“What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask.” James 4:1-2

“Our eldest daughter, Ann, invited her college roommate to join our large family for Thanksgiving dinner. As families sometimes do, we got into a lively argument over a trivial subject until we remembered we had a guest in our midst. There was an immediate, embarrassed silence. “Please don’t worry about me,” she said. “I was brought up in a family too.”

“Alive and Changing: God speaks to us through our lives, we often too easily say. Something speaks anyway, spells out some sort of godly or godforsaken meaning to us through the alphabet of our years, but often it takes many years and many further spellings out before we start to glimpse, or think we do, a little of what that meaning is. Even then we glimpse it only dimly, like the first trace of dawn on the rim of night, and even then it is a meaning that we cannot fix and be sure of once and for all because it is always incarnate meaning and thus as alive and changing as we are ourselves alive and changing.” (Buechner, Frederick. Listening to Your Life. HarperOne. Kindle Edition.)

“I was brought up in a family too.” That is a funny line. It is a reminder that all of us have a variety of family experiences – many of them good – and many of them, well, not so good. I was lucky enough to be brought up in a good household – one that nurtured individualism bolstered by unconditional love. But not all people have that experience or have been lucky enough even to have been raised in a single, stable, household.

I find it of great solace that the bible is filled with familial distress – situations where sons treat their fathers rudely, and brothers seek to kill one another. It reminds us that family problems were endemic within family dynamics since the beginning of time. In other words, we are not alone when we are faced with arguments and dissention in the home – and among siblings. And even in the midst of these difficulties, G-d continued to speak – through a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night – through the prophets – finally through Jesus Christ – and today through the presence of the Holy Spirit.

Jesus is about love – a love that is above all things – a love that does not change. G-d will speak to us in different ways throughout our lives, but the love of G-d through Jesus Christ will never waiver. 

Pastor Dave

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. ¹⁷ For in it the righteousness of God is revealed through faith for faith; as it is written, “The one who is righteous will live by faith.” Romans 1:16-17

“Joe always went to his local barber, Mr. Verks for a monthly shave and haircut. But one day Verks the barber was ill. So the barber’s wife, Grace, took over. Joe noticed over subsequent weeks that his beard was not growing. The barber, a good Lutheran, explained the mystery. “You now understand that when we are not shaved by Verks,” he said, “you’re shaved by Grace.”

“…the people you love have two sides to them. One is the side they love you back with, and the other is the side that, even when they do not mean to, they can sting you with like a wasp.” (Buechner, Frederick. Listening to Your Life. HarperOne. Kindle Edition.)

Saved by Grace through faith. It is what we lean upon when we encounter the close shaves in life. It is one of the fundamental teachings of the Lutheran Church – Justification by Faith through Grace. As the scripture states above, Grace is a gift from G-d. There is nothing we can do to earn such Grace. This is important for us all to understand, G-d does still depend upon our works. Now before you accuse me of heresy, listen to what I am saying. Our works are Not to earn G-d’s continued love, but because Grace deserves our continued efforts of an active, loving relationship of faith through loving deeds of service.

Martin Luther spent much of his time in the Monastery trying to earn G-d’s love and favor. No matter how much he did, no matter how badly he mortified his own flesh, he could not find the G-d of love he so much wanted in his life – he could feel the sting of the wasp of judgment, but the love of G-d eluded him. So he returned over and over again to scripture, until he read those words: The one who is righteous will live by faith.

Now that we are well into the New Year, we are either well into the changes we had hoped to make in 2021, or we have already abandoned them. Thank the Lord our G-d is not as capricious with Grace as we are with works. Justification by Grace through faith. It saves us time and time again.

Pastor Dave