Holy Spirit

Something out of nothing

/ The Pastor

One of the many joys for me as a pastor is seeing God create something out of nothing. No, I am not talking about anything magical here but rather the Holy Spirit bringing about a sermon when I had nothing.

Often times I enter Thursday not knowing where I am going with a sermon. I know the text, since I am preaching through the Gospel of Mark, but I don’t always know what the message is. And there are many times when I am anxious about this even though I know I shouldn’t be; even though I know I should trust God.

Today was such a day.

I did my reading and note taking before “relocating my office” to my favorite coffee shop down town. I do this every Thursday (for the most part) and at the same time. I set up my computer, ordered my lunch to be brought to me at 11 AM, got my coffee and scotcheroo and off to work I went. This is my routine.

As I started writing I noticed that my fingers started flowing across the keyboard faster and faster and with purpose. The message started to materialize in front of me like a Star Trek transporter. And as the message became clear I got more and more excited and felt more and more guilty. I was excited as the Spirit was working through me to create this message but guilty that I didn’t trust God enough to not be anxious about it. I have been a pastor for 10 1/2+ years and God has not let me down. Every Sunday I was scheduled to preached, I preached a sermon. Never once did I show up on a Sunday morning with nothing.

And God does this in other ways in our lives; creates something out of nothing:
~ Opportunities to share our faith
~ Opportunities to serve one another
~ Faith where there was no faith
~ Purpose where there was hopelessness
~ Life where there was death

If only I had the faith to see this more often.

Oh God, increase my faith and sharpen my eyes to see you at work in this world.

Praise be to God!

The Pastor -|—

 

Sometimes…

/ The Pastor / 3 Comments

Don’t judge me when you see me seemingly doing nothing:
~ Sometimes I just need to sit and reflect.
~ Sometimes I just need to savor the Word just read.
~ Sometimes I just need to talk to my Savior.
~ Sometimes I just need to slowly sip my coffee.
~ Sometimes I just need to daydream about the ministry before me.
~ Sometimes I just need to mull over a conversation.

Sometimes I look lazy, sometimes I look lost but whatever the case don’t judge me because it’s in those times I can be the most productive. Many people don’t understand how a pastor works because how a pastor works can be so different from how we saw our parents work. But a pastor’s work can be just as taxing thus the different kind of work we sometimes engage in.

Today I sat in the corner at my favorite coffee shop for an hour or so; holding my Google tablet, sipping coffee and nibbling on a cookie.

And that was work.

My finger nails didn’t get dirty and I don’t have sore muscles as you know them but the pastor does feel the effects of ministry thus my coffee shop work.

And as I walked back to my office; breathing in the cool winter air, I felt refreshed and ready to do some more “traditional” work; work that doesn’t draw the ire of some.

But now you may say, “Work? You’re writing a blog post. How is that work?” To answer that fully I would have to write another blog post but I’m not going to do that. So what I will say in response will have to suffice for now:

Sometimes I just have to write…

And that is work of a different kind; one that exercises the mind.  But now I’m off and ready to go; thankful for the “work” I did today.  May God be praised in all I do and say; and not just sometimes but always.

The pastor -|—

Holy boldness

/ The Pastor

Happy Pentecost Sunday!

May the Holy Spirit rush into your life and lead you to boldly speak the name of Jesus without holding back.

May the Holy Spirit give you courage to face the world as the world is so much stronger.

May the Holy Spirit remind you what Jesus taught that you may teach others.

May the Holy Spirit lead you to places that you would never dream of going.

May the Holy Spirit be your guide as it did for those first disciples.

Let us pray…

Holy and Mighty God, it is difficult to admit that we are powerless and weak.  It is scary to think we are nothing but sheep in the midst of ravenous wolves. Oh God, restore our hope in you through Jesus.  Strengthen our faith that we may know your peace.  Open our eyes that we may see your power.  And send us forth in your name.  May we not rely on our ingenuity, creativity or intelligence but may we seek your wisdom in order to bring your peace into this world.  Loving God, you are the restorer of creation, not us.  May we be your instruments and give glory to your name.  Now may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, Oh God, our Rock, Redeemer and Restorer, Amen.

God bless you this day and always 🙂

The pastor -|—

Don’t wear red

/ The Pastor

I saw a question on Twitter this morning that asked:

“Are you wearing red today?”

To some of you this may seem like a strange question so allow me to put it into context.  Today is Pentecost Sunday (liturgical color: Red).  This is the Sunday when we recognize the giving of the Holy Spirit to the disciples in Acts 2.  A great story of the birth of the church and the work of the Holy Spirit. But I have serious problems with this question and the encouraging of people to wear red today (other than the fact that we don’t encourage people to wear clothing to match other liturgical colors throughout the year).

Think about it:  If you were to visit a church on Pentecost Sunday (not knowing what this day was or forgetting it was Pentecost) and upon entering the church you notice a sea of people wearing red, what would your first thoughts be?

For me I would:
(1) Start to wonder if there was a special celebration going on that I wasn’t invited to. I might be a little leery about going in; thinking I was crashing a party.

(2) Wonder if people were looking at me wondering why I didn’t wear red today. Kind of like going to a Vikings tailgate party and not wearing purple and gold.

(3) Feel like an outsider; not part of the group.  Kind of like wearing a Packers jersey to a Vikings tailgate party.

(4) Feel left out; like I am not wanted in this group…like a Packers fan at a Vikings tailgate party 🙂

(5) Probably not return to that church…because I would not want to feel like this again.

The encouraging of people to wear red on Pentecost (and Reformation Sunday…the other Sunday people are encouraged to wear red) is done in order to give those Sundays a special emphasis; not to isolate visitors.  But it does have that effect.  So I have stopped inviting people to wear red.  If they do…great.  Will I wear my red stole today?  Absolutely.  But I want ALL people to feel welcome.

Think about that today and other Sundays:
~ Are there things that we do in our churches that might cause people to feel like outsiders?
~ Are we truly welcoming communities?
~ When visitors walk into the church do they feel like they are wanted?
~ When visitors attend worship do they feel self-conscience about not knowing the “rules” of the church?

Let’s not become so comfortable that we exclude others.  Make it a point to say “hi” to someone who is visiting and befriend them.  Don’t let your church become an exclusive club but an inclusive family…the Body of Christ.

So don’t wear red today…wear the love of Christ.

edh -|—

Defeated

/ The Pastor

It never fails.

Every year at this time in Lent I hit “the wall”.
Every year I begin Lent thinking I am going to be fine…I have this under control.
And every year God humbles me.

On Monday I hit the proverbial wall.  I maybe got an hour of sleep that night as my brain was running wild. I had very little energy on Tuesday that no amount of coffee could fix.  I was experiencing stress related aches and pains.  And I had a hard time concentrating.

It was not a good day 😦

Mid-afternoon on Tuesday I made the difficult decision to cancel my Tuesday night small group at Belmont and cancel confirmation on Wednesday.  I was ready for my Wednesday small group and almost ready for Wednesday night worship.  So I after I got the word out about the schedule changes I went home to lie down.

Defeated.

God help me.

I prayed and prayed.  I confessed my sin of self-confidence in my ability to go through Lent on my strength.  Not that I totally ignored God, but I was happy with MY plan to get everything done.  I scheduled everything out.  I felt I could just plow headlong through Lent and then rest for 2 weeks after Easter.  But I ran out of MY energy.

God defeated me…and I thank God for that 🙂

I got a solid 8 hours of sleep on Tuesday night and felt better on Wednesday.  It felt good to sit and relax…and reflect…and pray.  It felt good to take my time to prepare for release time and then small group and then worship.  It felt good to have fellowship with God and rely on God’s strength through the Holy Spirit.

It felt good to be defeated.

One of these years I am going to figure this Lent thing out.
One of these years I am going to remember who is truly in charge.
But in the mean time I am going to cherish this feeling of being defeated and enjoy the power of the Holy Spirit working through me.

God help me 🙂

edh -|—

Feed your sheep

/ The Pastor

Loving God – because your sheep NEED to be fed, grant me strength.

Grant me the words to say this morning as we mourn the death of Gene.

Open the hearts of those who have not heard of you that they may hear the Good News.

Comfort the hearts of those who have heard with the hope of the resurrection.

Strengthen us as we go through these days, weeks and months that lay ahead with the promise that in Christ there are no “good byes”.

May our time together this morning bring you praise, honor and glory as we are FED with the awesome story of Jesus Christ crucified and risen FOR US.

Thank you, God, for your faithfulness.

Come, Holy Spirit.

Amen.

edh -|—

My “gift”

/ The Pastor / 2 Comments

Something weird happened to me when I was at my synod council meeting this past Saturday.

One of the synod ministers was talking about networking; trying to connect people’s gifts and talents with others.  It is a very good idea and am glad we have someone on the synod staff whose job is to do that.

But that’s not the weird thing.

As she was showing us the list of people she has in the data base I was scanning for people I knew and what was listed as their “talent”. For the most part I was not surprised with what I saw.

Then my name came up. (by the way…this is where the “weird thing” begins)

After my name I saw “writing”.  I have never considering “writing” a talent or gift.  Sure…I have been blogging for 5 1/2 years or so but that doesn’t mean I am a gifted writer.  But don’t get me wrong…I wasn’t upset with what I saw, I was just surprised. (This is not the “weird thing” yet…that was just the beginning of the “weird thing” story)

The weird thing that happened was that after I saw “writing”by my name I got inspired.  You see…I hadn’t written a blog post since Dec. 12.  With the Christmas season and an increased emphasis in communicating through Facebook and Twitter, I just kind of drifted away from blogging, but on Sunday I wrote.

And today I wrote…

…and now I feel inspired to write some more. (But don’t worry ramble on and on here)

It is funny/weird how the Holy Spirit works.  And it WAS the Holy Spirit at work that day; kicking me in the butt.  I guess there is more ministry to do done through my so-called “gift” of writing.  Weird…huh?

Praise be to God!

edh -|—

Really?

/ The Pastor

I recently read a little blurb in the March issue of The Lutheran.  Check this out:

A British university study suggests that people of strong faith can spread
religion through a “believers’ gene” that is part of their DNA.
The Proceedings of the Royal Society B, a prestigious journal
of Britain’s Royal Society of scientists, theorizes a “predisposition
toward religion.” Author Robert Rowthorn suggests that people with
strong religious beliefs tend to have more children and this, combined
with a genetic predisposition to believe, can explain the expansion of religion.

Wow…I think someone needs to tell these people that they have too much time on their hands but more importantly about the work of the Holy Spirit.  Then again…maybe they have figured out how the Holy Spirit “really” works.  Who knew that God programs us at the DNA level to believe.  The next thing you know is that on CSI, while they are doing a DNA profile, you will hear them say, “Hey look…we have a Christian.”

But seriously…this is just another sad example of how people just can not leave some mysteries up to God.  There is this insatiable desire to try to figure God out.  We can’t just leave things up to faith.  I mean…there are some things we can not fully explain.  I think this is just another attempt to remove God from the picture and become gods ourselves.  Surprise, surprise.

For me…the wonder of creation is that I don’t totally understand it.  I love being surprised.  If everything was calculated, figured out and predetermined ahead of time life would be incredibly boring.

“Believers’ gene”…nope.  It’s just good ole fashioned parenting.  No mystery there.

-edh-

Whew…

/ The Pastor / 1 Comment

Yup…I am still here.  This past week has gotten busy…which is normal for this time in December.  Let’s see what we have here: (1) Christmas open house at the parsonage is coming up; (2) along with our Christmas program; (3) Christmas worship services need to be planned; (4) and of course there are board meetings with the synod, Bible camp and congregation; (5) Plus the everyday, normal church “stuff”; and (5) For good measure I have a funeral next week.

Whew…

…But don’t get me wrong…I am not trying to whine and complain; sharing my sob story here.  But it never ceases to amaze me how I forget about the mayhem that always seems to hit this time of the year.  It’s like I get amnesia…and maybe that is a good thing, because if I were to dwell on this craziness all year-long I might have run for the hills a long time ago.  But as it stands, I am still here…and…God continues to be faithful.

I am a little stressed, but I know everything will turn out great.  The Gospel will be preached and the Holy Spirit will do its thing.  And after all…isn’t that the point?  To let go and let God be God.  I think so.

So I am going to get back to my “lazy” afternoon of sitting in my favorite chair; drinking coffee and reading scripture.  A combination that you can never go wrong with.  And oh ya…all that Christmas planning and other “stuff”…it will get done.  To the glory of God.

-edh-

Sermon prep on a busy Thursday

/ The Pastor

Today is Thursday…

…and that means sermon prep.  But being that it is July 23 it also means day #4 of VBS…AND…wedding prep day (I have a wedding on Saturday for a couple of friends).  All in all…it will be a busy day (with any luck I will also get my lawn mowed).

In any case…back to sermon prep.  The text I am preaching on is from John 6:1-21.  This is John’s account of the Feeding of the 5000 with Jesus walking on the water to boot.  It’s almost a 2 fer today.

My plan right now is to start things out with a prayer (like I usually do) but this time I am going to use the second lesson text (which is a prayer for the Ephesians — Eph. 3:14-21).  I am going to change some “yous” to “we” and use it for us…here and now.  I thought that sounded like good way to start.  It talks about being strengthened by the Holy Spirit; being rooted and established in love; that we may know Christ; but in the end all glory and honor to God forever and ever, Amen.

Now on to the Gospel text…

…here I don’t really know where I am going yet, but that’s what the Holy Spirit is for.  With everything going on today I am trying not to get too nervous.  Normally I would leave my office at 11am and head to Coffee Choices to eat and write, but with VBS today I can’t leave here until after 12noon (that will throw off the routine).  To the naked, untrained eye this may not seem like a big deal, but routines (for some) are important.  And when I get thrown from mine I often need to focus a little harder to stay on track.

<There I go again…off track…I am supposed to be talking about John 6>

Anyway…here are some initial thoughts about John 6:1-21:
(1) A foretaste of the Feast to come.
(2) When we are “hungry” Jesus WILL feed us.
(3) Jesus can do much with what we consider little.
(4) With Jesus in our life, we will have more than enough.
(5) A defense of youth ministry — a small boy was encouraged to contribute and 5000+ people were fed.

These sound like small tag lines but sermons often start with thoughts such as these.

What do you hear in this text?

In your particular place in your life, how does this text “feed” you?

God bless you today and always.  Praise be to God!

-edh-