Presby-Musings

When we are going through difficult times, it can often seem as though God has taken a few days off when it comes to us.  We might find ourselves wondering, "Why me?"  We can think that God might be angry at us, or that we've done something wrong to incur God's silence.   But the truth is, no matter what is happening in our lives, God is near us and also completely understands what it feels like to feel grief, suffering, and even God's seeming absence.   Author Rob Bell captures this sentiment beautifully when he writes:  “Our tendency in the midst of suffering is to turn on God. To get angry and bitter and shake our fist at the sky and say, ‘God, you don't know what it's like! You don't understand! You have no idea what I'm going through. You don't have a clue how much this hurts.’  The cross is God's way of taking away all of our accusations, excuses, and arguments. The cross is God taking on flesh and blood and saying, 'Me too.'”...

I like to be in control of my life. I feel most comfortable when I can make plans that unfold exactly how I want them to.   As you might imagine, this often results in a great deal of angst because my plans seldom turn out how I imagined they would.  Something unexpected always occurs to throw a wrench into the works.  You may resonate with this (I imagine we all do to some extent). Truthfully, I've been learning more about what it means to surrender my desire for control lately—much more than I want to.  This season of Lent has been a primer on letting go of control and learning what it means to surrender.  I'm starting to figure a few things out.   As we journey through the sacred season of Lent, we are invited to reflect upon the profound and transformative act of surrendering ourselves to Divine purposes.  This time of introspection reminds us that faith isn’t a passive acceptance of life’s circumstances but an active, trusting engagement...

The season of Lent is a symbolic journey with Jesus, connecting us to the forty days he spent in the wilderness, fasting and praying after his baptism.   Jesus was tempted in the wilderness to end his hunger, to reveal his purpose dramatically, and to embrace earthly power.  Instead, he stayed true to the journey he was determined to complete in the way that he was called to complete it.  He emerged from this experience free from all the constraints that would distract him from his purpose.   As we continue our journey through the season of Lent, we find ourselves in a similarly sacred space—a time set apart for reflection, growth, and ultimately, liberation.  Traditionally regarded as a season of sacrifice and introspection, Lent invites us to delve deeper into the essence of our faith and Jesus' teachings. It allows us to examine the distractions, burdens, and habits that weigh us down and prevent us from fully embracing the life we are called to lea...

Several years ago, I was preaching a Lenten sermon series about letting Jesus undo some of the things in our lives that keep us from being the people we ought to be.  One of those sermons was about forgiveness and reconciliation with the people we were in conflict with or had experienced a falling out with at some point.  As I was preparing that sermon, I became burdened by a conflict I'd had with a colleague years before and how that conflict had led to our estrangement.   I decided at that point that I needed to practice what I was about to preach, so I reached out to him and asked him for forgiveness for anything I had done to contribute to the conflict we'd experienced.  I'd love to tell you that there was a complete restoration of our relationship and that we both asked for and received forgiveness from each other, but it didn't turn out that way exactly.   But I was free from my bitterness about the whole thing and realized how heavy that had bee...

It’s the Fourth Sunday of Lent  Lent is a season of preparation, reflection, and repentance.  It’s also a season when we can learn what it means to discover the holiness of hard things, which is also the title of this sermon series we're working through.  Today, we are going to read some mail from the Apostle Paul.  It is kind of interesting, isn't it, that we are reading someone else's mail when we read all of Paul's letters? And Paul made one of the most essential claims about reconciliation between God and us.     But first, I want to talk about two very important things: Truth and Reconciliation.  Truth & Reconciliation go Hand In Hand.   There can be no reconciliation without truth.   After Apartheid ended in South Africa, the black majority of the country was asked by leaders like Nelson Mandela and Bishop Desmond Tutu to put aside the need for revenge in favor of reconciliation. The Truth and Reconciliation Commissio...

The season of Lent invites us to reflect deeply on our lives and journeys, encouraging a powerful act of letting go that paves the way for renewal and growth: forgiving ourselves.  I came across this poem by Wendell Berry in his "New Collected Works," and it resonated with me powerfully:  “At start of spring I open a trench In the ground. I put into it The winter’s accumulation of paper, Pages I do not want to read Again, useless words, fragments, errors. And I put into it the contents of the outhouse: light of the suns, growth of the ground, Finished with one of their journeys. To the sky, to the wind, then, and to the faithful trees, I confess my sins: that I have not been happy enough, considering my good luck; have listened to too much noise, have been inattentive to wonders, have lusted after praise. And then upon the gathered refuse, of mind and body, I close the trench folding shut again the dark, the deathless earth. Beneath that seal the old escapes into the new.” I ...