Pastor's Message, April 2009

I do not have to try very hard to do something goofy! Once or twice a day I say something or do something that makes me whisper, “That was stupid.”

I was at a meeting recently at Concordia University. When we broke for lunch I sat at a large round table with a group of my colleagues. The President of the University came to sit next to me. It was a tight squeeze and in my haste to move my food over I set my large glass of orange juice on the edge of my fork. The glass tipped over flooding the whole center of the table. I whispered, among other things, “That was stupid.”

It took me a while to let go of that one. But when I shared my embarrassment with several different people they each kindly said in their own way, “It only shows that you are one of us.”

Maybe this is the time to quote Billy Joel who often sang, “You’re only human, you’re supposed to make mistakes.”It is a truth worth remembering.

We can try our best and be as careful as we can but sometimes we stumble. But in our brokenness God has found great value. Jesus said, “I am come that you might have life and that you might have it to the full.” (John 10:10) The journey of this Lenten season has been a reminder that God’s love is constant. And that even while we were busy being human, God was rescuing us from death and despair. The shouts of Easter morning, “He is risen,” are a reminder that we are more that our embarrassing moments or times of failure. We are forgiven people of God ready to take on another Day.

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