakes, I should be more patient with those new to their craft. I wish I could say I always am, but alas, too many times, not so. But take heart…God is patient. Can we take from God’s great store of patience and use it toward others on their various journeys? Can we be part of the journey of others on their way to becoming?

The Password Is…

November 9, 2021

Passwords! How many do you have? We need them for email, our phones, too many websites and businesses to even count, and so much more. Even our doctor needs one, not to mention our car, the electronic devices controlling our locks, alarm, door bell and other such devices at home. Oh, and don’t forget to change them frequently and make certain you do not ever use the same password in more than one account/device.

My experience with passwords is that they can be absolutely exhausting some times. Too numerous, too complicated, and too necessary. Without them we have no access to much of our modern day life.

Sometimes it seems to me that many of us Christians see Jesus as our password to God. Aha! I have a relationship with Jesus! I have an access to God that many others lack. I just fold those hands and Jesus belongs to me alone. It reminds me of many sibling rivalries that seem to end with, “Mom/Dad loves me best!”

With Jesus we do have a very special access into God. But unlike passwords, this access is not secret and is not the sole possession of any one person or group. We have insight into God that those without Jesus may not have. We can indeed be grateful for that insight. Yet such insight, such access is not like many of our passwords a privilege that we have either earned or been granted just for us.

It seems to me one of the insights Jesus gives us into God is that God is God of all; God is a god who loves and cares for all with no special persons or groups. With God, as we see in Jesus, all, not just us, are special.

The insight we have into God through Jesus is not for exclusivity, privilege, or status. It is so that knowing this all-embracing God whom we worship and follow, we can be those all-inclusive children of God reaching out in demonstration of this wide embrace of God for all.

Passwords by definition must be kept to ourselves. We hide them in secure places on our computers or in small password books cleverly hidden in our home or office. Some we even commit to memory. In Jesus we see a God who is not secret and not hidden.
We see a God who reaches out to those whom many would rather avoid; a God who embraces those who make us and others uncomfortable. We see a God who works to hack our password codes to get through to us so that we might in turn get through to some others.

Jesus. We might want to know more about God, but Jesus is all we need to know about God. Even those without such a password can have access. And God can’t be hacked or disrupted.

The Role of a Lifetime

November 2, 2021

“If grace is true, you must bear a true and not fictitious sin”. So said Martin Luther. Luther went on to say God does not save only fictitious sinners, but those who are real sinners; bold sinners. This is why he could also say, “Sin boldly, and believe all the more.” In other words, perhaps our worst sinning occurs when we “sit on our hands”, failing to act instead of plunging in with the hope we are serving.

We are pretty good at this, are we not? How often have you heard (or said?), “I know that I am a sinner, but……” and then go on to make someone else a worse sinner than the one speaking (or us)? Too often! Ours, after all, seem to be trivial or lesser sins compared to someone else. Therein lies both the problem and the theological misunderstanding.

With such talk covering up or making less of our sinful deeds, we allow our faith response to the life, death, and Jesus to morph into a simple moralism. Our sin, along with the sin of others simply becomes a description of right or wrong, good or bad. People, then, become divided into similar categories. There are good people and bad people.

This is a complete misunderstanding of sin. There may be good or bad deeds, but if sin infects us all, that is if all are truly sinners, how does one label a person good or bad?
Does God? Where do you see that in scripture? Where does Jesus say such a thing?

It would seem sin in its most original state achieves its best work at controlling us and leading in those times it works to deny our sinfulness. It pretends to allow us to admit certain sinful deeds almost as a boast, but fails then to convict us on such evidence as sinners. We become good people, after all.

Certainly some sinful actions are worse than others. Some cause more harm. I would much rather have someone hate me than kill me, though both are sinful. Yet both flow from the same source….a deep wrongness within us; a bubbling, churning “Me first” that brews deep inside us all.

“If grace is true…..” If grace is true, we can be honest and open to each other and especially to God. No band aids, camouflage, crutches, or make-up necessary. We can be that very plain person we are when we awake each morning for that initial glance in the mirror. Eyelids may droop, hair can be askew, and eyes glazed. That is who we can be before God, the very person we work hard to cover up and not allow the world to see. Grace is more powerful than our rationalizations, cover ups, and denial. At times the world may buy our disguise, but God does not. Grace does not.

Occasionally we may feel as though our life could be more real, our joy deeper, and our purpose stronger. Perhaps it is because we are putting too much energy into being someone and something other than who we are. To play a role is one thing; to live a life that is true and deep quite another.

Sin boldly. Be aware and admit from where that sin flows. Own our sin! Hold on to the grace that frees us, yes, fees us to even sin again. Bear a true sin. In Jesus Christ, God has already borne a true grace.