PASTORAL REFLECTIONS - MAY

Dear Good Shepherd Folk:
 
Church signs like the above are making the rounds. “There are some questions that can’t be answered by Google.” So, are you wondering how to cut an onion without crying? Arrange marching band music? Audition for SURVIVOR? Bathe a guinea pig, cook couscous?  You can web surf until your eyes grow sore. Nothing is out of our reach now in information technology! There’s also eHow.com for those who want to learn how to do anything –brought to you by experts on everything from relationships to getting rich. The eHow database has 70,000 articles and visited by more than eight million people each month. When inquiring minds want to know, eHow delivers!
 
But if you type in “How to have hope” you get some ideas about how to have inner peace or how to carry on when a loved one dies – all important, of course, but the advice gets thin and pretty individualized. A tougher one is “How to suffer faithfully” – mmm, not much there - except an article about how to treat a pinched nerve.
 
Database is one thing – a deeper awareness of God and the world goes far beyond electronic how-to’s. As the church sign suggests, “there are some questions that can’t be answered by Google”…. or eHow.com. Sooner or later I have to leave my computer screen to discover there is a life to be lived… a faith to be grasped… a hoped to pursued… and a love to be experienced.
 
I came upon theologian Reinhold Niebuhr’s powerful observation in a book(!): “Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime; therefore we are saved by hope. Nothing true or beautiful or good makes sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we are saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore, we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as from our own; therefore, we are saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness.”
 
I took awhile for this to sink in. I read it ‘umpteen’ times, until it spoke volumes about seeing life in the greater context of God’s Big Picture. Really! It humbles me to know that I am here taking up space, my life on loan and gifted by God to share for a short time. Right now what I need more than anything is forgiving love so I can make the most of life …faithfully, hopefully…lovingly…while I have time. I couldn’t find any advice on Google or eHow to see this any clearer than from within my own heart of meditation. Now, how to cook couscous - that’s something else!
 
Pastor Ron