12-24-2024

Good Morning All,

     1 Thessalonians 1:4; “For we know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you.”

    Do you remember being a kid in school, out at recess, while the much dreaded choosing of sides occurred?  It might have been kickball or tag or whatever; you never wanted to be picked last.  The really strange thing is that we never really get over it.

    If a group of friends begin to decide to do something, we hope to be included.  Maybe many of your friends are beginning to settle down and get married and you don’t even go on many dates; will anybody pick you?  You begin the long process of looking for a job; everyone else has a job but you are still looking, will anyone hire you?  Even if we are in the middle of all the excitement, we wonder if it will end and we will be alone.

     For all our claims of individuality and personal self-reliance, we are very much a social creature.  In the end, one of our deepest fears is being alone.  Some people get married to someone who doesn’t love them just so they aren’t alone.  Middle school and high school kids will run with the wrong crowd just so they aren’t alone.  We fear being alone and the devil will play on that fear all he can.  When it is late at night and you can’t sleep, the devil often tries to make you think that the troubles you face, you face all alone.

    One of my favorite TV shows is still MASH.  During one show when Radar is worried about his widowed mother dating again’ Hawkeye tells him to let her have her fun.  “Loneliness is everything it is cracked up to be.”  It really is.  Sin causes this loneliness.  Sin broke our relationship with God and caused us to turn our backs to God and go our own way.  We think we are tough but deep down we are alone and the devil and the cares of the world circle around us like the vultures that they are.  Soon they hope to pick our bones clean.

    Into this mess of a life, Jesus came and because of Jesus; God chose you.  You are not left standing at the wall; you are not the odd one out.  You are chosen; called by the Holy Spirit through the Gospel and sealed as God’s child in Baptism; a time when you are individually claimed by God to be his child. God specifically and especially chose you.  Since he chose you, he is always with you, and you are never alone.  Even when it feels like there isn’t anyone even close to you, God is there with you and for you. 

    We never face trials alone; we never face the terrors of the devil alone.  God is there with us.  We also don’t have to face the trials of this life alone.  God works through his church through his redeemed children.  When you face the trials of this life, God uses his church to give you comfort and hope.  God uses his other redeemed children to support you and console you.  You never need to be alone; God and his family are there.

Gracious Lord, we give you thanks that you have chosen us.  Give us that due sense of your presence, your comfort, and your peace.  Guard us and protect us and lead us to be of comfort to those around us who are most in need.  In your precious name, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret