An Open Letter to Graduates

Dear Graduates:

Congratulations!  What you have accomplished is reason to celebrate.  For the past 13 years you have participated in co-curricular activities, developed and deepened friendships, given much joy (and at times frustration) to your parents, and completed your school work (sometimes better than others, and some have worked harder than others).  You have fulfilled the requirements set forth by the school district of which you are now a graduate.  Congratulations!

For some of you a high school graduation will mark the completion of your formal education.  You will still be taught but just not in a formal academic setting.  You will be going on to the armed services of our country; taking more of a role in a family business; or perhaps straight into the work force.  Others will move on to more schooling.  For all, life will change.  People you have not met yet will become good friends.  You will lose touch with other people that you have known for most of your life. 

You will receive cards, and gifts, and lots of hugs.  One question you will be asked repeatedly is:  “What’s next for you?  What are going to do with your life?”  You might respond with summer plans or plans for next year.  I invite you to think about that question a bit deeper though. 

In 1992 Mary Oliver wrote a poem entitled “The Summer Day” which concludes with the phrase:  Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?  

Tony Deifell, an activist, a Harvard MBA, a photographer, a consultant, a teacher, and a leader of a non-profit organization uses that sentence as an introduction to a web-site he created (http://www.hbs.edu/PortraitProject/2002/DeifellTony.html).  In 1998 he fielded a variation of that question that he could not answer.  A child, who Tony had never met, called and insistently asked him:  “Why do you do what you do?”  

To this question, and to his own shock, Tony had no ready response.  That question got him thinking about his life and his purpose. So he’s invited other people to consider this question and to post their answers and their photos on a web-site. 

You probably have some ideas at this point as to what you plan to do with your one wild and precious life.  You might not be able to put it into a succinct phrase.  Or perhaps you can.  Don’t be surprised if what you plan to do now with your wild and precious life is different in a few years.  How I view my life now is very different than how I thought of my life when I graduated from high school several years ago. 

So graduates, let me offer this word to you as well:  I have found that my deepest joys in life have come as I have looked outside of myself to the needs of people around me.  God has put each one of you on this earth to make a profound difference in the world.  You are here, you are fearfully and wonderfully made; you are worthy of love and respect; God is at work in your life to change the world. 

What will you do?  How will you use your unique gifts to change the world.  How will you live so that your life is a blessing to others? 

Dear graduates, God’s blessings to you on this journey called life. Congratulations on what you have already accomplished.  Go with God.  

Dashed Hopes to Burning Hearts

“Our chief priests and our leaders handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him. ²¹ We had hoped he was the one who would redeem Israel.”  Luke 24.20-21

We had hoped that he was the one who would redeem Israel.  These are a few of the saddest words in all of Scripture.  I don’t think there is a person alive who has not had their hopes dashed at one time or another.  Their hopes were that Jesus would redeem Israel. 

Our hopes might look a bit different.  

• “We had hoped that the tumor had shrunk.”  
• “We had hoped that our child would recover.”  
• “We had hoped that our marriage would last.”  
• “We had hoped to have a child.”  
• “I had hoped to get that job.” 

Few things are more painful than dashed hopes. 

If you take the time to read the story that surrounds these verses (Luke 24.13-35), you will see what Jesus does when hopes are dashed.  He comes along these two followers of Jesus, and asks them to name their loss. 

Naming our dashed hopes, naming our loss, naming our grief, is the first step in bringing healing.  That does not mean that we name them and forget about them or name them and move on.  It is a way of acknowledging what it is that we have lost.  Naming the dashed hope is a way of rising beyond it so that it is no longer what defines us. 

In the Harry Potter series the people refer to the primary antagonist as “He-who-must-not-be-named.”  As a result the people live in fear of him.  Harry does not seem to know any better and calls him what he is: “Voldemort” (which comes from the French word “mort” meaning death).   By naming Voldemort, the power Voldemort holds over the people is reduced.  When we name the power that has dashed our hopes, the power is lessened.  It does not happen right away.  But it is the first step. 

What are your dashed hopes?  What do you grieve.  When we name our grief, our pain, our disappointment, and our fear – in the midst of a caring community and with the assurance of grace, we find these things have less of a hold on us.  The result is that God can come alongside and surprise with God’s love and presence.  Like the two followers in the story from Luke, we may even move from dashed hopes to burning hearts.  We might be surprised by joy. 

It does not always (or even usually) happen quickly.  The road from dashed hopes to burning hearts might be a 5K, or perhaps a marathon, that we struggle to finish.  That’s okay.  Jesus will walk or run that distance with us.  And so will those who love us.  

The Resurrection Business

I write these words on the Friday we as Christians call Good.  I write at the end of a week that has been anything but good.  Four funerals in five days.  A 90 year old woman.  A 53 year old man.  An 85 year old woman.  A 19 year old.  Funerals are never easy for me.  I think that is probably the case for most of us.  It is really, really hard when someone we know and someone we love dies.  It is made even more difficult when death come suddenly with little to no time to prepare. 

I wonder if that’s how it was for those followers of Jesus as well.  It all happened so very quickly.  The entry into Jerusalem with the crowds of people gathered about singing their praises to Jesus turned suddenly into a solemn and what must have been an awful situation with Jesus’ arrest in the Garden, his rushed trial, and then his death the next day.  How do you move forward when life changes so abruptly?

We know how the story turns out.  None of us are surprised to worship on Easter and find out that Jesus is risen; the tomb is empty.  The risen Jesus is a reminder that every one of us needs.  The empty tomb changes everything!

God is in the business of bringing life from death.  It’s not just the physical death at the end of our lives in which the resurrection matters.  We all die hundreds of little deaths before we take our last breath.  And each time we die, God is at work to raise us up as something new.  The apostle Paul says that in Christ we become a new creation; the old passes away (2 Corinthians 5.17, if you care to look it up). 

When I was a child, I had dreams of playing football, or at least of coaching football.  My family had dreams of my being in the medical field.  Then this happened and that happened and along the way God tapped me on the shoulder and called me to be a pastor.  And then this happened: that little boy died.  He died.  God raised him up again as a new creation where I was a student at a college in Decorah, Iowa.

I went to college with the hopes of making my parents proud.  I was going to be a doctor or perhaps a veterinarian.  God again tapped me on the shoulder and called me to be a pastor.  A few years later the college student died, and God raised him up as a seminary student in St. Paul, MN. 

About five years later the seminary student died, and I was raised up again as an associate pastor of a church in Westby, Wisconsin.  The old passed away. 

Along the way the solitary young man died and was raised up first as a husband and then as a father.  The Wisconsin pastor died whom God raised up as a pastor in Caledonia. 

At some day in the future, I’m hoping it is the distant future, I will die again what this world calls a physical death, and then, sure enough, God will raise me up yet again to the life God has had in store for me all along. 

God is in the resurrection business.  God brings new life from death.  God brings new life from our physical deaths and from the thousands of deaths we all experience as we live this life. 

Easter changes everything.  It does not take away the grief we feel and we experience anytime someone close to us dies.  It does not change the grief we experience when some part of us dies and God brings something new.  It’s hard.  It’s painful. It does not mean that we need to be happy.  It is, however, a promise that we hold to and that I invite you to embrace this day.  God is always at work to bring life to you and to me. 

May God’s promise of resurrection life be yours today and every day.  

A Tidy Proposition

I was visiting a nursing home in a neighboring community the other day.  I parked my car, and as I started to get out of the car I noticed a magnet on door of the car beside me.  The magnet read:  If you died tonight would you be in heaven or hell?

The magnet reminded me of an encounter I had with an individual at Riverside Park in La Crosse.  The man carried a sign that read:  Repent.  Turn or Burn.  The implication from the sign was that if I (or anyone else for that matter) did not turn from my current life to a new and different life, I would burn for eternity in the flames of hell.  

The man carrying that sign approached me me and asked:  If you were to die tonight do you know where you would go?  I bit my tongue and did not say what first came to my mind - "to the funeral home"  but said "Yes.  I trust the promise of Jesus."

The man persisted and asked:  "How do you know?  When were you saved?"

"About 2000 years ago, on a cross outside of Jerusalem" I responded.  He pressed on:  "You know a lot of people talk the talk but do not walk the walk.  Jesus warns us that all sorts of people say Lord, Lord but end up in the fires of hell."

I let him talk a bit.  He told me how his life has changed from being a person of the bottle to a person of faith.  He then handed me a card and told me I needed to pray the prayer that was on the card in order to be a true believer.  I thanked him for his witness and wished him God's blessings in 2017.

As I've thought about that encounter and the magnet on that car, I think it is quite the tidy proposition. We say the right words in the right way and it makes all things right.  We are in the club.  We are on the bus to heaven.

My life has taught me that there is much more to following Jesus than saying the right words.  There is the nitty, gritty, dirty business of living life with eyes wide open and ears to hear the cries of the hungry needing to be fed; of kids growing up with parents more concerned for their own pleasure than their children's well-being; of standing with those who are oppressed; of speaking for the vulnerable; of showing hospitality for the stranger. 

Loving God and loving neighbor.  That is what the Christian life is about.  It's not easy.  It's not always safe or socially acceptable.  Choices need to be made.  Boundaries need to be crossed.  Jesus was born into this real world.  And his message of love is still our only real hope.

Who You Are

I write these words coming off of a week that was filled with a band concert, a choir concert, four nights of dance dress rehearsals, six dance recitals, along with visits from both my parents and Stacey’s parents.  It was a full week in our home.   It was also very much a life-giving week for our family. 

I was able to spend some time watching what our girls love to do: play music; sing; dance.  I was blessed by watching how the teachers have worked with all the kids in band, choir, and dance. I could see the growth these kids have experienced from their teachers during the past nine months.  Perhaps most importantly, in the midst of all the busy-ness, I was reminded of who I am – lovingly and wonderfully made by God, and that God is at work through each of our lives. 

Weeks like this past week for our family are precious.  I think many of us live busy lives and it’s difficult to juggle the events going on in our lives.  We work hard at our jobs; we take our kids from one event to another; many friends I know provide care for their aging parents and their rapidly growing kids; we try to keep up with responsibilities at home; we seek to be faithful stewards of our time and financial resources.  In the midst of all that busy-ness it is easy to forget who we are. 

For any of us, it’s easy to forget who we are.  We go grocery shopping and see magazine covers that tell us that in order to be of worth in this world we need to look a certain way.  Facebook and Twitter give us our social standing by how many “likes” or “followers” we have.  For some of us the numbers that appear on a scale affect what we think of ourselves.  The grades we receive on a math test or on an English paper determine if we call ourselves “smart” or “dumb.”  The number of push-ups we can do or the amount of weight we can bench press control whether we are “strong” or “weak.”  The phone calls we receive or the visits that never happen make us feel as though we are of no use anymore.  Regardless of our age, none of us are immune to those realities. 

You know what?  All that is bunk!  You are more than that.  As Psalm 139 reminds us, you are fearfully and wonderfully made by God.  You are gifted by God and God is at work in your life so that you will make a difference in this world. This simple yet profound reminder came to me watching and hearing the Senior Performance Company of Misty's Dance Unlimited.  I invite you to watch it as well. 

http://www.morethandancers.com/who-you-are/

That reminder is the gift that found me in the busy-ness of this past week. In the midst of everything you are doing and in the midst of everything that goes on in your life, hold to the truth that in Jesus you have a Lord that loves and values you, and that through you God is at work to change the world. 

1978 - My First Track Meet

My love for running started way back in 1978, when I was in 6^th grade and our elementary school had a track team.  I got to run the long distance run – 400 meters – which is one lap around the track.  For most runners, that’s not really a long distance.  But for a fifth grader, it sure seemed like a long distance!

We had one track meet.  It was the city meet held at the high school track.  I remember very well getting ready for the run.  Clear sky.  Bright sunshine.  Temperature in the 60’s, maybe 70. 

We lined up for the race.  Eight ten year old boys.  Me in my red shorts, red tank top, and red and white shoes.  School colors.  The gun sounded and away we went.  

I remember receiving advice from my Dad before the race.  He said, “Pace yourself. Don’t start out too fast.”  I took his advice to heart.  I started out slow.  When I reached the far side of the track the view for the spectators was obscured by bleachers.  As we entered that part of the race and ran behind the bleachers I was in last place.  When no one could see me I picked up the pace and made my move forward.  

By the time we came out from behind the bleachers I moved from eighth place to third place and gained ground on the front two runners.  We entered the final stretch of that one lap around the track the lead runner and I battled it out for first. In that last 100 meters I gave it my all and we ended up crossing the finish line together.  My first race!

For a number of different reasons I didn’t run track again and I didn’t race again until I ran cross country as a senior in high school.  I never again finished as well as I did that day.  In fact, when I ran cross country I never finished near the top.  I finished closer to the back of the pack in every one of my races. But I finished. 

It was another 26 years after my last cross country meet that I took up running again.  I’m a better runner now than I ever was in high school.  I know more about how to prepare for a run – what to eat; how to recover, how to start a race, and how to finish. And I’ve experienced my share of setbacks in the form of a torn hamstring, torn meniscus, along with the more minor discomforts of blisters and blackened toenails.  

In 1 Corinthians the Apostle Paul writes:  “Do you not know that in a race the runners all compete, but only one receives the prize?  Run in such a way that you may win it.  Athletes exercise self-control in all things; they do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable one” (9.24-25)

These words help me think of my own spiritual journey as a race.  I'm not in this race to finish first.  In fact winning this race is more about finishing than it is about being ahead of others.  Like in running I encounter things that trip me up and set me back.  Blisters on my soul rather than my feet.  Wounds that make me stumble as I seek to follow Jesus.  Like in my own running I ask myself: 

• How am I running this one wild and precious life I’ve been given?
• How do I rest and recover?
• How do I care for the blisters on my soul?
• Where do I look for support from others?

The Christian race is not so much about coming in first, or placing in our age group.  It is, however, about running in such a way that we finish the race.  And it is in finishing that we win. 

Encourage One Another

I have been reading from Thessalonians the past few weeks, and am struck by the number times I read the phrase:  "encourage one another."  In this short little letter in the Bible, it occurs 5 times.

There are days, weeks, even months that we really need encouragement. I just spoke with a member of the congregation that I serve.  For well over a year now she has battled cancer.  Her daughter is staying with her for a few days and on a day when she really did not want to leave the house her for a meeting at the church building her daughter encouraged her to go so that she could be part of a group that supports her and gives her life.  After the meeting this woman said to me:  "It's always good to have someone encourage me to do something."

Runners, it seems, and those who watch races, are extremely good at encouraging one another.  I remember vividly watching the 1992 Barcelona Olympics when Derek Redmond pulled up in the 400 meter semi-final with a torn hamstring.  He continued limping around the track, while his father pushed past security to join him.  Derek's Dad told him:  "You don't have to do this."  Derek replied: "Yes, I do."  At which point his father answered him:  "Then we'll finish together."  The two finished to a standing ovation.  Encouragement in action.

At the 2014 Minnesota state high school girls cross-country race two girls stopped to help an opponent who fell just 50 meters from the finish.  All three were disqualified because of a high school league rule against aiding another runner.  Again, encouragement in action.

In some ways it is easier to offer encouragement to a runner than it is to encourage another person experiencing the ups and downs of life's journey.  In running it is often easier to tell what type of encouragement to offer.  A runner appears tired so you cheer.  A hamstring is torn so you walk alongside.  A young woman falls so you help her up.  Encouragement.

In everyday life such encouragement, is, at times, more difficult.  We don't often let our guard down to say how someone can help us.  It is hard to ask for someone's help.  We don't want to become a burden.  Where do you need encouragement in your life today?  How might you be a source of encouragement for someone today?

Should the church not also be a place where we receive and offer encouragement?  Can it be a place where you can come and be renewed and strengthened to do the work God has gifted you to do; a place where you can come as you are, a place where we celebrate achievements and console following disappointment; a people who gather to give hope when hope is scarce, comfort when it is needed, and courage when we are afraid; a place where you can be the person God has created you to be.

In Matthew's story about Jesus, Jesus says:  "You are the light of the world...Let your light so shine before others that they may see your good works and give glory to God."  When your light is dim, I pray that someone will come alongside you to rekindle the flame so that the light of Christ in your life will shine for all to see.