8-31-2017

Good Morning All,

                  Psalm 56:3; “When I am afraid, I put my trust in you”

     “FAIL”; it is an internet sensation.  It shows pictures photographed at just the right time to show someone having a little misfortune.  It might show a person walking down the street being splashed by a passing car.  It might show a person slipping and falling while carrying cake.  It might be the sign that is misspelled.  There are limitless options to this viewing.  Some are more painful than others, some are funny; some are cruel but comedy is often in the eye of the beholder. We can see failure everywhere we look; often we feel it our own lives.

    Perhaps you feel that you could sum up your life in that one word; “FAIL.”  There are many people who do feel that way.  Does your mind swirl with thoughts of inadequacies and confusion?  Do you look at what is going on in your life and, according to your measurement, it failed?  “What did I do wrong?”  “Maybe I simply cannot do this; or anything right!”   I remember dealing with a preacher who would plan an event for his church.  He would spend months working on it.  He would totally immerse himself in the project, getting very excited about it.  Soon his expectations about the event began to climb.  He was expecting hundreds.  When the event occurred, there were only a few more than the 80 members who usually showed up.  To him, it was a colossal failure.

   Maybe you do that as well.  Maybe you are the parent who feels they have failed if your child isn’t a straight “A” student.  Maybe you are the woman whose house isn’t as clean as you would like it, with three kids, a dog and a fulltime job.  The people on TV get it done; why can’t I?  Maybe you’re the dad that can’t get to your son’s game this week while everyone else does and you haven’t called your mother in two weeks but then you will only hear about your perfect sister.  The world seems to define you as a failure and often times; you are your worst judge.

    You are not alone in this feeling.  The devil does his best to make sure you know of all your inadequacies.  He wants you to always remember those times when you came up short.  He wants you to think that God will view you in the same light; as a failure.  Yet God does not view you as a failure.  He views you as a parent views his child.  He views you through the eyes of love; a perfect love that knows no bounds or limits.  He loves you and then tells you to trust in that love.  We can be confident of God’s mercy for us.  When we think of confident, we should think in terms of "set in place, make secure, to be made ready, be attached" like an anchor in a storm.  When we fear, whether it is life, death, failure, rejection or loneliness, God is there to comfort us and to give us hope for a certain tomorrow living in his grace.  Trust in his promises; he has never failed you.

Father, your mercies are new every day.  Give me courage to see that, because of Jesus, I am not a failure.  Give me wisdom to hold onto the fact that I am your redeemed, beloved child.  In your hands we are safe and secure.  In the precious name of Jesus our risen Savior we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret  

8-30-2017

Good Morning All,

            Matthew 14: 16-17; “But Jesus said, “They need not go away; you give them something to eat.”  They said to him, “We have only five loaves here and two fish.”

    So are you prepared?  Are you prepared for the unexpected?  I can remember as a kid that, more often than not, my mom would keep a John Morrell ‘easy cut’ ham in the freezer.  That way, if company showed up on day she could feed them.  It might have been baked, or sliced and fried or just sliced for sandwiches but she could always feed them ham.  She was always ready to feed someone who showed up at dinner or suppertime.  She loved it so you usually had enough “reserve resources” to manage a houseful when she needed to.  Perhaps your mom is or was like that as well.

   In our verses, from the Feeding of the 5000, one might be tempted to think that these disciples needed a Lutheran mother to be ready to feed a crowd of unexpected company.  The disciples and Jesus had sought out a quiet out of the way place so they could take a breather for a moment.  They had just went out on an evangelism program and came back to tell Jesus.  As they were coming together, they received word that John the Baptist had been executed.  So they desperately wanted some quiet alone time.

    But the people recognized Jesus and began to gather.  First it was dozens, then hundreds and finally thousands of people; perhaps as many as 25,000 people.  It was approaching the supper hour so the disciples went and asked Jesus to send the people away to find food on their own.  They had looked around and saw nothing for food for the people to eat.  They were away from the cities and even then didn’t have that much money.  The disciples figured the only way to resolve this was to send the people away before they got too hungry and restless. 

    Yet Jesus gave them a different and a direct command, “you give them something to eat.”  The disciples scrambled and found two fish and five small loaves, roughly two McDonald’s fish filet sandwiches for 25,000 people.  They panicked and were lost and confused.  The problem was that they looked to themselves for their answer and supply rather than to Jesus.  Eventually they came to Jesus for the supply that they needed.

    One thing that comes through to us is this simple fact; our source is always Jesus.  When the need arises, we can look to him first knowing that he will provide for our needs or we can wait, try it on our own, suffer from fear, anxiety, worry and discomfort then look to Jesus.  It might seem somewhat strange but it is our decision.  Do we look to Jesus right away or do we bear a burden that we do not need to bear?  Which is it for you?

Father, the eyes of all look to you and you furnish their meat in due season.  Lead us by your Spirit to look to you as our only source of hope, joy and peace.  Be with those who are trying to bear the burdens of this life on their own.  Lead them to see that all things come from you and our help is in your hands.  In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret               

8-29-2017

Good Morning All,

                   Hebrews 11:1; “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

     During one of my high school English classes, we spent a fair amount of time doing some pre-journalism class stuff.  We looked at what it took to be a good journalist.  A good journalist didn’t go into a story with a preconceived idea of how the story was going to flow.  When you did this, it was too easy to find the “evidence” that supported your idea and also too easy to discard “evidence” which showed your idea to be false.  A good journalist would always try to answer the following questions: who, what, where, when, how and why?  Once these questions were answered, the story to be told would unfold naturally.

    As we look at these questions, the first four are pretty standard and are really only informative.  We can know who is involved in the story; we know what the story is and we know where an event occurs and we can know when it occurs.  These are elements of the story that are very observational.  The evidence can exist for many years allowing us to look back in time and to see the events unfold.  Yet these four questions provide only the body of the work, they only answer the rudimentary questions.  The difficult questions are often how and why.

   The questions of how and why probe into the internal mental and spiritual thoughts, plans and desires of the event.  The how and why can and are at times difficult to imagine.  If you were in a car accident a year ago, you have answered three of the four questions in those 10 words.  Why did the accident happen and how will you go forward after it?  Will you be able to drive again?  Can you go forward?  How will you go forward?  These are the questions you ask.  Sometimes the questions are harder to answer.

    If you are sitting at the funeral of a loved one, like a spouse or a parent; how will you go forward?  How will you go on to the next day or week or month?  What if it is that you are experiencing a very severe sickness, it may take months to recover, if ever?  How do you make it through tomorrow or even the next hour?  How do we go forward?

   Going forward always requires faith.  Going forward is unseen; going forward requires us to trust that it will work out.  How will it work? We have to trust God to keep his promise to us.  We have to trust God to keep the promise that he made to us in our Baptism to love us and to claim us as his children.  This is what faith is.  Faith is trusting in God’s promise even when we cannot see the path or the method of accomplishing this.  Faith is taking one more step.  Faith is turning one more page.  Faith is knowing that, through it all, God goes with us protecting us from harm and danger and giving us hope for the better tomorrow that he has promised.

Father, strengthen my faith.  Lead me forward by your great mercy.  Uphold me in your hand.  Keep me safe from the terrors of uncertainty.  Lead me to trust in your promise of love and salvation.  Lead me to know that in all things you are in control.  Give courage to those who are facing challenges at this time.  Give them the faith they need to see them through.  In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret