Welcome from Pastor Patrick Curley

“A Valentine for God”

                Do you have any pet peeves?  You know, little things people do that just get under your skin? Like in October when people say “punkin” instead of “pumpkin” or in December when people decorate for Christmas with Sponge Bob and Disney characters.  February has a double whammy.  First, many people pronounce and spell the month as “Febuary”, without the “r”.  Admittedly it is harder to say “February” than it is say “Febuary”.  Maybe it’s also because February follows January which has no extra “r”?  But the other one is even more annoying.  It’s when people say “Valentime’s Day” instead of “Valentine’s Day”.  “N”, people, not “m”.

                Now this isn’t my pet peeve.  How could it be when I spelt “Christ” without an “r” once on a Lenten banner for my field work church while at seminary?  Fortunately a classmate caught it at the last minute.  I was so focused on making the lamb for “Christ, the Lamb of God” look realistic that I just wasn’t paying attention to spelling.  There would have been a peeved altar guild alright at St. John in Kendallville, Indiana, had that banner made it past quality control without the “r” for Christ.

                Pet peeves aside, forgetting Valentine’s Day when you are in a relationship is a whole different thing.  Beyond irritating, that can be hurtful to the one you love.  Flowers, jewelry, dinner, chocolate, a balloon…something to mark the day and, of course, your declared love.  Human nature makes us far too accustom to being loved than loving.  We often forget to actually love the ones we love and take it for granted they just know.  And we should say now that love is more than gifts and more than for a day but a thoughtful card at Valentine’s Day isn’t a bad idea either.

                God isn’t exactly prone to the hurt feelings and disappointments that we are.  Still, I wonder how He might be letdown, too, when we fail to say, “I love you, Lord”.  Wouldn’t it be a nice idea to place flowers on the altar from all of us on Valentine’s Day, a Sunday this year?  Well we don’t want to turn our church into a shrine of some kind with pills of oranges, chocolates and burning incense but in some way we need to say back to God, “I love you”.  He tells us every day that He loves us as He provides all our needs of body and soul.  His Word, the Holy Bible, is His Valentine to us as it tells us of Jesus who gave His life up because He loves us so. 

I pray that our lives will answer back that we love God, too, as our choices, priorities and regular worship reveal.   God isn’t peeved at you; He loves you.  Remember to tell Him that you love Him also.  

“Running for Ministry"

I heard an ad the other day on the radio.  Maybe you’ve heard it too?  A woman is running for governor of California.  I guess the election is coming up.  Hasta la vista, Arnold. Many people want the job and each, of course, claims their brand of leadership is just what Californians need.  Anyway about this ad, the woman, whose name I can’t place, says she’s a business woman and in business you try an idea but if it doesn’t work, you try something else until it does work.  She claims current leadership is trying the same old approach in government- more money, more taxes, more government spending to “fix things”.  She’ll try her business approach of trying new ideas and abandoning ones that don’t work if elected and won’t stick to old paradigms that don’t really work.  Pragmatic.

Okay for politics, I guess, but not okay for ministry.  If I were running for Pastor of California, I wouldn’t use that approach at all.  Mayors and governors can “try and see” if they like but pastors have eternal life on the line.  We have no time to play around with novelty and innovation.  We have to know what works and not tinker with God’s truth at every whim of current opinion.  The Gospel works.  It’s all that works salvation for it is the sole power of God to save sinners.  The Bible works.  Its God’s inspired, timeless Word and the only standard for what’s right and good.  The sacraments work, too.  Jesus instituted them as means of grace that the Holy Spirit then uses with the Word in worship to bring and sustain Gospel faith.  Thus when we gather around the Holy Gospel as it is offered in Word and Sacrament, the Holy Spirit works.  This is His ministry, His Church and they work as long as we stick to the Gospel as proclaimed in Scripture.

Now there isn’t a unanimous opinion in the Church about this.  Many wish to adopt the “try and see” approach in ministry also.  Truth is negotiable in such an approach, though.  Biblical Jesus may not work for everyone so such advocates are willing to tinker with Him, sometimes even to the point a first grade Sunday Schooler wouldn’t recognize Him.  Doctrine is too confining they would say.  Better let people choose what’s right for them and all say “hallelujah”!  The cross may just be too exclusive for this emerging church today.  Just so you know.

But if you elect me for your Pastor, I’ll preach Christ alone as proclaimed in God’s Word and I won’t experiment with… hey wait a minute.  I already am your Pastor called by God to preach His changeless truth.  Well, if it’s the pure Gospel you want, stick around this year.  Hearing God’s love in Christ for you may be the only thing you’ll be able to count on in these changing times.

“Mary Christmas”

Now I can’t swear to it but I’ll just bet that somewhere there is a Mr. and Mrs. Christmas.  I’m not confused with that fictitious couple on the North Pole here.  I’m just saying that there are many unusual names around.  And if there is such a couple and if they had a little girl, I’ll just bet they couldn’t refuse calling her Mary.  Mary Christmas.  What a pun.  But, in fact, Mary and Christmas do go together even apart from the usual greeting this time of year.  Christmas is the birth of Jesus Christ and Mary is the virgin maiden who conceived through the Holy Spirit.  Through Mary, God became man.

So if Mr. and Mrs. Christmas had a little boy, what would they name him?  Jesus, Y’shua, Immanuel?  All these fit as they have to do with Christmas, too.  Jesus means “the Lord saves” and it is the given name for the one born of Mary.  Y’shua is the Jewish origin of that Greek name.  And Immanuel, also a kind of given name, means “God with us”.  Through Jesus, “the Word made flesh”, God came to dwell with man.  Our Lord brought us back together having canceled the debt of our sin that had separated God and man.

Well even if there isn’t a Mr. and Mrs. Christmas, there is a Mary and Joseph.  And even if there isn’t a Jesus Christmas, there is our Lord Jesus Christ.  I think it is a wonderful part of the Christmas story that it starts with a family.  But like most families, the real Christmas family had its share of difficulties.  The bride was pregnant and if that weren’t enough, it wasn’t by the groom.  As stated above, Mary conceived by the Holy Spirit.  There was no impropriety.  It took an angelic visit, but Joseph came to know that and took his young bride to be his own but had no relationship with her until Jesus was born.  Then there was the census that dragged them from Nazareth to Bethlehem, no easy trip as Mary was with child.  Then once in Bethlehem, there was no place to stay.  All the hotels were booked.  They took refuge with animals.  What mother today would have accepted those filthy conditions to bring forth her first born?  And then all those smelly shepherds came barging in to take a look and hold the new baby?  I’ll bet Mary wished they had invented Purcell by then.

Sometime later some sages (wise men, not the spice) from the East came bringing expensive gifts.  That had to help with the family budget that was probably pretty strained about now.  Just when things were settling down, another message came by angel to high tail it out of Bethlehem to Egypt because the local government wanted to kill the child.  Hardly the Kodak moment of a Mary and Jesus Christmas sitting around their Christmas tree in their cozy pajamas opening up beautifully wrapped gifts with wide smiles and the smell of warm eggnog and roasting chestnuts wafting through the air.  But the real Christmas family was… real.  Ups and downs for families at Christmas are just par for the course.

Remember that when it seems more a hassle than it’s worth to get together for Christmas. Put away the family grudges in this time of peace on earth, goodwill toward men.  Don’t worry so much of getting or giving the perfect gift.  God took care of that part in the gift of His Son.  If the decorations don’t all get up this year, so be it.  I think the neighbors will get over it.  And don’t worry if all the Christmas cards get out.  In fact, let me take care of ours right now: “Mary Christmas everyone.”

“Modern Leprosy”

H1N1.  It’s kind of like H2O or E=MC2.  We all know what it means.  You don’t have to be a surgeon or a physics genius to recognize those encrypted formulas.  They have been integrated into society’s lingo.  H1N1 is, of course, the virus that causes “swine flu”.  Doctors and health officials have been warning since last spring really of a potential pandemic.  The mutated form of this virus could potentially be devastating.  So wash your hands a lot and don’t go out if you’re sick and spread the illness to others.

Many can’t believe that we still have such worries in our modern age.  I mean, hasn’t medical science all but cancelled out disease?  Who fears polio, tuberculosis or whooping cough anymore?  (Yet these are making a comeback, too).  Influenza was devastating a century ago, but now?  Sure we have AIDS and cancer to contend with but gone are the days of the Black Plague that was the scourge of humanity.  There are no modern plagues; at least, in America. Right?  Apparently not.  There are still a lot of bad bugs out there and increasingly unfazed by our antibiotics and other medical wizardry.

In Jesus’ day it was leprosy.  It was one of the most horrific diseases known to man, eating away literally at the flesh like some necrotizing fasciitis (I was on a jury panel once for medical malpractice).  But there is another disease that is far worse that eats away at our flesh, heart and very soul.  It is sin.  Sin separates us from God eternally if not for the medicine offered in the blood of Jesus received in faith.

Jesus not only healed leprosy.  He forgives sin and thus rescues us from death and hell.  In one recorded incident in Luke 17:11-19, Jesus healed ten lepers; however, only one returned to thank Him and was commended for his faith.  Ingratitude.  That’s a disease, too.  It is a spoiled selfishness that wears at the heart and spirit.  It weighs us down.  And ingratitude is an epidemic that is spreading across America.  It robs us of our joy.  It causes us to fight with one another and destroy the common good.

I pray that this year we will truly pause as a nation and count our many blessings.  I pray we will be thankful.  We have been redeemed from sin and death through Christ’s cross.  Certainly that is reason enough to return and give thanks to the Lord.  He is good; His mercy endures forever. And in His grace, with joyful hearts and minds, we find a healing from any problem or modern disease this sin sick world can throw our way.  See ya’ Sunday!