9-12-2026

Good Morning!

          Psalm 34:18; “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.”

    Have you ever shopped at a discounted discount store? They have all the “seconds” or the damaged goods. You can buy some of them real cheap if you want to. It is amazing how cheap these can be. They are so cheap that people often pass right by them, afraid that there must be something wrong with them. 

    These goods, especially canned goods, are often dented. Sometimes the label is missing. Some of the boxed goods are broken open and taped up to be somewhat presentable. The store knows that the only way to sell these items is to offer a huge discount on them. Even then most just bet tossed out; they are just not shelf worthy anymore.

    All of us at one point in time have felt the pain of being damaged goods. Maybe you made some bad decisions when you were younger and have been viewed as “damaged goods” ever since. Maybe the pink slip from your last employer left a dent in you, especially since you are on the top side of 45 now. Perhaps looking at your spouse has left and now you are all dinged up. Perhaps a loved one died way too early in life. All these things can take a toll on a body and a spirit.

    The truly good news is that God has great compassion on us. All you have to do is read the Gospels and see time and time again where Jesus had compassion on the lame, the blind, the sick and dying. Jesus looks past the dings and the dents and sees the heart that is broken and the spirit that is crushed. He reaches to you and to me with all the love that we need, and he gently lifts us up in his arms and brings us to his loving bosom and holds us close, safe in his arms.

    The world and the devil focus on our “dings.” The devil will know your name but call you by your sin, your “dings.” He will point to your jealousy, anger, greed, selfishness, or lack of compassion, no matter how fleeting; the devil will not let you forget. The world will ding us pretty good and then throw us away as damaged goods.

    But God continually retrieves us from the damaged goods shelf and restores us to his family keeping us safe from the true pain that devil will try to cause. God knows your sin, your “dings” but instead of focusing on them, God calls you by name with love and compassion, with hope and salvation. God reaches out to the brokenhearted and the crushed spirits and gives them hope; and gives them life. He removes your “dings” and gives you life in His name.

Dear Father, we are all dented and dinged by the sin of the world and our own failings. Give us your precious grace to cover us and your mercy to save us. Protect us from the sorrows of this world. In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret

9-11-2026

Good Morning!

      Psalm 10:17 “O Lord, you hear the desire of the afflicted; you will strengthen their heart; you will incline your ear.”

       I am at the age and stage of life where I don’t always hear as well as I would like. When the precious preschoolers come out of church and give me a hug and then tell me a story, I have to lean in and listen intently to get the story. If I am in a gym where the acoustics are so-so and the PA is crackly; I just nod my head, clap when everyone else does, and try to be quiet and fit in. Hearing is important but acting upon what you hear matters even more.

    We often think God does not hear us. We want miracles, spectacular, earth-shaking miracles. We want to see the sea open up and let us walk on through or the storms quieted and when we do not get them, we question and doubt. “Does God even know I am alive, does He even care?” Sometimes it seems like the bad guys win and we only experience injustice.

    Our verse comes from a classic example of a lament prayer in the Book of Psalms. The first portion of the psalm lists a series of trouble or pain that is occurring. Then it turns in prayer to God, calling upon Him to bring about justice. The psalm ends with a statement of faith proclaiming, “God will do what He has promised.” The whole psalm is a prayer to God to deliver us from evil and then the psalm ends with “God will do this!” This is what faith looks like. It is placing our confidence in God’s great love to deliver us, as He has promised. This type of faith requires us to see with more than just our physical eyes; we need to see with our eyes of faith and know that God is in control and victory is ultimately going to be ours.

    So, God tells us to pray, to call upon Him, knowing He will incline His ear, that is bend down low and listen really close to hear us and then to act. God speaks to us in a way that is more ordinary and we often overlook it. God usually uses the ordinary to deliver on his promises to us. Rather than thunder and lightning, it is the just word and hug from a fellow believer, the shared prayer lifted up, the blessings of the sacrament that gives us God’s very presence in our hands. It may all sound ordinary but anything ordinary, when connected to God’s Word, becomes extraordinary and will give us hope.

    So, if you are in the midst of things that you cannot understand. If the pain of loss or hopelessness is too much; pray, pray without ceasing and don’t be afraid to tell the truth. We do not need to sugar coat our experiences and feelings. God already knows where your heart is and He calls us to speak, so He will hear, so that He will heal. Look to God and trust His promise to comfort, restore, heal, and give you rest.

Father of all mercies, hear us for we are a wounded and broken people. Send us your Spirit to comfort and console us. Use us when our brothers and sisters are hurting and in need of your mercy. Let us be your hands and your voice to bring healing and comfort to the world. Defend us we pray, in the precious Name of Jesus, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret

9-10-2026

Good Morning!

     Genesis 1:2; “Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.”

    One thing that I would encourage you to try is to look at the Scriptures in their original language. The Old Testament is in Hebrew and the New Testament is in Greek. Where our English offers the message, the original languages can offer in little insight and even a little more emotion and sense of depth of the phrase. I use a website called biblehub.com and it is very functional.

    The phrase “formless and empty” in the original Hebrew is “tohu” and “wabohu.” While we may read the phrase formless and void as saying a blob like existence, kind of like a lump of clay. It is there but it has no distinguishing features or beauty. However, the Hebrew “tohu wabohu” has a deeper meaning. It means in chaos. Not only is there no form, but there is also no organization. It is a beehive that has been knocked over and the bees are not happy. It is a group of candied up 6-year-olds. It means utter mayhem.

    So, God speaks and brings order, peace, and calm, by his Word, He speaks, and order arrives. In Hebrew it is called “towb.” We say “good,” but the Hebrew is more along the line of beautiful, pleasant to the senses, of giving pleasure. It is not just “good” as in good shape or good condition but rather this messy chaos was now beautiful and pleasant.

    Yet sin enters the world and “tohu and wabohu” re-enter creation. One day life is going pretty well, and them wham, out of nowhere, “tohu wabohu.” Your world falls apart, it may be your health or the health of a loved one, it might be a financial setback, a loss of a job, a loss of a spouse or other family member and boom, you are in one chaotic mess. You are spinning and can’t seem to get your bearings. The bottom has dropped out and you are left with “tohu wabohu.”

    But just like creation, God enters our world and makes it “towb,” He gives us Jesus and life settles down. We look to our Savior, the one who came to end the chaos and to make all things new and right. We look to Jesus to give us hope. In the midst of all the “tohu wabohu” Jesus brings hope and peace. We know that in all that we experience, Jesus has overcome sin, death, and the devil; all the forces of chaos to bring us the good things, eternal life in His name.

    So, when your “tohu wabohu” hits; remember your hope, remember your salvation, remember Jesus and his love for you and his salvation given to you to bring you good, that is eternity in His presence and under his protection.

Gracious Father, our lives are filled with chaos, terror, and fear. Send your Spirit to calm our hearts and lead us to look to Jesus as our rock and fortress. Guide us to find peace in his name. Be with those who are especially tormented at this time. Give them your peace, surround them with your love. Give them your peace to comfort them today. In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret   

9-9-2026

 Good Morning!

     Genesis 15:16; “And they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.”

    Every so often, we come across a verse that makes us stop and wonder what we are reading.  To me, this is one of those verses.  This verse comes from the covenant that God made with Abraham.  God was actually explaining the future to Abraham.  God told him that he would have many descendants but that for a period of 400 years they would be slaves but that God would free them and return them to this land where Abraham lived and that God had promised to Abraham and his descendants.  But they would not return until the iniquity of the Amorites is complete.

    This is one of those verses that can cause us to really scratch our head.  We fully understand this verse to mean that God is patient and he is waiting until the end before he will pronounce judgment.  He is giving the sinner, in this example the Amorite people, every opportunity to repent but there is a limit.  We can see that God is patient and long suffering.  He is willing to give the sinner every opportunity to repent.  We may know it but knowing it doesn’t always make it easier.

    During the time of the Amorites, they practiced all sorts of horrible stuff including human sacrifice.  They practiced sexual depravity as well.  There was a lot of pain and suffering by a lot of people but God allowed it to go to its completion.  The reason I think of this verse every so often is that I watch the news and wonder.  I watch the news about how we slaughter millions of unborn children every year just because they are inconvenient.  I watch the news and see how we seem to be looking for ways to be increasing in our level of cruelty to one another.  Whether it is halfway around the world or just down the street, callousness toward human life seems to be on the rise and I wonder if the iniquity is almost complete.

    This is another example of why it is so useless for us to question God.  Isaiah describes God as looking down on the inhabitants of earth like grasshoppers.  God’s way is so far beyond us that we really need to live in trust of hid benevolence and mercy.  God has promised to love and redeem those whom he loves.  We may not always see the sense or the logic in the events in our life but we must trust God’s good grace and favor.  We will never understand everything in this world.  Our vision is clouded by sin and the limitations of being human.  So, we look to the only true source we have; we look to God for his mercy, trusting in his promise to pour it out upon us.

Gracious Father, there are so many times when I wonder about things I cannot change.  Help me to see the things that I can change and give me the courage to change them.  Help me to see that I may not fix the problems of the world but that I can change one person’s life.  Use me in your service.  In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret        

9-8-2026

Good Morning!

       Isaiah 9:2; “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shined.” 

    Have you ever experienced total darkness?  Not many of us have.  Even in the dark that we experience, there is usually some light.  Maybe you have a night light in the hall or in the bathroom or in a child’s room.  Maybe you always have a flashlight handy.  The darkest place I’ve ever been was a cave.  It was an old prospecting cave in the Black Hills.  It was so narrow and small in places we weren’t sure that we would fit.  After we got in about 50 feet, we turned our flashlights off.  That lasted about 20 seconds before we couldn’t take it.  It felt like the mountain was going to swallow us.  Even though nothing had changed in that 20 second period; it was hard to breathe and you felt like you were spinning.  I was with three others and they felt the same thing.  We had another 150 feet of cave to explore but we agreed that we had seen enough.

     The worst part was all those “things” which come out in the dark.  There are things; things that run across your shoes, things that crawl up your arm, things that hang in your face or buzz in your ear, things that we cannot see but we feel and experience them anyway.  Then there are the sounds, sounds that seem to amplify in the dark, things that sound like moans and groans or hideous laughter.  

    That is sort of how the people in the text would have felt.  When sin entered the world, man no longer “saw” God.  Adam and Eve walked with God but sin veiled their eyes and plugged their ears.  Soon man’s relationship with God just kept deteriorating.  In our blindness, we just kept spinning out of control.  We wandered in the dark and were getting more lost all the time.  We walked away from God and His light and kept going further and further into the darkness, suffering the whole way.

   “But God beheld our wretched state.”  Out of His unfathomable love God sent Jesus into the world to be that “Light.”  This verse is actually part of a longer section that is a Messianic prophecy.  In this verse, God is promising to send the Light but we live in that Light.

    Jesus came to live and die and rise again so that we could return to the Light.  God used Jesus’ sacrifice to serve as ours so now we get to have His Light, the Spirit, live within us.  The devil will try to block the light or even use the light to blind us but God, in his grace and mercy, is always there to correct the problem and keep us moving.  Sometimes we wish that the light we have would light up more of our path ahead but we can trust God to lead us on that path that will lead us to our eternal home.  Then along the way, we are to “let our light shine” for others to see the wondrous blessing of the light and then listen to the call of the Spirit into their hearts as well.

   Father of all Light, thank you for the gift of the Light which illumines our way.  Keep our light, our faith, burning bright in this dark world that knows only pain.  Cause our light to shine brightly so that others may come to know You.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret

9-7-2026

Good Morning!

              1 John 3:1: “See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him.”

    Many people take vacations in the summer.  They usually go to “see” something.  Perhaps they go see a professional baseball game or go to a national park or perhaps we just go to an area of the country where they have not been to; just to see what it is like.  While what we are planning on seeing is important, for most of the way; what we see is out the window of our car.  That is why when I travel, I prefer to take the lesser roads and not the interstate.  Part of this was watching Charles Kuralt and his “On the Road” series as a kid and the desire to see what else is going on in the world.  We see the world go by and we see it as it is, warts and all.  We see the broken houses next to the new “Mcmansions” or the abandoned farm site with the leaning barn next to the multi-bin multi-shop immaculately kept farmsteads across the road.  It is how we see things, mostly through a window, usually driving down the road somewhere.

    Our passage for this morning speaks of seeing.  We see what kind of love God has for us.  It is a love that the world does not understand nor can it reproduce it.  The world’s love is conditional.  It will love you as long as you behave and reciprocate.  It will love you as long as you have something to share or allow a gain for the other.  We see God’s love through a window; it is the window of the cross.  When we look into the window of the cross, we see what kind of love the Father has given us.  We see God incarnate, Jesus, suffering and bearing the weight and the cost of our sins even as we were enemies with God.  Yet in His unfathomable grace, God made you his child.  He looked at you and claimed you just the way you were.  He washed you and fed you and clothed you with new clothes.  That is our God.  We see that by looking through the cross of Christ to see it. 

    As we travel through life we will pass by and through many events which we may or may not comprehend.  Those events may never add up.  Death, at times, makes no sense.  Life, at other times, makes no sense.  Suffering never makes sense.  We need to see the love of God, through the window of the cross, and then move to share that window seat with others who need it as well.  You and I cannot touch the whole world but we can touch one person and we need to do so.  Share the Gospel of Jesus with one person.  We are part of God’s solution; we are partners in the ministry of reconciliation.  Look through the window and see how much the Father loves us and then go and share that love with someone else.

Gracious Lord, your grace rolls over us like a river and carries us into your loving arms and presence.  Use us to bring others into your river of life and mercy that they too will be able to look through the window of the cross and see how much the Father loves us.  In our Savior’s precious name we pray, Amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret

9-6-2026

Good Morning!

        Luke 22:41; “And he withdrew from them about a stone's throw, and knelt down and prayed.”

    How far is that?  How far is “a stone’s throw”?  Now we would think that there are many things to consider, like how much does the stone weigh?  A baseball weighs not less than 5 ounces and not more than 5.25 ounces.  Many years ago, I could throw a baseball about 250 feet but that was a baseball not a rock.  Most rocks weigh more than that so the distance would be less.  In fact, if I went out today and picked up a stone and threw it; I would probably be lucky to throw it 20 feet; more than likely it would be less than that.  How far is a stone’s throw?  Not very far.

    Even he was approaching the lowest point in his life; Jesus was still staying close to his disciples.  Even as his agony was increasing; his compassion for his disciples was first and foremost in his mind.  Even in his time of despair and suffering, he tended to the needs of the disciples.  He may have been saddened that they were unable to remain awake with him through this tough night but he never abandoned them.  Even when later on they all ran away; he was with them, protecting them from the arrows of the devil.

    At no time in your life is Jesus ever more than a stone’s throw away from you.  No matter how painful or sorrowful we may feel; Jesus is always close by.  He is always near us.  He is the ever-present presence of God’s love for us.  It is by his love for us that we are saved; it is by his love for us that we are kept safe.  He has claimed us as his own and has promised to never abandon us.

    So, if you are facing a difficult time in your life, know that you do not have to face it alone.  You do not have to fear the future because the future rests in the loving hands of God.  Your future is secure because of God’s great love for you.  As we go through this Lenten season, instead of focusing on the suffering of Jesus; see it as an example of God’s love for you.  God was willing to have his only Son become human; to live the life of a man who was under the Law so that his sacrifice would be all sufficient for all the sins to be paid.  By doing so, we are no longer outcasts, we are his beloved children.  He will never forsake us or leave us.  We will never be separated from his love.  He is never more than a stone’s throw away.

    So, we can face today knowing that our loving God is always right next to us.  We can know that we never need to stand alone and face the fury of the devil.  Jesus has defeated the devil and has given to us the power to tell the devil to leave us alone.  The devil’s attacks are empty; the only way he wins is if you or I turn away from Jesus and fail to see and to seek God’s incredible grace.  It is less than a stone’s throw away.

Father of all mercy, you are near me at all times.  Your Spirit renews me and secures my future.  I no longer have to fear that which I do not see or understand because you are always with me.  Be with those who do not know this comforting truth or do not trust it.  Give them your peace.  In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret