Christ Is Risen!

Christ ist erstanden!

Sunday, April 20, 2025

Hallelujia!

God Chooses Life

For Us All!

Luke 24:1ff

On the first day of the week, at early dawn, [the women] came to the tomb, taking the spices that they had prepared. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in, they did not find the body. While they were perplexed about this, suddenly two men in dazzling clothes stood beside them. The women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here, but has risen.

…

Words of Grace for Today –

…

Today with great joy we proclaim:

Christ is Risen! (He is risen indeed!) Christ is Risen! (He is risen indeed!) Christ is Risen! (He is risen indeed!)

What’s For Breakfast?

Winnie the Pooh and Piglet take an evening walk. For a long time they walk in silence. Silence like only best friends can share.

Finally Piglet breaks the silence and asks, ‘When you wake up in the morning, Pooh, what’s the first thing you say to yourself?’

Pooh answers quickly, ‘What’s for breakfast?’ and then asks. ‘And what do you say, Piglet?’

Piglet says, ‘I say, I wonder what exciting thing is going to happen today?’

Billy Strayhorn, Easter Heart Burn, www.Sermons.com adapted 2025

What wondrous things God has in store for us today, just as God had the most wondrous thing in store for the women that first Easter as they made their way to Jesus’ tomb with their spices.

As for the women that day and for Christians ever since, Easter morning is the most joyous time of all our lives! But this day’s joy cannot be truly appreciated, if we do not remember what has brought us to this day.

Easter Only After …

After Advent calls us to be alert, to wait for Jesus’ Christmas’ birth, long promised. After, in Epiphanies unending, God reveals Christ’ Light come to shine forever in our darkness. After Jesus draws us up to the mountaintop-wonder of his glory revealed, so astounding!

After all that and more in this year so far, we were marked with ashes. Ashes bring us back to the humble reality of who we are: sinful people needing to repent, to be saved … again and again. So Jesus calls us to repent, to turn to God.

Repentance though is a root problem, not a problem of what fruit we produce. It lies at the root of who we see ourselves to be. “I can” statements cannot form our repentance, such as “I have sinned God. I am sorry God. I can do better.” Repentance contains our “I can’t” and “God can” statements: “I have sinned, God. I am sorry, God. I’ve tried and tried and tried but I just don’t produce good fruit. I can’t do better.

I need your Vine dresser to work on the roots of my life. Turn me around to your will. Give me a new life, God. Give me your life. I can’t. You can.”

(Richard Jensen, Preaching Luke’s Gospel p. 147, via B. Stoffregen, “Gospel Notes, adapted 2001 & 2025)

No matter how hard we try, we cannot save ourselves. Only God can. So we turn to Jesus, who bends down to wash our feet at his last meal. And we protest like Peter that it should not be so. We try to protect Jesus, with swords, but Jesus tells us to put them away. We stand by, waiting, in grief, and, like Peter, we deny we know Jesus when others threaten us for being his followers, (or because we feel uncomfortable following such a demanding Saviour.) We watch as he is crucified, most torturous. Jesus is thirsty as one in three people on earth are today. He receives sour wine. Most receive nothing. And Jesus, the hope of all nations, of all generations, dies…

and is buried

in a new tomb

spices and linen covering his body.

It is the greatest victory for Evil, for Evil has wielded death against God’s own Son and won.

Our hope has died as well, for what hope can we possibly find? There is none. There is none. There is none … without Easter.

Jesus Gives Us The Badly Needed …

Early in the morning on that third day the women go to the tomb with spices for the body, but Jesus is not there. He has risen from the grave.

The story is more than one resurrection; for others, like Lazarus, have been resurrected before. With Jesus’ resurrection all evil, even death, is defeated, for all time. And with that defeat God promises us all resurrection to new life.

For Jesus’ story is not just standing at home plate and hitting a home run out of the stadium. It’s standing at the plate, in the bottom of the thirteenth inning, with a full count, down three runs, bases loaded, having been put up at the plate in desperation by the manager, after you are mostly recovered from a chemotherapy treatment three days ago and surgery on your left shoulder last month, at 65 years old. You will never be here again, ever, even if you beat cancer.

Then you hit a home run to the utter amazement and benefit of a home town desperate for a team that could finally win.

That’s Jesus, not only on the cross, but risen on Easter morning for us, giving us all a badly needed win over Evil and Death itself.

What appeared to be Evil’s greatest victory, using jealousy, ridicule, plotting, bribery, riotous crowds, false testimony, weak leaders, a false conviction, and that most terrible symbol of Rome’s power, the cross …

What appeared to be Evil’s victory over everything good, over all hope, over all love,

is denied!

Instead God works love in a most demonstrative way, and Jesus returns to teach, call, and send us, his disciples, out to share the Good News with the world.

But we’ve heard all that before, haven’t we?

More Precious Than A Sweet Orange

In East Germany in the early 1980s fresh fruits were so scarce that a simple orange was a very special Christmas gift. Imagine (if it could be found and then afforded) one simple and always imperfect orange was the most precious gift one could give … and so sweet to receive!

Jesus’ Easter story is more precious than any gifted orange, and still, like the bags of oranges now available to us in grocery stores, we take it for granted. Yet, as we hear the familiar story once again, it is God’s promise to each of us, that we too can live again. That promise is more precious for us today than that scarce and costly Christmas orange.

That promise is not just for 2000 years ago, nor only for all the sins of our past. It is a promise that we will never be separated from God’s love, not by any sin, not by the most powerful Evil, not even by death itself. And don’t we know there’s enough sin and evil and death going around still today!

This is the ‘home run’ we most need again today.

As Christ’s new creation forms around us and in us, we proclaim:

Christ is Risen!

He is Risen Indeed!

Amen

Were It So

So It Is

Monday, April 7, 2025

Sin Casts A Wide Net

The Well Trod Path of Sin.

Easier than bushwhacking our way?

Psalm 103:6

The Lord works vindication and justice for all who are oppressed.

James 4:17

Anyone, then, who knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, commits sin.

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Words of Grace for Today –

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Scriptures contain so many promises and promises and promises of how God comes to the aid of those who suffer, especially those who suffer at the hands of other humans.

But

we honestly can say

We truly wish it were so!

…

The deep rooted, widespread, ongoing problem is simply that we humans are creative, most creative, when it comes to doing what we know is not right,

telling ourselves

so rationally

so heartfelt

so comprehensively

that though we know we are doing wrong,

we really are doing the best

for us

and that makes it right.

…

And since God created us to love, which requires freewill, including the choice to not love,

therefore

we will always be very creative at sinning,

and causing harm and suffering to others (and ourselves – for doing others harm, causing suffering, always comes back on the perpetrators more powerfully than on their original victims.)

So we could go out and wipe out all those sinful people. Ending humanity no less.

But the most profound word is

that vengeance is God’s,

not ours.

…

So we will continue to sin, causing harm and suffering,

and we will continue to hope that God will set things right.

Maybe in the afterlife?

Maybe in our hearts?

Maybe not turning everyone from vengeance, destruction, and manipulation (deadly as any other attack on another person),

but bringing a few in every generation to know

love

as the purpose of life,

and joy a free gift from God.

Hovering Overhead

Protection? … or Drones!

Friday, March 28, 2025

What Do We Hear/See?

See the Drone Threat, Or Is It The Moon Reflecting Christ’ Light?

Isaiah 31:5

Like birds hovering overhead, so the Lord of hosts will protect Jerusalem; he will protect and deliver it, he will spare and rescue it.

Matthew 10:6-7

but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. As you go, proclaim the good news, “The kingdom of heaven has come near.”

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Words of Grace for Today –

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Hovering overhead these days,

one thinks of drones, loaded with missiles of destruction used against targets, against enemies, against … too often, innocents.

Who protects them, and us

from Drones – including the metaphorical drones of crazy voices threatening our very lives, livelihoods, sovereignty?

Reset one’s mind to hear/see first the promise long ago given, that God will protect us, that God will bless us, that God will walk with us even when the way is troubled with our earthly demise, laden with minefields of unknown threats and disasters.

Knowing God’s love

unconditional love

for us

and for our enemies,

and remembering it first,

then

the drone threats are

nothing

in comparison to the blessings God already pours out on us, so we have so much to share with others.

Fear not.

Move with the Light,

The Kingdom of God is here!

Cries and Truth

We’re all in trouble

Wednesday, March 26, 2025

blessed as Jesus walks with us

Saying We Will Be Saved From All Trouble

Is Like Saying

The Badlands are Flat!

Psalm 34:7

This poor soul cried, and was heard by the Lord, and was saved from every trouble.

Matthew 11:28

Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.

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Words of Grace for Today –

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If I tell you I’m hungry

You’ll tell me to eat.

If I tell you I’m tired

You’ll tell me to sleep.

If I tell you I’m sick

you’ll tell me to see a doctor.

If I’m sick and tired of being hungry even after I eat

I can’t tell you because

You’d tell me to eat better, sleep more, see a doctor, and get a psyche-eval.

So I’m OK, OK? I’m just fine!

It’s the world’s that going to hell in a hand basket

again.

But me, I’m just fine. Don’t pay me no mind.

…

And I just know it’s like that for nearly everyone else who is alive. It’s the state of being human and sinful.

We’re all in the same boat.

Well in the same ocean. Some in cruise ships and yachts, others in submarines and sea going sailboats, but most of us are in dinghies not meant for the sea, hanging on to flotsam, or just swimming with or without life jackets, hoping the sharks stay away.

…

Now Jesus, Jesus knows I’m how I am which is not OK or fine, and He pays me great mind, calling to me, weary and burdened as I am, to come and find rest.

‘course I don’t know about that other fella, who cried to God and God saved ‘em from all trouble. Now that sounds like a dream or a wish, and there ain’t no way that’s true.

We’s all got troubles, and no angel gonna save us from ‘em.

But Jesus walks through ‘em with us. Yes he does.

And for that we’s ever grateful, yes sir. We’s all greateful to the bottom of our hearts.

Singing and Saying

To Be Known and Loved

Sunday, March 23, 2025

By God – Nothing Is Greater.

See the Light? The Light Sees You!

Psalm 59:17

O my strength, I will sing praises to you, for you, O God, are my fortress, the God who shows me steadfast love.

Acts of the Apostles 26:22

To this day I have had help from God, and so I stand here, testifying to both small and great, saying nothing but what the prophets and Moses said would take place:…

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Words of Grace for Today –

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We all have a basic need to be seen, known, and loved for who we are, just as we are, warts and all.

When we accept that God sees, knows and loves us, just as we are

Then life becomes very interesting, very challenging, very rooted, and wildly unpredictable,

for God not only sees, knows and loves us, but also

sends us

to engage all kinds of people, to see them, know them, and to love them as God does.

Engaging with others does change us at our roots, and gives us a little better view to God’s perspective on us (all people), our lives, on this planet, and on the entire universe.

Singing and Saying what the prophets and Moses did …

Singing and Saying what God does in the past, today, and promises to do in the future …

Singing and Saying like that reflects that when we engage with others, actually keeping silent and listening intently, there is nothing predictable about where, how, and why God will take us today and all our tomorrows,

only that God’s love will always be there, as God walks right beside us into and through it all.

Yep, that brings us to Singing and Saying, all day and all night long.

The Lines

Of Sorrow and Mercy

Monday, March 17, 2025

Are so long

Across the face of all creation.

Micah 7:18

Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of your possession? He does not retain his anger for ever, because he delights in showing clemency.

Luke 1:54

He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy,

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Words of Grace for Today –

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When God hides from us, there is nothing more than despair left.

Joy has taken wing, along with hope,

and the wear and tear of life eats away at our hearts, minds, and strength until nothing is left, except

a prayer of desperation.

Phillip John Hanseroth wrote it in The Story for us all.

All of these lines across my face

Tell you the story of who I am

So many stories of where I’ve been

And how I got to where I am

But these stories don’t mean anything

When you’ve got no one to tell them to

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HP0BZ9P4gdA

…

Then a year ago, @Malindams, told her story commenting under one of Brandi Carlile’s renditions of The Story: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8pQLtHTPaI)

“All of these lines across my face, tell you the story of who I am, so many stories of where I’ve been and how I got to where I am”.

These words saved me during many rounds of chemo and radiation. I was diagnosed with breast cancer when I had a kindergartener and a 4th grader. My boys were so young, I told my oncology team, bring it on, I can take it…I just have [to] live long enough to get them through high school.

The chemo took it’s toll and aged me so much faster than my friends, it was hard to deal with. Now I know the lines across my face tell the story of where I’ve been. 15 years out and one boy has graduated from college and one who is a junior…both are thriving and I celebrate life every day.

Thank you, Brandi for putting into words, what I could not.

So it is with many of us, and for me:

The grief engulfed us and took us down, as God hid from us,

or so it seemed.

What then, but to take the advice

what can you do when you find yourself in hell, day after day?

Just keep going.

And on the other side of the dark dark blue blues, there are the days of brilliant sunshine, and blessings that were there all along,

just hidden in the grief,

holding life out in all it’s wonder for us to be grateful for.

…

so we thank everyone who had words to help us keep going through the hell.

It’s still there, it never goes away,

but the promises are truer now than before,

for there is no better way to know there is light,

than to see it from the darkest moments of the darkest wildernesses.

…

Thanks to all those who had the honest words

of God’s love for us all along…

You see the smile that’s on my mouth

It’s hiding the words that don’t come out

And all of my friends who think that I’m blessed

They don’t know my head is a mess

No, they don’t know who I really am

And they don’t know what I’ve been through like you do

And I was made for you.

Special thanks to the few who were always there …

And God, full of mercy and steadfast love, who sent them …

For whom we were made.

Found, Favoured

and Sent

Thursday, March 13, 2025

Out of Darkness

into Brilliant Light, God Calls

and Sends Us …

Genesis 6:8

But Noah found favour in the sight of the Lord

1 Peter 2:9

But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvellous light.

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Words of Grace for Today –

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God chooses us, favours us,

and oh, we could celebrate ourselves into oblivion with such great pride!

But

God does not choose and favour us that we may be made important in our own eyes or in the eyes of the world.

God chooses us, favours us, and then sends us out to proclaim with our deeds God’s mighty acts of saving us miserable sinners caught in the deep darknesses of our own making.

In the Light, by God’s grace alone, we see

God’s Wonders

so clearly contrasted to our own miserable attempts to make things right.

The greatest wonder is that God chooses to save us from the darkness.

Remember.

Re- member.

All that God has done for us, so that we can share it all with others.

Just

Friday, March 7, 2025

Just A Broken Body,

Not Alone,

By God,

By God’s Grace.

Proverbs 10:19

When words are many, transgression is not lacking, but the prudent are restrained in speech.

Matthew 5:37

Let your word be “Yes, Yes” or “No, No”; anything more than this comes from the evil one.

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Words of Grace for Today –

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In a word

just

just me

That’s what each of us have,

Even if others are around us, love us, hold us, wonder with us,

in the end

it’s just

…

not that others loving us, holding us, wondering with us is nothing … because

because it is about all the bonus life has for us,

still

in the end

it’s just

…

for each of us.

…

Doesn’t take many words to say it all.

Just me.

Except it really is

…

as God shows us again and again,

it’s nothing about

for each of us.

It’s all about God’s love

that we share with others.

Just me, because God loves me,

is what each of us can say,

which is really to say

just nothing about me at all.

Help, Help?

Listen For Help Given Long Ago

Thursday 20 February 2025

When Life Comes All Apart, Trying to Blindly Throw It All Together Rarely Works. Jesus Advises Us To Be As God Created Us, Ones Who Love Even Our Enemies.

Deuteronomy 32:36

Indeed the Lord will vindicate his people, have compassion on his servants, when he sees that their power is gone, neither bond nor free remaining.

Luke 18:7

And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them?

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Words of Grace For Today

…

While we have many plans to bring justice, by defeating evil itself, sending it into a grave it will never return from …

This is seldom the way God delivers us.

Jesus calls us to love our enemies.

Some of us have figured out that this is how God conquers evil.

Three bigger boys started in on the new boy, Yari, calling him names, taunting him, bullying him in more and more threatening ways. Then one day they knocked him around, stole his lunch, and ate it in front of him – taunting his helplessness. That night Yari talked it over with his father. They made a plan together. The next day, when the bullies appeared again, calling him names and demanding his lunch, Yari offered them three lunches, made especially for each of them. At first they were shocked. Then they left in embarrassment, never to bully or taunt him again.

Lectionary Stories, Cycle C, adapted 2025

May we be the instruments of God’s way to peace, in small ways each day.

Do Not Worry

About the Hour When …

Tuesday 18 February 2025

What’s Coming At Us, From Behind the Trees, On the Road, Through the Woods?

What a Beautiful Sunset

Over the Snow and

Through the Woods!

Isaiah 49:23

Kings shall be your foster-fathers, and their queens your nursing-mothers. With their faces to the ground they shall bow down to you, and lick the dust of your feet. Then you will know that I am the Lord; those who wait for me shall not be put to shame.

Luke 12:11-12

When they bring you before the synagogues, the rulers, and the authorities, do not worry about how you are to defend yourselves or what you are to say; for the Holy Spirit will teach you at that very hour what you ought to say.’

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Words of Grace For Today

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It’s all fine and good to say do not worry, but most of us worry no matter what, sometimes even about things that deserve to be worried about.

Being brought before the authorities to defend oneself for being a Christian, when the punishment for that faith was death for so many … well that certainly seems to deserve more than a little worry. One’s life is on the line.

But then

one’s life is always on the line

if one is faithfully serving Christ

by being a servant to all, and master to none.

Only in a different life will the kings and queens bend so low as to care for us, let alone care about us, other than to wipe us out for showing the truth about their wickedness and God’s goodness.

But that worry, and that other life to come, need not consume more than passing thoughts from us. We have our work cut out for us, sharing God’s blessing and gifts with those most in need of them. Without cost they are given to us, though we certainly have not and cannot earn them. The only ‘string’ attached is that we share them. For these gifts are really only blessings if and when we share them with others in need.

That’s how God’s world works, whether we worry or not.