4-2-2021

 Good Morning All, 

    Col. 2:6-7: “Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in him, 
rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.”

     Have you ever tried to pull or dig a bush out of the ground?  We have a dying/almost dead bush that we hope to get rid of.  It is going to be a bear to get out.  The roots are deeper than the bush is tall.  We will pull and dig and probably rip up the lawn to dig it out.  It is rooted well.  It will probably come back next year.  It went down to find water and nutrients.  It did this in order to survive the dry summers and the tough falls.  It stores nutrients in the roots in order to survive the winters. 

    Scriptures tells us we are to be the same way when it comes to our faith.  We are to be like a tree planted by the waters with roots down deep trusting in God’s grace and mercy to see us though.  God’s Word and sacraments nourish us and sustain us.  Even in our lives, when we feel that we are in the greatest of droughts; God gives us the faith to pull through.  It is still a drought; it still gives us pain, but God sees us through.  When we are rooted deep in the Lord, we will survive.  The roots which we have because of faith will hold us secure.  The world may cause parts of us to be damaged, but we will survive.  Our faith is established and because of it we can live a life of thanksgiving.

     Too often we see each day as a lifetime.  What occurs in one day, we see as forever; yet it is only one day just a fraction of our life and an infinitesimal part of our eternal existence.  God looks at you and sees a child that he loves for eternity.  God laid the foundation of the earth after He prepared heaven for you.  We should give thanks for this and all of God’s blessings on us.  Most we take for granted; we do not see them as gifts to be thankful for but as something we deserve.  God’s grace leads us on.  He keeps us rooted by faith in the living waters which flow from his mercy and nourishes us with his grace.

    We are rooted in Christ, by faith, so we can live the life that God gives to us.  A life that may have its challenges and its pains but a life that is rooted in the promise of life eternal with Him in heaven.  This is part of why Jesus willingly went to the cross on Calvary.  He went to die on the cross so that we might receive new life, new hope, and new purpose. With each new challenge, we have the promise of God’s unchanging, unending grace to sustain us.  With each new threat from the devil, we have God’s protection and love.  Jesus died so that nothing would ever separate us from his love, and we can place all our worries and fears in his loving arms, and he will deliver us from the pain, worry, sorrow and fear that the world has for us.  We have life because we are rooted in His wondrous love shown to us in the cross of Jesus.

 Father of all good gifts, we know that your will is done with or without us; yet you have given us the blessings of prayer.  We ask you to send your Spirit of comfort to those who are in pain and to those who are lost.  Keep us firmly rooted in Your Word always trusting in your promise.  All this we boldly ask in the Name of Jesus, Our Lord, Amen

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret