Pastor's Blog

I don’t know about you but lately my life has been a roller coaster. Last year, we had a great middle school mini retreat where 40 youth got together safely and worked in small groups to have a Bible Study, played games, and did a service project. Then, we took kids to camp. Lutheridge was a wonderful experience! We started the school year with an outdoor luau for the middle and high school youth! It was great. Things seemed to be getting “back to normal.” Then Omicron hit.

Diamonds are valuable. I don’t have to convince you of that. Like gold or silver, diamonds have intrinsic value. They are valuable because of what they are. They don’t need to be molded or crafted into another form for them to have value. We’re usually pretty good about knowing when something is intrinsically valuable just by looking at it.

This past weekend we babysat our granddaughter, Chloe. There is never a dull moment! She loves to play “Hide & Seek” and “Go” with Poppy (Mark), loves to read books and loves to laugh!

This week, my talented co-worker, my trusted colleague and one of my closest friends, Mark Glaeser, announced that it was time to retire after serving Christ Lutheran for 32 years. My heart both sank and was lifted when he took me aside in private to tell me about his decision.

As parents, our life revolves around the school calendar. Now that school is back after the Christmas break, it feels like we’re taking off again from the starting line of a race. Yet, after the first week I find myself out of breath and exhausted, ready for another break. Parenting is hard, and it wears you out. What makes it difficult for me isn’t being with my children. I actually like them – most of the time. What’s so hard is wearing the other hats that fall under the title of parent: taxi driver, chef, cleaner, teacher, doctor, coach. But the hardest job, the one that gives me the most anxiety, is scheduler.

2022. Two thousand twenty-two years since the birth of ourLord, Jesus the Christ. We gave Jesus the highest honor: we ordered the timingof all humanity around him. We used to call it B.C. and A.D., now we aresupposed to call is B.C.E. and C.E.. However you call it, that turning point isJesus.

The well-known song “Mary, Did You Know?” has been a staple of contemporary Christian Christmas music for over thirty years. The song propounds a number of questions to Mary about Christ’s birth that, while pensive, can seem rhetorical. This has led to its criticism: social media is often ripe this time of year with nay-sayers who post memes and contribute vacuous comment-section banter: “Mary knew she would birth the Messiah,” the more tactful comments retort, “the angel Gabriel told her.”

I’m not just coming back to my house. A house is a building with a couple of walls, windows and doors. When I say I am coming home, it is to a place where I belong, a placed filled with memories, a place that when I get there, I am eagerly welcomed. I’m coming home!

Really can’t we just talk to God at our homes and be done? Isn’t it in the bible somewhere that God is with us, even in our homes? And if God is with us at restaurants and golf courses and couches then why bother with going to this building every week?

24“Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. 25 The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. 26 But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. 27 The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.”

You know those moments.‍ When someone does something to you that you don’t appreciate.‍ After a sneer, a smirk, or an inappropriate verbal explosion, you turn to the offender and sarcastically say, “Thanks a lot!”

Ann Powell, age 92, died last week and for the past several days, every time I think of her, it puts a smile on my face.On Tuesdays she would come to the church office to answer the phones while we had our staff meetings. She would often bring in the crossword puzzle to work on and I would stop by her desk to help her with a couple of clues before the meeting.

The two weeks of fall we had were wonderful, but now the cold has come. It’s time to pull out the winter coats. We must bundle up before walking outside. It feels like winter!

It’s time for another COVID check-in. How are you doing? More importantly, how are your children? Whether you’re a parent, grandparent, aunt/uncle, godparent, teacher, or friend … how are the children in your life hanging in there? 

Since I shared a letter last week announcing my call to serve as a Navy Chaplain, Megan and I have received many kind notes of support and well wishes for which we are so grateful. We have also gotten some good questions. As a follow up, I thought I would use the Pastor’s Blog this week to try and answer some of the most common ones.