3-7-2024

Good Morning All,

     John 3:16; “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”

       Do you remember a song by Anne Murray called “A Little Good News”?  It was recorded in the early 1980’s.

There's a local paper rolled up in a rubber band
One more sad story's one more than I can stand
Just once how I'd like to see the headline say
"Not much to print today, can't find nothin' bad to say", because…

Nobody robbed a liquor store on the lower part of town
Nobody OD'ed, nobody burned a single building down
Nobody fired a shot in anger, nobody had to die in vain
We sure could use a little good news today.

 

    It is both sad and ironic that a song that is 40 years old could have been written about today’s events.  The only part that really needs to be changed is that Bryant Gumbel isn’t on the Today show any more.  The truth is that the human condition really hasn’t changed much, if any since Adam and Eve left the garden.  We see violence, hatred, pain, suffering and sorrow every time we read the newspaper, watch the news, or listen to a report.

    While the world gives us nothing to hope for or on, while it gives us only pain; we have hope that is above this world.  It is beyond this world, yet it penetrates and permeates the world.  God saw how wretched and hopeless the world’s condition was.  There was no way that we, as humans, could or will ever fix this condition.  So, God fixed it for us.  Because of his love for us, he rescued us and restored us into his beloved family.  He sent Jesus to heal the suffering that we experience every day.  The struggles of this life, while painful at times, do not define us, limit us, or contain us.  We live in hope; hope that radiates from the cross into us.

    That is our good news, every minute of every day.  God gave his Son because he loves you.  Even with the pain of this sin filled world, we have the certainty of hope that leads us above and beyond the world.  You may never hear this good news on the “Today” show or any other TV news program, but God shouts this good news to us every time we open his Bible and hear what he has to say to us.  He has really good news for you today.

Father, in this world we have a lot of pain, and many are broken and hurting.  Your grace is our only good news.  Keep us in your loving arms that we may always know the wonders of your mercy.  Bring your good news to those who are in pain at this time.  Brighten their life with the light of your salvation.  In the precious name of Jesus, we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret        

3-6-2024

Good Morning All,

     Matthew 22: 37-39; “And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.  And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

     In 1976, a new group on the scene called “Boston” released a song entitled “More than a Feeling”.  It was a song about a guy who let his one true love get away.  There are old songs that remind him that this love for the long-lost love is more than just a feeling but rather a deep-seated response to the world around him.

    While it is a popular rock song from the 1970’s, it expresses an opinion about love that is contrary to the world’s view.  The world will tell you that you have to feel in love.  The world tells you if you feel it then you are in love but if you don’t feel it then you are not in love.  According to this thought, you could be in and out of love a dozen times a day.  The world tells you that love is what you feel and if you don’t feel it then, whatever.  This is not how the Scriptures explains love.  In Scriptures, love is “more than a feeling!”

    Love is more than a feeling; love is an action.  In the world, love is more of an adjective, describing you as a person.  In Scriptures, love is a verb; love is an action.  Love is a definitive action that we do.  We must act in order to love.   Love is more than a feeling; it is an action.  Love is more than a feeling; it is motion or movement that makes itself known by doing something for another person.

   We see love in its purest form when see how God loves us.  God’s love for us is seen in Jesus dying for us.  The Apostle Paul tells us that “while we were yet sinners; Christ died for us.”  In other words, while we still hated God, he was dying for us to being us back into his family and to give us hope.  We see it when we look and see how Jesus went out and actively sought out the sick, the lame and the hurting.  We see true love in everything that God does for us.

    For us to love is to show action.  To say that we love God is to praise him, to thank him and to follow his will.  This type of love is more than a feeling; it is also a change in our lives that the world will see.  True love is seen by its actions; it is more than a feeling.

    Part of this love is seen in our response to others.  How we act toward and how we treat others will show as well.  It is not enough to “have good thoughts;” true love acts on behalf of another.  True love is an action that benefits the other person and not you.  True love makes the life of the other person better.  True love is what you do not what you feel.  It is deeper than a feeling; it is more than a feeling; it is an event for someone you know.

God of love, in you we see true love in action.  Move us by your Spirit to love as you have loved us.  Move us to act, to show your love though our actions to others.  Move us by your Spirit to make the lives of those around us to be easier, happier and more fulfilling.  Cause us to reach out to those who are especially in need of your love.  Act through our hands.  In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret    

3-5-2024

Good Morning All,

               Exodus 15: 26; “saying, “If you will diligently listen to the voice of the Lord your God, and do that which is right in his eyes, and give ear to his commandments and keep all his statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you that I put on the Egyptians, for I am the Lord, your healer.”

    I remember watching a movie a few years back where the hero of the movie was a young man who couldn’t stand to be in sunlight.  He always wore clothes that covered his entire body.  He would wear long sleeves, a hat, gloves, and a scarf all in an attempt to keep the sunlight from hitting his skin.  He would get blistered burns wherever the sunlight would hit.  Because of this he was something of a recluse, shy and a little timid.

    What he did possess was the ability to heal living creatures, birds, animals, and people.  For the most part, he kept this talent hidden until one day he met a girl and fell in love.  Eventually, she falls ill, and he must withstand the sunlight in order to get to her and heal her.  He suffers burns on his face and hands and arms and in the end; he dies from his wounds.  He died saving his girlfriend from death.  It was a sad movie.

    The ability to heal would be a remarkable gift.  If one could remove pain or suffering just by touching another person, you could do a lot of good for many, many people.  That is why our verse can be such a comforting verse for us.  God is our healer, and he uses the name of Yahweh (LORD) here to show us that he does indeed get his hands dirty in our lives healing us from the spiritual devastation that sin causes.

    The people would have been used to shamans and other false healers who would have let the sick person down time after time.  For them to have a real healer who would cure them; gave them great joy and comfort.  God was their comfort and. in a very real sense; he healed them of what they suffered from.

   We too, have this great joy and comfort in our life.  God is our healer.  He heals us emotionally, spiritually, within a relationship and often times in a physical sense as well.  God heals us so that we may be whole.  We can have confidence that God will hear us and send us his Spirit of hope and compassion.  We can trust that God, who did not spare his Son, will give to us healing. God will make us whole, make us part of the kingdom of heaven restoring us, healing us, and making us whole again.   God is our healer, and we can have faith that, through his grace we are being made perfect and whole.

Father of mercy, in your arms we have healing.  Send your Spirit upon your children that they may know the completeness of your mercy.  Be with those who are broken and are suffering.  Give them the certainty of your incredible grace and heal their hearts to know the love that you give them.  Heal their spirits so that they may know peace.  In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.     

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret

3-4-2024

Good Morning All,

          Numbers 13:30; “But Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.”

      Our verse is part of an amazing story.  12 spies from the Israelites crossed over the Jordan to study their soon to be opponents.  These spies checked out the cities, the land, and the people of Canaan; the land that God had promised them.  The spies saw it.  They saw fertile land, bountiful vineyards, large cities, and people that they described as giants.  They returned and gave their report to Moses and the Children of Israel. 

    Ten of the spies went on and on about how they could never conquer this land or this people.  “We will die by the sword.”  They looked and saw the giants and knew they could never succeed.  There were two, however, who took a different view.  Two men, named Caleb and Joshua, told a different tale.

    Caleb and Joshua both said they should conquer the land.  They spoke of the fertile land; the bounty of the land was amazing; they spoke of the cities and the people who inhabited the land.  They saw the people as giants, but they focused, not on the size of the task but on the size of God. 

   How do you face challenges?  Do you look at the size of the “giants” or do you look at the size of God?  It is easy to be overwhelmed by the size of the “giants” in our life.  Health issues look huge, financial strains can look humongous, cracks in a relationship can look gigantic.  The size of the troubles can be immense.  There is no denying it, even Caleb and Joshua in our story didn’t deny the size of the “giants” in Canaan.  We can look at the size of the struggles that this life will throw at us and realize that they are big; definitely bigger than we can handle on our own.  That is what the other ten spies did.  They looked at the size of the “giants” and could see no way for them to win against these great cities, armies of these “giants.”

    But Caleb and Joshua didn’t look at the size of the giants; they looked at the size of God and the promise that he had made to them.  Caleb and Joshua had faith that God was bigger than the giants that they were to face and trusted God to deliver them.  They knew that God was faithful to his promises; they had witnessed this throughout their entire life.  They trusted God and we should as well.

    God is faithful to his promises, and he has promised to love you, to redeem you, to protect you from all harm that the devil will throw at you, and he has promised to be with you every step of the way.  God is with us, giving us comfort and hope until we are reunited with him in his glorious kingdom.

Father, give me the strength to know that you have destroyed my giants.  Keep me safe in your holy kingdom.  Hold me in your arms.  Be with those who are facing their own giants at this time.  Send your Spirit of comfort and hope that they may be calmed by your grace, and they may know your peace.  In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret 

3-4-2024

Good Morning All,

    Acts 2:42; “And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.”

       It is always interesting when you discuss church membership with some people.  When asked what church they belong to; some can’t tell you the name of the minister at the church, they aren’t sure what times services are, some aren’t sure of the denomination or what it meant.  When asked if they are Christian; it is not uncommon for the answer to be, “No, I am Catholic” or “No, I am Presbyterian” or “No, I am (fill in the blank)”.  Unfortunately, many people do not know what it means to belong to a church or what that means.

    So, what does it mean to belong to the church?  Probably first and foremost, the church is relational.  It should be a place where, the relationship that you have with God and with one another is strengthened, healed, restored, enhanced, rejuvenated, invigorated, made perfect.  That is what the early church was engaged in; it was engaged in relationship building.  Notice what the members of the early church did: Bible Study, time with other believers, time with other believers in worship, interceding for each other.

    They studied the Bible, the teaching of the Apostles.  They did this, not to be a champion on “Jeopardy” but in order to hear what God was telling them and to see what God was revealing about himself to them.  They hungered to hear God’s Words of mercy and grace.  Through those wonderful words, he drew them closer, strengthened their faith and built them up.

    Because God is rebuilding this relationship with you, he desires that we rebuild our relationships with each other as well.  We do this through the fellowship that is discussed.  This can be a meal together (first potluck?) or time around a table with a cup of coffee.  The important thing is that it is about listening to each other and truly hearing about the events in each other’s life and having a true compassion for each other. 

    It is about joining together, as this compassionate fellowship and sharing together in God’s gift to us in his body and blood in the bread and the wine that we, as a group, may be strengthened in faith and in fellowship with each other.  Then they joined in prayer, corporately and individually, always praying for each other.  Lifting the concerns and needs of each other up to God and sharing in the rejoicing of God’s mercy.

    This is what the church should be.  If this is missing from your life, then you may want to prayerfully review your relationship with your fellow believers.  God gives you the church to strengthened and comforted in this life.  It is yours for the using.

Gracious Father, you give us the church so that we may be strengthened.  Help us to see and to use this wonderful gift.  Help those who feel they are alone and without hope.  Bring them to those whom you have called that they may be blessed through the true church.  Keep your church safe from the attacks of the devil.  Heal its wounds and strengthen it so that it may be your true light in this world.  In the precious name of Jesus, our head, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret  

3-2-2024

Good Morning All,

               1 John 4:18; “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.”

        He was a cantankerous patient.  He growled at the nurses and the nurses’ aides who tried to help him.  He never said thank you or offered a smile or a kind response.  He seemed to be angry at everything.  One night, when he was particularly grumpy, an older aide asked him why he was so mad at everyone.  He stopped for a moment and while looking at the ceiling began to tell the aide his story.

    He told the aide that he wasn’t angry; he was frightened.  He was afraid of what the doctors would tell him.  He was afraid of losing his independence.  He had never depended on anyone for anything but now; he had no choice.  He was afraid and being afraid made it hard to be thankful, joyful or hopeful.  Fear was driving away his confidence; fear was making his life miserable.

    Fear is the devil’s favorite tool.  When we fear, we tend to become frozen in our vision.  We seem to only focus on how big the challenge ahead of us is and not on God’s grace.  Fear paralyzes us into inaction.  It drives us to emptiness and hollowness.  It deprives us of the confidence in the love that God pours upon us; it weakens our faith.  Fear causes us to deny our thankfulness and our willingness to see past the immediate and miss God’s perfect promise for our life.

    The only way for us to lose our fear is for the perfect love of God to drive it away.  We can never fight fear on our own.  We will never defeat fear on our own.  It is far stronger than we are.  If we are going to defeat fear, we will need help; help from God.  His grace is poured out upon us freely because of Jesus and his all-atoning sacrifice for us.  Because of Jesus’ victory, we have nothing to fear.   The devil can only taunt us but in the end, we know that God and his mercy will prevail in the end.  Nothing can defeat God and his love for us.

    So, as we face our fears, we can be confident that God has already defeated them.  We can trust that in Him we have complete victory; in Him we have the promise of our salvation.  When we grab hold of this truth, we can give thanks to God that this challenge or struggle that we face has already be conquered by his mercy.  We can know that each struggle will end in God’s loving arms.  We can rejoice in his grace and peace. 

Father of all mercy, when we stand on our own fear can overtake us.  Use your love to drive out our fear.  Strengthen our faith that we may stand tall and face our fears with the confidence of your love destroys fear.  Be with those who are struggling at this time.  Give them the strength to overcome their fears.  Show them your perfect peace.  In the precious name of Jesus we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret   

3-1-2024

Good Morning All,

             1Peter 5:7; “casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.”

      My office habits are not necessarily the greatest.  I am a proponent of “moderately organized mayhem” or “semi-controlled clutter.”  I don’t really file things; it is more that I pile things.  I have a pile on this corner of my desk and then a pile on the other corner of my desk.  One pile is for marriage counseling stuff.  One pile is for membership class.  There is a pile on the edge of my desk that has stuff for next week’s service.  There is a pile in the center of my desk that has sermon prep stuff.  There is a pile by the printer that is miscellaneous church mail.  There is a pile of books on my library shelves from various study materials.  A new pile is forming for confirmation and then there are just the seeds of a pile for more electronic preaching. It is mayhem but moderately organized.

    Yet sometimes, especially if things get a little hairy and harried, the piles get a little deep.  Sometimes, I just have to stop and take an afternoon and start throwing things away.  I just hope as I go through it that nothing of any importance emerges from the bottom of one of the piles.  So far nothing major has shown up.  But I do find a fair amount of material that really doesn’t need to be kept.  It might be duplicate material, it might be outdated, or it might not seem as valuable or important as it did a few weeks ago.  Sometimes I need to go through the piles in my office.  Sometimes we need to go through the piles in our life as well.

    Sometimes we keep piles of past sins, past worries and past hurts and fears around too long.  Every so often, you need to go through and truly clean house.  When we hold onto these painful, past events, they pull us back from Christ and his love.  They serve to distract us from focusing on God’s grace and his promise of salvation.  It causes us to lose sight of God’s promised mercy in our life.  Holding onto the past pain short circuits our contentedness and our ability to truly enjoy the life that God has for us.

    Jesus invites us to get rid of those sorrows and worries.  He invites us to cast them on his back.  He invites us to replace our anxiety with his peace, peace that only God’s mercy can give us.  So go through your “piles” in your life.  Are there worries that are outdated?  Are there worries that occur over and over?  Are there worries that aren’t important to us at all?  Then cast them away.  Don’t keep the baggage; that only serves the devil.  Cast off the unneeded and the unwanted cares and sorrows of this life.  Jesus has removed our sins and with this, has given to us the certainty of God’s grace.  So clean out the piles that are hurting you.  Give them to God for he loves you and cares for you.

Father of all mercy; help me to clean up the piles in my life.  Help me to throw away those things in my life which cause me pain.  Help me to have a clean heart and spirit so that I may better serve you.  Be with those who are struggling with the piles that are building in their life.  Lead them from the destruction of the world and the devil and to return to you and your peace.  In the precious name of Jesus, our risen Savior, we pray, amen.

God’s Peace,

Pastor Bret