1-31-2023

Good Morning All,

   John 10:10b, “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.”

     What are some things that are abundant in your life?  What do we have that is lavished on us?  Those can be tough questions.  Most of us would be slow to answer these questions.  What do we have abundantly?  Maybe it is the beauty of nature around us.  Maybe we would say it is in the peace and quiet that we live in.  But would we say that we live life abundantly?  We tend to think in small terms.  We tend to see things in small increments.  We tend to think that God gives us what we need and only what we need.  But Scriptures tell us something entirely different.  We are told that we receive the gifts lavishly and abundantly.

     In this verse Jesus is telling his disciples that we may have life and have it abundantly.  That is quite a statement but what does it mean?  What does it mean to have it abundantly?  It is interesting how throughout Scriptures we read different phrases that describe the life that God wants for us.  It is called abundant; we are lavished by God’s gift; it is poured out on us; we receive it generously; among others but we can see what we have.  But what does that mean to us?

    I write these the night before, so I don’t know how any of the elections will end.  By the time you read this, hopefully; the dust will have settled.  No matter who wins or loses; we are God’s redeemed children and we will always have abundant life.  Yet it always seems as though we live as though we don’t.  Too often, we live as a morose group of people.  No one should ever be happier than we are.  We have the certainty of salvation given to us.  We don’t have to go work for it; it is given to us.  We have been given life and we have it abundantly.

    God blesses us as his children at every turn.  Even when we think we are missing it; it is all around us.  God gives to us the love of family, of Christian brothers and sisters, the love of the church, the comfort of the Gospel in all its forms, the written, the spoken and the Gospel which we take in through the sacraments.  We have abundant life, so let’s live like it.

    God gives us life and he gives us the gifts of this life abundantly.  We have more than we can ever measure.  The devil will always try to convince you that you don’t have that much and you don’t have near as much as your neighbor.  Then the devil will try to convict you with the fear that God doesn’t love you.  Nothing could be farther from the truth.  God shows his love for us through the cross and the empty tomb.  God continues to show us that love through the Holy Spirit building the church and keeping it safe.  We live in the lap of God the Father.  We have the gift of abundant life so go out and enjoy it.  Live a life of happiness and contentment in God’s lap.  Receive his gifts and enjoy.

Dear Father in heaven, you lavishly pour out your Spirit on us.  You give us life and give it abundantly.  Help us to see it, to live it and to enjoy it as a gift from you.  We ask you to continue to shower us with your gifts and guide us to share those gifts with those around us.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret            

1-30-2023

Good Morning All,

       1 Peter 5:8; “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” 

    I remember watching a show on one of those nature channels about lions hunting.  They are kind of lazy and “cheap shot” hunters.  A group of three or four would hunt down so wounded, sickly, little wildebeest and have it for dinner.  The lions chased this poor critter until it stopped.  It was all played out.  When the camera zoomed in on the little wildebeest, you could see it panting with the saliva dripping off its mouth.  You could see it pant so hard that you watched the chest as it breathed as it pumped in and out. The thing about this that I found intriguing was that the lions did not go in for the kill right away.  They slowly circled the wildebeest.  Each pass around the wildebeest was closer than the last.  They did this until one of the lions attacked and killed the wildebeest. 

    The devil is that way to us.  The devil looks for our weaknesses and then tries to attack and exploit them.  It will run us until we are about to drop and then he slowly moves in for the kill.  The devil seeks someone to devour.  For many people, even many Christians, there is very little fear of the devil.  Many people back away from the idea of a devil.  This is in part doing to our unwillingness to call “sin” a “sin.”  If we don’t call it “sin” but we call them “errors” or “lapses” then it is just a “character flaw” and not the devil at work.  Always remember that the devil is very real.

    The devil is defeated but he is still out there.  It is like the football team that is behind by 40 points with 2 minutes in the game.  The game is lost by the devil but he keeps playing the game.  The devil keeps coming after us.  His weapons are limited but his ability to seduce, to beguile, to deceive, and to turn us from God’s grace at every opportunity is still great.     

      Unfortunately, you dear Christian, are the ones in his sights.  The lost and the unbeliever, the devil already has.  The glorified saints in heaven are beyond his reach.  That leaves us.  The devil favorite tools are doubt, worry and guilt.  Any of these tools is effective, but together they are almost unbearable.  At least for us.

      This is where you have to rely on Jesus as the answer to your problems, as the Redeemer that we need.  Just like those lions didn’t attack stronger wildebeest or ones that were part of the herd so to the devil wouldn’t attack as well when we are close to Jesus.  God, in his mercy, guards us from the devil.  Especially when we are tempted to our limit.  God defends us from the attacks of the devil.  He loves us with a father’s heart and will clutch you safely in his arms.  Stay close to the Lord for he will protect you.

Dearest Father, your mercies continue to flood over us and over whelm us, we pray for the families of those in the vehicle accident and for the survivor who is in the hospital that you comfort the families and bring peace to their hearts.  We also pray for our elected and re-elected officials that they may seek to govern through you looking to you for their wisdom.  Move among with your Spirit that we too, may be safe from the devil.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray.  Amen          

God’s peace,

Pastor Bret

1-29-2023

Good Morning All,

          2 Chronicles 20:15; “Do not be afraid and do not be dismayed at this great horde, for the battle is not yours but God’s”. 

    Don’t you just dread some of those days.  You know “those days.”  You get up and the alarm went off at the wrong time, you go outside and there is a flat tire on the car or you go out the door and a cow is staring back at you (and not supposed to).  Your kids tell you that the car they drive makes a funny sound and you see there is no oil in the engine.  You know “those types of days”.  Sometimes it just can get almost comical; you almost wonder what can go wrong next.

     Sometimes those days are not funny; they are downright painful.  We look out and see a great horde of pain coming our way.  Think of the folks where the hurricane struck this past week and now they get snow and wind; no electricity or water or a warm place to stay.  I would call that a horde of trouble.  Sometimes the troubles build but strike all at once.  Maybe you are caught between two feuding relatives, and you are expected to pick sides.

    Maybe your spouse is less attentive, maybe your job is less secure, maybe your health is not as good as it used to be.  One at a time, we could deal with them but when they come as a great horde, all at once, it is overwhelming.  We can be swept away easily when the great horde strikes.

    The devil loves to use great hordes.  He loves it when we feel weak and deflated.  Our resistance is down, and we are very susceptible to doubt.  We are very susceptible to hearing the question, “did God really say?”  That question that the devil asked Eve to create doubt instead of faith to create questioning instead of trusting God.  The devil always wants you to look out and see that great horde on the horizon.  The devil will always tell you look at all the things that could go wrong, look at all the trouble that could happen to you.

    But God quietly tells us to relax.  Don’t let the worries about tomorrow get you down.  I’ll take care of tomorrow just as I’ll take care of today.  The fight with the devil and his horde belongs to God and not to you.  You can look out and worry but you don’t need to.  God’s grace will keep us safe.  The ill winds of this world will still blow but we need not fear or worry.  God has promised to be with us and to lead us through it.  We will face the great horde, but we don’t face it alone and we don’t face it on its terms.  We face it in God’s care and in his comfort and support.  The battle is his and he won it on Calvary.  He declared it with the open tomb and he delivers it to you and me through Baptisms. 

     We receive God’s blessing for this life according to his mercy.  The battle he fought for us is won.  We need not fear the great horde; God has destroyed it.  We live by his grace.

Gracious Lord, you have defeated the horde which comes to destroy us.  Yet we still look on it with fear.  Give us the strength to face our fears and realize that they are not the victors but are the vanquished.  They exist so that our faith may grow, and your light may shine.  In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.      

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret

1-28-2023

Good Morning All,

       Lamentations 3:24; “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, therefore I will hope in him.”   

    We have become a society that wants everything in a “one stop has it all” lifestyle.  We want to get our car serviced while we get our teeth checked and our kids get their eyes tested.  When we get done we’ll get groceries and take supper home; all under one roof.  We have come to demand this type of service.  We expect our every want to be satisfied and quickly.

     We do the same with God.  Oh, we may pray to God, we may bring our petitions to him but is it prayer or a shopping list.  You know the prayer.  “Dear God, Fix my kids, straighten out my spouse, do something about my boss and that co-worker, give me a pay raise, give me patience and give it to me now.”  Too often, we think this is a prayer.  We view God as our celestial Wal-Mart ready to deliver all our wants and now. 

    The thing we miss is that this type of prayer; actually, this type of life; misses God’s promised blessings in our life.  This type of “demand prayer” leaves us empty, wallowing in a muddy shallow of selfishness and hollow discontentment.  When we take this attitude; we rob our lives of some of God’s greatest blessings.  We blur the line between God’s plan for our life and our desire for our life.  We tell God want we demand and how we demand it and then expect Him to intervene on our behalf on our timeline.  All the while we are stressed and distressed because things aren’t going to our plan.

    We fail to see that it is not God’s presents that matter it is his presence.  God lives actively in our lives offering to us a true hope.  Too often we get caught up in our consumer society and miss God’s love. 

    Our verse tells us that the Lord is my portion.  It doesn’t say part of my portion but the whole portion.  We are distracted cravers when we expect our people, places and things to fill our hearts as only God can. God loves us so much. Why do we forget this all the time? His plan is perfect and we can trust Him. He knows our needs and desires. When we seek Him as the answer instead of for the answer, God enables us to rest in confidence that He's working on our behalf and in our best interest, to bring glory to Himself through our lives.

    Let us remember that God is our portion.  He is the only one who can fill our heart with true hope, true comfort and true peace.  So let’s set our lists, our demands aside and seek God, seek his love, seek his peace.  When we finally let go of our goals and cling to his promise by faith will we have true happiness.  Remember his mercies.  Relish in his love and receive his portion as your fullness.

Dearest Father, your mercy is new to us every day.  Too often we seek our own goals and desires and place our wants ahead of your grace.  Forgive us when we do so.  Give us strength to live our lives with you as our portion, with you as our wholeness.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray.  Amen

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret

1-27-2023

Good Morning All,

       Mark 6:34; “When he went ashore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. And he began to teach them many things.”

   This is actually one of my favorite verses in the Bible.  A little strange I’ll grant you that but it really catches Jesus’ response to the people who had contact with him during his ministry here on earth.

   This verse occurs shortly before the feeding of the 5000.  Jesus and his disciples were taking a break from their ministry work.  The people around saw Jesus and began to gather together on shore where his boat was going to land.  There were thousands and thousands of people.  The feeding of the 5000 only counted men who were fed.  It doesn’t count women, children, those who went home early; it doesn’t count the people who “don’t count”.  Jesus looked out on the people as if they were sheep without a shepherd.  Sheep without a shepherd don’t know where to go and not to go.  A flock with no shepherd would have been battered, bruised, bleeding, hungry, thirsty and completely lost.  The sheep would have been cut up from the attacks of wild animals, emaciated from a lack of food and water.  These people weren’t just gathering for a picnic; they weren’t a beaten down and beaten-up group of souls.

    One of the reasons that I like this verse is the part where it says “and he had compassion on them”; I think that line sums up Jesus both in his earthly ministry and his eternal ministry.  The word for compassion in Greek is splagchnizomai and it means to literally have your innards turn and twist and come out.  When you say the word properly, it feels like that is what is happening.  It means more than pity or sympathy.  It is that “kicked in the stomach” feeling you get when you see or hear or experience something painful.  It is what most of us felt if we saw a 10-month-old was killed in an accident with her grandfather driving.  It is that feeling that makes your knees weak and your eyes blurry.  It is, for a moment, living it out in our own life.

   Jesus looked out on all those people and that is what he felt, a pain that not only hurt but a pain that leads to action.  In Matthew’s version of this passage, Jesus heals many of their illnesses.  Jesus not only saw the pain, experienced the pain but then did something to alleviate the pain.  This is where, too often, Christians in the US, miss what faith is.  In our antiseptic PC world, Christianity is a messy, dirty business.  You have to get your hands dirty.  You have to see things that aren’t always pleasant.  You have to experience things that are messy.  Sometimes life is just plain ugly.  The death of someone way to early; the living of someone who no longer knows who they are or anyone else; sicknesses, diseases, broken and destroyed relationships; Jesus calls us to get in there and get dirty.

    The truly wondrous part of this is that Jesus wants you and me to do it because he did it and does it and will do it forever.  Jesus came to this earth and got right down in the messiest parts to reach and to save.  He does the same in our lives, usually with family and friends, and he wants us to do the same.  So go out and get dirty and sweaty; have compassion, have splagchnizomai, for those in need of God’s mercy the most.

 Father of mercy, you shower us with your grace beyond our comprehension and you have compassion on us.  Break our hearts when we see, hear or experience others in pain.  Lead us to be your arms of comfort, of healing, and of consolation.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret        

1-26-2023

  Good Morning All,

     Mark 16:15; “And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.” 

    This is the Mark’s version of the “Great Commission.”  It is part of the direction and encouragement that Jesus gave to his disciples.  But did you ever think about what this means?  What does it mean to proclaim the Gospel?

     To many of us it is when the preacher stands up in front of the church and delivers the sermon.  This is, hopefully, an accurate event.  We certainly hope that the gospel is preached in the sermon.  But this is just a small portion of the Gospel.  We also include the Sacraments of Baptism and Holy Communion as ways that the Gospel is preached.  We also see the Gospel preached when we receive the forgiveness of sins in the absolution. 

     These are accurate examples of the preaching of the Gospel of Jesus, the good news about the promise of God to forgive our sins.  We receive the comfort and everything that provides comfort- everything that offers the favor and grace of God to those who have transgressed the law- is the Gospel.  Yet there is one thing about this that is missing.  For most of us, we see this “mission of the church” as the other guy’s job.  We usually hire a pastor to do this work.  We give money to missions so that someone else can go “do missions”.  We like to think that we are being supportive and doing our part by being the people behind the people preaching the Gospel.  We like to think that we do everything we can to support those on the front lines as it were.  The problem with this is; there are only front lines!!

     We are all on the front lines of preaching the Gospel.  There is still another way which we preach the Gospel and that is through the mutual conversations and consolations that we share with each other as brothers and sisters in Christ and with those others we come into contact with.  Jesus tells us that wherever two or three of you are gathered together there he is in the midst of them; not on the edges or the periphery but in the middle.  We all preach the Gospel every time we offer comfort to our friends and neighbors, near and far, and share with them the hope- the hope that the promise of God gives to us.  When we offer the comfort of God’s grace and mercy to others; we are preaching the Gospel.  This is part of the “as you are going about your day, make disciples” approach to witnessing your faith. 

    We don’t need to set aside time to share the Gospel with those w meet; we do it every time we talk to them, listen to them, offer them a shoulder, offer them a cold glass of water or something to eat when they are hungry.  We proclaim the Gospel in ways that we often don’t even realize showing love and kindness to all around.  So go and live your life proclaiming God’s love and mercy to all you meet.

Dear Father in heaven, your mercies are new to us every day and continue to overwhelm us with the depth of your love.  Give us the courage to preach the Gospel to the whole world that it too may know your love and mercy.  Be with those who have experienced the storms on the east coast. Protect them from all further harm and danger and move us, who are able, to provide aid and comfort in your name.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret    

1-25-2023

Good Morning All,

     Matthew 11:28; “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” 

     One of the more frequent themes of music is the plight of the working man.  Tennessee Ernie Ford sang of “Sixteen Ton.” John Fogerty sang of the “Fortunate Son.” Merle Haggard had a number of songs about the working man.  All these, and others, tell of working hard, barely hanging on, other people living off of our work; about a system that is stacked against us so that we can’t get ahead.  The plight of the man who carries a heavy burden in life, who is boned tired every night and often wakes up exhausted the next day still stiff and sore from the day before.  We often see the image of a man carrying a heavy pack on his back, all hunched over, stumbling, from the weight he bears.

    That is the image that Jesus wants us to have when we read this verse.  All those who labor and are heavy laden; all you who work hard every day, all of you who are totally exhausted from the demands of the day; come to me and I will give you rest.  The thing we want to remember is that this isn’t about physical labor; it is about spiritual labor.  It is about confessing our sins.

     When Jesus first spoke these words to his disciples, they were living under the law as interpreted by the Scribes and the Pharisees.  This led to a very work oriented path for forgiveness. Under the Pharisees, if you were a sinner, you had to make financial restitution, you had to pay for a “proper” sacrifice at the temple, and then you had to keep the law or repeat this procedure.  Well, as you can envision, the cost of a “proper” sacrifice was high and available only from the Pharisees.  This made them rich and feared for the cost was very arbitrary.  To the right people the cost was low; to the wrong people the cost was extremely high.  Often, the hardworking man barely made enough to live on, the burden of paying for this sacrifice was too much.  So, to the man who tried to be faithful to the teaching of his church, he was left with little hope.  He was trying to keep the law as the Scribes and Pharisees interpreted it.  When it was time to do a sacrifice to atone (or pay) for those sins, he had to buy the “proper” sacrificial animal from the Pharisees.  You can see how this is a losing proposition. 

     The devil tries to convince you of this same tactic.  The guilt that we feel after we sin is the devil trying to goad us into carrying that sin with us all the time.  He is weighing us down with the burden of paying for it.  He is placing the weight of that sin squarely on our back.  He wants you to carry it so he can use that sin to try and separate you from God.  He wants you to struggle and battle all day long, get no rest at night and then tomorrow he will add some more guilt, some more weight to that pack on your back.

    To this Jesus tells us come; come if you are heavy with burden, heavy with the weight of the guilt of sin, and Jesus will give you rest.  That is what confession of sins is about.  We are not telling God anything he doesn’t know when we confess our sins.  The confession of sins is about freeing yourself from the guilt of sin.  We take these sins and say, “Father, these are burdening me down please take them from me.” This is about having the burden taken from us, by Jesus, so that we may have true rest.

Dear Father in heaven, you call us through your Son to unload our burden and to receive from you your holy rest.  We are often too slow to hear these words of comfort and we carry the burdens of guilt that rob us of your grace.  Give us strength to come to you and receive rest.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret      

1-24-2023

Good Morning All,

       Psalm 1:2, “but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.”

    We spend a lot of time with rules or laws.  We have traffic rules, school rules, sports rules and maybe some of us still have house rules that we live by.  Most of the time, we aren’t big fans of rules.  We tend to see them as restrictions or limitations on our lives.  Yet rules tell us so much more than what we are limited to; they also give us the understanding of the flow of the situation.  We often view this as the intent of the law and intent is important.

     I used to umpire baseball, especially high school age.  As you study the rules of baseball, you begin to see the reasons for the rule and how it applies to other situations.  One such rule is called a “balk” by the pitcher.  There are dozens of ways a pitcher can balk so it can be difficult to call.  It becomes easier when you realize that a “balk” is the pitcher trying to deceive a base runner.  If the pitcher’s actions are to deceive; it is a balk.  You can learn this by studying the rules of baseball and then going beyond just memorizing them but trying to understand them.  You see the intent of the rule. 

    Our verse for today is similar to this.  Psalm 1 tells us about a righteous man.  His (the righteous man) delight is in the law and he meditates on God’s law day and night.  Now when some people read this, they think of just repeating the Ten Commandments over and over.  This seems rather boring.  Add this to our usual thumbnail definition of the law “showing us our sin”; it really would be.  Yet we can go much farther than this.  The law of God really shows us the Will of God or what God desires or commands.

    When we see what God desires or commands, we see that we are indeed sinners.  We see that we do need a Savior to redeem us.  However, we are God’s redeemed children, forgiven of our sins.  So the law shows us more than what we do wrong it also shows us how to live a God-pleasing life.  So as we study God’s law, we begin to see what God desires.  The law instructs us as to what our creaturely goodness before God is to be.  The commandments can really be seen as a guide to our relationships with God and with our fellow man.

    Some of the commandments are written in the positive as in “do this” and some are written in the negative as in “don’t do this.”   From these we must study and meditate (read the rest of Scriptures as well) to understand what God’s Will for us is.  This can be a daunting task sometimes.  For example, we are told not to covet, that is to want something that our neighbor has.  Suppose your neighbor is renting some land, the landowner comes to you and asks you what you would pay for rent.  When is it coveting and when isn’t it?  This could apply to a job or a position on the team or many other areas.  Some of us have dealt with mistakes with companies and their computers.  Perhaps you got too many items or too much money back, when are you breaking the 7^th commandment and when aren’t you? 

    These and other questions can get really difficult.  God’s law is perfect, but we aren’t and there are times when we are put into situations which have no obvious answer to us.  This is why we meditate on the law; to help give us guidance and direction in living a God-pleasing life.   

Dear Father in heaven, we are often blind to your holy Will and even look away when we know it.  Forgive us when we sin.  Turn our hearts to love you and your law.  Give us the wisdom to apply your law to those whom we meet and to show them your love and grace.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret

1-23-2023

Good Morning All,

Jeremiah 9:24, “but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the Lord.”

    “Tell all books;” the accounts of people who were there or claimed to be there are all the rage.  We like to get the lowdown on some people, especially someone famous.  If we are not particularly fond of the famous person, we like the real lowdown dirt.  Even if we have no strong feelings about someone we like to read or hear the story. 

    We tend to read stories that tell us about people that reveal the real person to us.  We like biographies which humanize the famous, the important or the heroic.  We like “Profiles in Courage” and other stories like that.

    In many ways, the Bible is this type of book.  The Bible is a very revelatory book.  In it, God reveals himself to us.  We learn about God through the Bible.  There are some things that we can learn about God through nature; like He is powerful, orderly, he loves beauty but this is about all we can learn from nature.  Yet in the Bible, in his book, God reveals to us who He is.  In our verse, God reveals to us that He is just and righteous and that he is merciful (steadfast love). 

    It is interesting to see that God not only has these traits but that He delights in them.  These traits give God joy and happiness; they are the traits which God shows to us in the way that He deals with us.  He is just and merciful toward us and shows us his righteousness.  We celebrate because of God’ goodness to us.  Yet this verse also tells us what God wants from his people.

     In other places in the Bible, God reveals that we are to be imitators of him or that we are to be like him.  God wants us to exhibit the same traits which He has.  We are to love mercy, seek justice and display righteousness.  We aren’t supposed to do this to our fellow man as well and we are to not only act this way but to delight in acting this way.

     God calls us to show this kind of compassion to all we meet, with all that we have contact with.  Throughout the Old Testament, God continually reveals his displeasure with a people that mistreats the poor, the widowed and the orphans.  God repeatedly expresses his anger with a cold and heartless people that shows no mercy to others.  While it is God’s nature to love, we see repeatedly where God is provoked to anger at his children when they do not love others as God loves them.

     God calls his children to live a life of justice and of love.  This life is to be an imitating life where we reflect God’s nature to all we meet.  This can be very difficult; the devil likes to whisper to us how we deserve the things we have; about how hard we have worked to earn them; about how we can boast in our accomplishments.  Yet these lies lead us away from God.  All we are to boast in is Christ and his mercy.  The mercy that led him to Calvary is the mercy we are to show to all that we encounter.  It is a difficult task, one we usually fail at, but it is the task we are called to.  We are to love mercy, do justice and live in the righteousness of Jesus our savior.

Gracious Father, far too often we fail to love as you love, we fail to act as you would have us act; we lack your justice.  Forgive us as we fall; move us to do your will in all that we do.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.              

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret

1-22-2023

Good Morning All,

         Psalm 6:8b-9; “for the Lord has heard the sound of my weeping.  The Lord has heard my plea; the Lord accepts my prayer.”

    Most of us have been there.  We have heard the sound of someone weeping.  Perhaps you are a parent of a young child and heard them weeping in their room as they were afraid of the dark or they didn’t feel well.  Maybe your children are a little older and you have had to deal with the tears of disappointment; the first broken crush, the team not made, the grade not earned, the date not received.  Perhaps you heard your spouse weep at the loss of a parent or the loss of a job or the pain of an argument you just had.  Perhaps you heard your parents weep as they are being told that they really can’t live alone anymore.  Perhaps you were the one doing the weeping.

    So, as you heard the weeping, what did you do?  Did you keep on walking by pretending to have not heard it?  Did you knock and ask if they were alright?  If they answered yes, then what?  Did you go to them and comfort them and console them?  What did you do?   I would venture a guess that as you felt you had an answer; you went right in but if you didn’t know what to say; did you walk on by? 

     This is one of the biggest mistakes we as Christians make; we think we have to be able to offer “the answer” to every problem; when we can’t we often try to avoid the issue.  Remember that you never have to, nor can you, defend God and his actions.  God doesn’t reveal everything to us and there are more questions than answers.  Why did that baby die?  Why do people have to live with pain?  Why are loving people unable to have children and the worst parents around seem to have them at will?  These are a few; I am sure each of us could add dozens.  When you hear someone weeping and these are the questions, what do we say?

     The thing we have to remember is that “WHY?” belongs to God.  Why did that baby die?  I don’t know why; only God knows why.  Why do bad things happen?  I don’t know why, only God knows.  God doesn’t reveal “WHY?” to us all the time; we must rely on what we do know and that is the gracious salvation we receive because of Jesus.  We only know what has been revealed to us and that is what we know.  We can’t answer questions like “WHY?” but we can pray and offer a shoulder to cry on, an ear to listen and a hand to hold.

     Sometimes, we feel that prayer is all we have to offer.  That is not a bad thing.  Sometimes that is all there ever is.  We pray for comfort and consolation.  We pray for the Lord to send us the promised “Comforter” and to give us peace.  The great thing is that God hears our prayers our cries and He answers them.   He sends his Spirit, in the form of family and friends, to hold us close, to give us a shoulder to lean on, a hand to hold, the willingness to wipe away the tears.

     God hears our cries; he hears our pain; he desires to give you comfort and peace.  We don’t have to hole up in our room; weeping all alone, bearing the weight of that pain.  Give it to God; trust in his promises of grace.

Dear Father in heaven, we cry, we lament, and we carry the burden of sin with us.  Remove our pain, our fear, and our loneliness.  Give us strength to call upon your holy name and seek from you peace and comfort.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret            

1-21-2023

Good Morning All,

      Isaiah 61:10, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation; he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.”

    Since we are experiencing real winter this year, we pay attention to our clothing. Yesterday, we made a trip to help watch the grandchildren at Elkton. We made sure we had a full tank of gas. We left earlier to allow more time for travel. We packed our boots, heavy coat, warm gloves, and hats so we would be warm if something happened.

    The clothes we wear can be very important.  Some of our clothing is specialty clothing like a fire fighter’s.  Some clothing is very elegant like the wedding attire that the verse describes.  Yet most clothing we wear is more practical.  It serves the purpose of keeping us warm and protecting us from the elements.

    In our verse we read about being clothed with garments.  At this time it was a common occurrence at weddings for the host to provide the proper wedding garments for the guests.  This was especially true if the host was a prince or a king and he wanted a lot of guests to be at the wedding feast.  He would provide the proper clothes for his guests to wear.

    This is a great image of our relationship with God.  God gives us the proper garments to wear.  It is Christ’s righteousness that clothes us that lets us be at the wedding feast.  This clothing protects us from the arrows that the devil slings at us.  This is the clothing which keeps us warm and comforted from the fears and the trials which we face.  It is in this truth that we exult that we glorify God for the wonders of his grace. 

    These are the clothes that are whiter than white, cleaner and more pure than any clothes we could ever imagine.  These are the clothes that let us in the banquet feast that let us stand before God.  These are the clothes we wear when we call upon God as our Father.  We receive his comfort, his safety, his protection from all that the devil throws at us.  Our own clothes, our own righteousness, are unclean and unworthy but God clothes us with his righteousness, the righteousness of Christ.

     So as we go out into this life, we have God’s promise, his sacred assurance of his grace; we wear his clothes the garments of his salvation which is the hope that we live with and live for.  The certainty of life eternal.  The best thing is that these garments never go out of style, and we never outgrow them and they never wear out.  We are covered with the robe, the robe fit for a king because it comes from the King of life.

Dear Father in heaven, you cover us with your righteousness and holiness.  You guard us and protect us all our days.  Give us the courage to live out our life in this world as your witnesses, serving our fellow man with the same love which you so richly give to us.  In Jesus’ precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret   

1-20-2023

 Good Morning All,

      1 Peter 2:10, “Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.”

    I remember watching an old western.  It had John Wayne and Dean Martin in it.  John Wayne is a sheriff trying to keep a bad guy in jail while the bad guy’s family/gang is trying to free him.  He gives Dean Martin a badge and tells him he is the new deputy.  When Dean Martin balks, John Wayne opens the door of the jail and tells everyone “this is my new deputy.”  When he turns to Dean Martin, he tells him, “Mister, you are now.”  Once he wasn’t the deputy but now, he is.

    We experience change often in our lives.  Once you were single, now you are married.  Once you were a child and now you are an adult.  When these changes occur, we are different.  You act, think, and behave differently when you become married or a parent or a house owner or whatever it is.  Once that change occurs you are different from what you were before to what you are afterwards.  This is what our verse for this morning is about.

    Once you were not people.  At one time we were just bunch of individuals wandering around lost.  Now we are God’s people.  This is a source of great comfort.  This particular phrase may not mean as much to us as it did in earlier times.  At the time that this was written and for a number of centuries following; most people were viewed as property.  You belonged to the king or the prince of the territory.  So for a time you might be King Bill’s people and then you are Prince John’s people and then there is a war and you are King Xavier’s people.  If the war was long enough you were nobody’s people.  This was the worst because you had no one who would protect you.  The roving bands of thieves and thugs could attack you all they wanted and you had no one to protect you from them.   

    This is how we see unbelievers as one’s who have no king; no one who protects them.  They live in a place of lawlessness where everyone is a victim and everyone is a target.  When we are not a people, we are just left alone with no help and no support.  The devil, the world and our sinful nature can do whatever they want to terrorize us.  We had no hope.

    But now we are God’s people.  Jesus came to reconcile us back to God.  In Baptism, God claims us as his own.  God declares us to his children, his people.  Now we don’t have to face the terrors of this life alone; we have someone we can call upon.  We can call upon the Lord to be our refuge, our security and our hope.  Now that we are God’s own we have mercy, his undeserved love.  Now we are different; we are God’s chosen children redeemed by the blood of Jesus and secure in the knowledge of our salvation with him.  We no longer have to fear the devil; we have the triumphant Savior as our king.

Gracious Lord and King, you lovingly make us your people and guard and protect us.  We ask that you send your Spirit of comfort to those who do not know of you great love and that you would bring them to faith.  Be with those who experience the pains of this life and reassure them of your great mercy.  In your precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret     

1-19-2023

Good Morning All,

      Galatians 2:16 “yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.”

    I remember watching a movie many years ago about a man who was tried for murdering his wife.  He was found not guilty but the detective investigating the case was convinced that he did it.  So for the next fifteen years the detective kept harassing the man.  He would leave messages on the man’s phone, he would send him letters, and he would show up wherever the man was.  This detective kept telling the man, “I know you did it” or “You may have fooled the judge but not me.”  Slowly but surely the man began to crack under the pressure of the detective and at a crucial point in the show confessed to the murder and then killed himself.  The detective, smugly sure that “justice” was done went back to his office where his superiors informed him that they had caught the real killer.  The detective had harassed the wrong man and drove him to suicide.  That was how the movie ended.

    The amazing thing on our life is that we live this life every day.  The devil whispers in our ear every day, “You really pulled one over on God; he thinks you are holy, but we know that you are not!”  The devil and our sinful nature wants us to believe that we are truly bad people, that we are sinners who have pulled a fast one and now are hiding from the truth.  So as we listen to this, the devil slowly grinds us down, making us feel guilty and ashamed.  The devil wants us to always feel bad just waiting for God to realize how bad we are and throw us out on our ear.

     The wondrous gift is that we truly are righteous; we truly are holy because God says so!  Because of what Jesus has done for us on Calvary, we are holy before God.  We stand clothed in the righteousness of Jesus, and we are holy; pure in God’s eyes.  This is why we can come to him in prayer because we are his redeemed children.  The devil will always tell us we are not good enough but God keeps telling us we are perfect.  The devil will try and tell you that you are really guilty but God declares you innocent.  The devil attacks but God saves!!

    It is truly one of the great mysteries of our faith but God says you are righteous in his eyes.  We hold onto that truth for it frees us from the guilt that the devil attempts to lay on our heart.  In Christ, through faith, we have the certainty of salvation and life eternal because we are freely declared holy by God in his loving grace.  The devil will lie to you all he can but he can never change the truth; you are holy and totally innocent before God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Gracious Lord, we give you thanks for the forgiveness of sins and the righteousness which you bestow on us because of Christ.  Give us the strength to reject the devil and his lies and lead us through this life with the true peace and contentment knowing for certain that life eternal awaits us.  In you precious name we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret