Pastor's Notes

I’m more than old enough to remember a game show called, “Password.”  The host was the late Allen Ludden, better known as Betty White’s husband. There were four contestants, two of whom were usually quasi celebrities. 

The host, Ludden, would hand out a word to each celebrity, who carefully, guarding the word from their game partner would try to give clues to what the word was and their partners would respond with guesses.  Meanwhile Ludden’s voice came to TV viewers whispering, “The password is (he would name the password)” Back and forth they would go until someone guessed the word. They would then switch and the celebrity had to guess the next word. And on it went.

Yes, I remember when Password was a game show. Now passwords are a form of life partner.  We have a password for our email account, one or maybe more for the bank, a password for our computer, our insurance accounts, and various apps. Don’t forget the password for Zoom, Ticketmaster, the newspaper, credit cards, airlines, and the App store, where….guess what? ….we need a password to get a new app or change an old one. But don’t worry! There is a place to store all those passwords. Yes, that’s right, we would then need a password to get our passwords. But if you forget the password to your passwords, your life is doomed! It would seem that in forgetting this password, if you would not be cut off from your life, you would at least be cut off from your lifeblood. 

People use all kinds of passwords. They may include their birthdate, children’s names, pet’s name, an old address, a current address, something cute, or something that says who they are. Computer security gurus tell us to stay away from biblical passwords, especially passwords that include Jesus as these are often easily hacked. 

Imagine. Jesus as your password. The Freudian in me thinks that using such a password might reveal at least a hope that Jesus might function as a password into some other place in the future. That is how Jesus is often understood. Jesus is simply our ticket, our password or passport into some better beyond.  

If that is so, what do we do in the meantime? What good are all those other passwords and the good things that can come from the places we use them? Why worry about pandemics and hunger, and justice, and love, and racism, and …and…. when our ticket is punched and our password granted? 

Jesus did not come to either be or give us a password. Jesus came to be out in the open, visible; seen and heard. Jesus came as much for any present we experience as for any future we might have.  As followers our call is not to give out passwords to God or the Kingdom of God, but to live out that which has been freely and openly given to us. We also do not need a password to or for each other. Our password for each other is brother or sister. Anyone who grew up with a sibling knows there are no secrets in households. There are no passwords. All is in the open.

While passwords may be a partner in today’s life, their function is to help us as individuals to live better in our life. Jesus, on the other hand, is to relate to us so we can live better together in human relationship in this world and this life.

Passwords, it would seem, are to keep others away from us. Jesus is the antithesis. For Christians, then, the password is not believe or love or hope or joy.  The password for Christians is “follow”.  Using that as our password can allow all those other passwords to fall into place. 

Pastor Gary

It appears my Bucket List is in serious need of a re-write. There were and there are many things I would like to do in the remainder of my life. Those who know me, know not only do I look quite a bit ahead, I also frequently have a scheduled idea of what I would like to do, and when I would like to do it. One associate pastor with whom I served, said she had never seen anyone like me who seemed to live in the future.  An interesting comment about someone who greatly appreciates looking back through the lens of history. 

Yes, our current COVID crisis seems to have messed with my schedule. Now I’m going to have to live a couple more years longer than I had planned so I can advance my Bucket List itinerary. More vegetables, less beef. More walking and swimming. 

As I thought about all this I was forced to realize, of course, the pandemic is “less interruption and more disruption” as one of my colleagues likes to say. That is, we are not in a period of intermission where we will soon return as we were.  Our lives will be changed permanently. What changes will take place is anyone’s guess but an even greater emphasis on technology seems, in general, to be quite likely. 

I have also been forced to realize this is not at all about me. Everyone’s life has been affected. Everyone’s life will be changed. Everyone may need to fine tune their Bucket List. As one who is fond of saying, “If you want to make God laugh, tell God your plans,” I am now forced to heed my own words. Plans and goals are good. Yet plans and goals are also hopes and not blueprints for exactly what will happen and how it will occur. 

This brings people like myself….disciples of the Bucket List….back to being disciples of Jesus. Life for followers of Jesus is not a Bucket List tally sheet. Life for followers of Jesus is first and foremost a calling. It is a calling to follow. It is a calling to serve. In baptism we were claimed by God and called to live like a member of God’s family.

Our COVID crisis may mess with our Bucket List, but it did not mess with God’s call for us to serve God by serving others. 

My Bucket List will need serious editing. Perhaps the list itself will have to go or at least become much more generalized. In its place I need to put a “Buck it up List”.  I need to buck up and remember who I am. I am a child of God.  Regardless of the state of my Bucket List, my status with God will not change. I need to buck up and remember what I am called to do: Live out the Good News God both gives and entrusts to me. 

Fortunately for me, and for all of us. God does not have a Bucket List for us. In Jesus Christ we see God gives us the freedom to be ourselves. God has no tally sheet or scorecard for us. God has Jesus Christ for us.  So, go ahead, plan, hope, schedule; but above all love, care, and serve. Make sure that part is on any Bucket List plans you  might have.

Our little dog, a Malti-Poo named Bella, has been sheltering-in-place for her 12 ½ years. As a rescue dog she began life in cage, then moved on to become Lady and Ruler of a house.

In the early morning hours, she sleeps on the love seat on the patio. She then moves to the guest bedroom to curl up and sleep until early afternoon. Then down the stairs she comes, heads outside for a moment only to take a nap in her bed by the fireplace in the family room. Dinner time has her lay on the floor by which ever table we occupy. In the evening after a hard day of rest she alternates between her bed and the family room couch. At night she sleeps on either her cushion in our bedroom or on the floor…that is, unless there is a storm with thunder and lightning.  Then she hops on the bed to be near those whom she apparently thinks can protect her from all things loud and frightening.

Bella does enjoy a morning walk, dinner, and occasional treats thrown her way. As Lady and Ruler of the house, with voracious barking, she protects us from all who dare walk their dogs in the park behind our home.  She provides ecstatic welcome for any who leave the house and return. Going to and from the mailbox, leaving the house for just a few minutes, qualifies for such a celebratory welcome.   For Bella life goes on mostly as it has been throughout her life. She is oblivious to all that is happening around our world. Life goes on interrupted.

Wouldn’t it be nice if we too could live in the bubble of life inhabited by our pets? It would seem some would encourage us to do so as though that was possible.  But we are not animals dependent upon someone to care and feed us and make all our major decisions for us. . We are independent folk called to live with interactive, relational, and responsible lives. We have to make our own decisions and accept the results.  But our life has been interrupted.

Actually we have had a sampling of living in a bubble lately, haven’t we? The adjudication on this type of life has not been less than positive. Did you enjoy being alone? Even if huddled with family, did you not miss going out and being among others?  Were there not other loved ones you wanted to spend time with?  We have been created to be in relationship and it pains us when we can’t live accordingly.

With all that is going on regarding the COVID 19 numbers there are calls for many responses. One that I have not heard often is a complete return to sheltering in place for an indefinite time. It seems we have had enough of that experience. Bubble living is not for us.

What is called for in an environment of a dangerous disease spread from person to person?  How does Christian faith, following Jesus, relate?

First, we need to recognize it is not about us. It is about all of us, including ourselves. That means our choices, our behaviors, need to take others into consideration. We simply cannot for now live and act as we once did. Those new appendages and fashion statements called masks not only are a sign of care and respect for others, they greatly symbolize we recognize our response to this pandemic can’t be all about us.  

Second, as those who follow one who was a healer, we need to look for places where we can bring healing. Where might there be pain and struggle that we might address?

I wonder if the huge outbreak of support for George Floyd and justice reform is somehow tied to our experience in this pandemic. Of course, the empathy and support of such a cause is long overdue. But as those sitting around wondering and wishing we could do something…..did this give us a positive, needed, avenue to do something?  Did sheltering in place humble us a bit and move us to a greater willingness for repentance?

I don’t know, really. What stands out to me is this: even in a very critical culture- changing time there are major things that can be accomplished. Things beyond a larger 401K and missing eating out at our favorite haunt.

People of God, people of Jesus, love and care for your pets. Just don’t chose to live like them.

Living in New Mexico, Colorado, and Arizona for 41 years, I can see why some people worshiped the sun and had a “Sun God.”  Let’s face it, we do have a little bit of sun worship in the sun soaked West. Instead of praising the sun in temples, we do it on beaches, around pools, on ball fields, and golf courses. 

One of the problems with a sun god is you need other gods to fill in the rest of the world. A god for rain, a god of harvest, a god of healing, and so on are required.  In Athens the Greeks once had a statue for an unknown god, apparently, just in case they missed one.  Paul addressed the Athenians (Acts 17:16-34) saying he knew who that god was. And, paraphrasing Paul, he proclaimed there was one God, and, without mentioning Jesus by name, said God was revealed through Jesus.

At all times it is good to have one God, and especially, to have the God of Jesus. Imagine a pantheon of gods! Think of how problematic family relations can be as we have to relate to one family member one way and another family member in a different manner.  Then there are the times we must deal with them all together with all their various personalities, quirks, and gifts. 

Imagine in a time like ours if we had to relate to various gods. There would be the god of healing, then there would be the god of peace among people. A god of work or the economy would be helpful.  For a while we may have even had or wished for a god of toilet paper. Now it seems, we could use a god of disinfectant spray. Seriously, there would be need for several gods to deal with our pandemic, the economy, and racial injustice.  

Yet you and I take our monotheism…..belief in one God only….for granted and don’t really ponder it much. Having one god, as revealed in Jesus, means we have a God not only of all, but for all. A God for all means not only for all people, but for all areas of life. This one God permeates life and is in every nook and cranny of our life and of the world. 

This means God is not confined to church, nor to those aspects of our life we associate with the Christian faith and with our own personal faith. God is in the boardroom, God is in politics, God is in our earning and use of money, God is in all those areas too often deemed “secular.” If God was not in these places, there would be a vacuum created, and into that vacuum would come other gods to take the place of the God of Jesus.  There would be a god of business, a god of our politics, and a god of personal finance. 

If God can reside in these otherwise ungodly places, our faith needs involvement in these places. It needs very direct connection and application especially to those segments of life we too often see as apart from God and faith. Having one God, the God of Jesus Christ means we are called to follow Jesus wherever we go, in whatever we do, and in all areas of life and the world. 

One God, three persons; one life, one faith; one world. None of it without God. None of it not in need of the faith of those who follow the God of Jesus Christ.

Are you surprised by the outpouring of anger, violence, and destruction across our country?  Are you surprised at the peaceful protest movement that has swept through our states and cities over the unjust killing of one man, George Floyd? People of color in our land are not surprised. The fact that you and I as white Americans are surprised by these is all the evidence we need to prove White Privilege.

Yes, I said you and I. Not bigots, not white supremacists, not Neo Nazis, and not even “those people.” I have said many times until we recognize the racism buried deep within our own being, not much will happen to stem the tide of racism. For some time we have fooled ourselves into thinking everything is better now. The protests and violence are loud statements this is not so and it has not been so. We have fooled ourselves because we have ourselves been fooled.  We deny and bury our own prejudice. We placate ourselves by having some others to blame. We lift ourselves by putting down some other persons or groups.  We rationalize our own imperfections while “noticing” and criticizing others for theirs. 

What do you see when looters raid stores and police cars are burned? Do you simply say you see people to blame, or do you see a symptom of a deep sickness?  The sickness has been festering for just over 400 years. Do you see yourself as having received and infected others with this sickness?

America has been called a melting pot. I prefer the metaphor of stew with many tasty ingredients and seasonings all retaining their individual contributory tastes to make our eating more profound and interesting. 

I would say I see the stew that is America, full of these varied and tasty ingredients, has become rancid. Actually, there was always a bitter taste in this stew. We were just too busy scarfing it down to notice. Those forced to eat slowly and carefully always knew of the existence of some bitter ingredients.

We need to change the recipe. And we need to see ourselves as chefs just as much as we see ourselves as those who dine on this stew. While too many cooks may spoil the broth, we need a recipe that expands beyond our own tastes. Others have culinary gifts to make. We need to explore with them just which seasonings produce the bitterness.  On our own, we have not figured it out.

I fear this stew is about to boil over. I am not sure how to improve this stew, but I know turning up the heat will not be helpful.

What about this for a new recipe: 

• First, in preparing this stew, make a plan for the ingredients
• Second, prepare this recipe with a mirror nearby to examine yourself as you stir the pot
• 1 pound of repentance
• 2 cups of dialog with intense listening
• 3/4 cup prayer
• blend fully with Jesus’ command to love the neighbor
• Serve with a wedge of Jesus’ call to not fear
• Add at least another splash of repentance

This stew is best enjoyed by eating slowly and in the presence of others, particularly those who might not normally be seen gathering around your table.  Vary the color and country of origin of the wine that accompanies this dish as you prepare it over the years. 

Let’s not hide this as a family recipe. Let’s get it all out in the open so we can deal with it and make the best recipe possible.

Struggling with my own bigotry, I remain your pastor,

Gary N. McCluskey 
Pastor 
University Lutheran Church, Lutheran Campus Ministry 
Arizona State University 
Tempe, AZ