I’ve been watching a lot of news about Hurricane Harvey.  It is difficult to fathom the destruction caused by the rain and water and the number of lives that will be forever changed. I’ve watched as interview after interview has some young mother or older, distinguished looking man looking into the camera and saying something like, “I knew things like this happened…but I didn’t think it would happen to me.”
 
When tragedy or heartbreak or a crisis strikes, “I didn’t think it would happen to me,” is a natural reaction.  I once knew a colleague who after making some drastic changes toward a healthier, more sustainable life style was told he had inoperable cancer.  Over his long career as a pastor he had been with many people as they received the same news many times.  Still when he told me the news, he looked like he was in shock as he said, “Why me!  I’ve done everything right!”
 
Very bad things happen to very good people for no good reason. Hurricanes blow… rain pours…cars hit slick spots…cancer comes back…And although most of the time most of us escape the truly tragic and find courage in the thought that others have it worst than we do…there are other times when the tragedy or accident or test results are as bad as anything we imaged we could experience. And deep down when nobody is listening, the question is often the same as my friend’s… “Why, God?  Why me?” And the question that often follows that I hear is…   “How am I going to get through this?” 
 
I don’t know how those whose lives have been forever altered by Harvey are going to get through this anymore than I know how people live with the pain of a tragic loss or the news of having very limited time left in this life.  I have observed a couple of things that I think are worth telling today.
 
First, the biggest challenges of our lives are an opportunity for the best we have within us to come forward.  I know this sounds a bit optimistic at best.  But I will tell you this… in my experience I have visited with so many people who when faced with the most difficult time of their lives… found something within them they did not know was there before.  Things like:  courage, faith, perspective, trust are surprisingly available.
 
Second, we do not need to face these experiences alone. These times bring out the best in people…people we know and people we don’t.  Notice how in all the stories from the flooding in Texas we don’t hear that the person wading in the water was black or that the pilot of the rescue helicopter was Hispanic or the woman on the rooftop was white.  Tragedy and a common cause bring people together.  In a moment of crisis… most of us want to do the right thing… we want to put our boat in the water…we want to put our phone down and listen to the news… we want to write the check…
 
…And finally for today, there are many Christian responses to the question of suffering… I believe two things.  First, suffering is a part of our human experience…God does not cause hurricanes and accidents and cancer as a way of judging us or testing us.  We suffer because we love. But suffering can be redemptive.  By this I don’t mean that there are reasons or hidden purpose for our suffering.  I do mean that something of a fuller, a better life can come out of suffering.  Better emergency plans can be developed… We can show our children how to face death… People remember that the face of the one who saved their baby was different in color.
 
Second, our suffering is also a place we meet God.  In part because when we are not in control of life, when we are vulnerable, we recognize God’s presences more fully.  But mostly because I believe it is in the suffering of the world that God is most often to be found.  That is the message of the cross… God does not prevent or cause suffering… but God suffers with us. And God comforts and responds. I find great solace, courage and inspiration in the belief that when something I didn’t think would ever happen to me, happens to me…that it is also a place God is present.
Keep the Faith,
​Pastor Dan
 
 
 
 
 
 

 feel the need to write two very different “memos” this week…One to reflect upon the troubling images of Charlottesville, VA….the dreadful scenes of violence and death and hate. The just as troubling reaction is cause for a renewed conversation around our attitudes of race and intolerance and hatred. Our bishop, speaking on behalf of all the bishops of the United Methodist denomination, has said,
 
Let there be no excuses or political justification for the evil that was on full display in Charlottesville last Saturday. Nor let us forget that many such displays of white supremacy, racism, and hatred go unreported or under-reported in many places. White supremacist and neo-Nazi ideologies are abhorrent and entirely inconsistent with the Christian faith. (You can read the entire article here.) 
​
The other memo is to tell you about a delightful worship service on Sunday. Yes, I said delightful… we are going to have a first ever for me, “Blessing of the Animals” service. This is where you can bring any animal that can fit into our sanctuary with you for church. You can bring a picture of one who is perhaps no longer with you or that you choose not to bring with you. You can bring a stuffed animal if you want. It is going to be a celebration of all God’s critters and our responsibility as humans to care for them and our planet.
 
How to comment on the dreadful and the delightful in the same space is a stretch at best.  So bear with me.
 
Often the things that bring us the most joy or sadness are connected deep down to one another. For many of us nothing says unconditional acceptance and love quite like the dog that meets you at the door. And nothing much stands more for its opposite, the conditional approval based on hate and intolerance, than white hoods and black swastikas. These images are rooted deep inside us and not just in our minds… they are ingrained in our soul.
 
We don’t often have what a friend of mine calls “bandwidth,” and what others call emotional capacity, to deal with both at the same time. And yet often… in a moment when we are being stretched to our soul’s capacity, the dreadful and the delightful come together to reveal how important it is not to ignore the connection.
 
Let me give another example. Most of our youth meetings begin with something we call “highs and lows.” It’s like joys and concerns in our worship. Youth share what is important in their lives. I remember a time in confirmation a couple of years ago when one youth hesitated when his turn came. He said something like, “I don’t know if this is a high or a low…well, it’s both… my grandma has died… It’s a low of course, because she has died… But it’s well, not a high… but something because she doesn’t have to suffer any longer.”
 
I want to invite you to have the same courage and the faith to put the dreadful and the delight of your week together and bring both of these images with you to worship on Sunday. The dreadful and the delightful of life are inseparable… they are both are part of our experience…we cannot and should not ignore either. The God we worship is a God of all creation and in Jesus Christ has known this difficult human experience, the dreadful and the delightful and everything in between.

This Sunday Rev. Mary Brown, an ELCA (that’s Evangelical Lutheran Church in America) clergyperson, will be preaching.  Mary has preached several times at our church. She’s great.  One of the important things that happens when Mary comes to preach is that she also presides over Holy Communion. 
 
In the area of church denominations like ELCA and UMC, this is a very big deal. Encouraging one denomination’s ordained clergy to preside at the sacrament of another denomination is not really all that common. But ELCAs and UMCs have been doing it for a couple of years. It’s another way we practice being a Big Tent Church in a Small Tent world.
 
Something a bit different this year for Mary is that she is on staff at PROP.  Mary does a lot with relating to the community and with churches.  She is going to be preaching about a parable Jesus tells called the parable of the sower. It’s a story about a farmer who plants seeds, and like farmers of the day and in our day had little idea of what would come of this work.
 
I’ve heard that Mary will be relating this parable to the work of our Crops for PROP garden.  For four years our garden has produced well over a ton (2,000 pounds) of fresh vegetables for people who come to PROP.  And by the looks of it, this year promises to do the same. I’ve always thought that the significant thing to pay attention to in that number is not how well our garden grows vegetables, but how many people need them.  And we are not the only garden in town like this.
 
It’s going to be a interesting day on Sunday… a day to celebrate and participate in a couple of ways in which we are in mission and ministry to Eden Prairie and to the world.
 
Keep the Faith,
Pastor Dan