Daily Devotions

O Lord, you are my God; I will exalt you, I will praise your name; for you have done wonderful things, plans formed of old, faithful and sure. For you have made the city a heap, the fortified city a ruin; the palace of aliens is a city no more, it will never be rebuilt. Therefore strong peoples will glorify you; cities of ruthless nations will fear you.

For you have been a refuge to the poor, a refuge to the needy in their distress, a shelter from the rainstorm and a shade from the heat. When the blast of the ruthless was like a winter rainstorm, the noise of aliens like heat in a dry place, you subdued the heat with the shade of clouds; the song of the ruthless was stilled.

On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken.

It will be said on that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, so that he might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation. Isaiah 25:1-9

Today is election day. Voting is an honor, a privilege, a responsibility of citizenship. It is also, in the history of how human beings have actually worked to bring order to their common lives, a relatively new practice. Throughout the majority of human history, it has simply been about “might makes right”, “who’s your daddy?” and “those who have the gold make the rules.” In much of the world, this remains the case.

But we live in a new world which includes a new idea. The government functions at the consent of the governed. We get to cast a ballot. Everyone of legal age – since 1920, including every woman – since 1965, including people of color who were previously discriminated against – since 1971, including 18 year olds – gets one single solitary vote. One vote.

One vote per person might not seem like it means much. But we aren’t a land of one person. We are a land of many people. Every flood wreaks devastation one drop of water at a time. Every blizzard kills people one snowflake at a time. Every parched field is restored one rain drop at a time.

As the people of Israel suffered in Isaiah’s day, their only option regarding their common life was to wait. To wait to see what the powers that be would do. To wait and see what God would do. They went about their daily lives. They suffered under an advancing army. They were terrified to see their beloved Jerusalem surrounded. Over and over they were starved out in a brutal waiting game of what might happen next.

Where was their champion? Where was their rescuer? Who would save them?

They lifted their eyes to the hills. They lifted their eyes to the future. Someday! Someday God will make things right! Someday will come! Someday we will have a feast of fat foods, a cup of fine wine. Someday tears will dry and death will die. But for now, we wait.

Nothing can change the hopeful optimism of people of faith. Life for us will always be comedy rather than tragedy. There will be an ending and it will be happy. We cling to that. But we don’t just sit around and wait for it.

Jesus didn’t tell the lame, the blind, the hungry, or the poor to sit around and wait because someday it will all be better. He did what he could while he had time to do it. So do we who follow him in our lives. We don’t just wait, we participate. And today, that includes voting for those who will bear responsibility to do their part in leading us in our earthly lives.

Let us pray: Gracious Lord, today is a glorious and terrifying day in the lives of the people of the United States. Thank you for those who volunteer their time in providing order and security as their fellow citizens cast their ballots. We pray for safety, for justice, for access. We are grateful that today has finally arrived. See us through this day as you see us through all days. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to throw away; a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace. Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

Pete Seeger wrote the song in the late 1950’s. The Byrds made it their own in 1965. Like many people, I can’t remember the first time that I heard “Turn, Turn, Turn.” I can’t remember a time when that song didn’t sound oddly familiar.

Who would have thought, in the midst of the turbulent changes of those days, that a passage from a long ignored Old Testament book, Ecclesiastes, would have reappeared in our culture in the form of a folk rock song that rose to #1 on the Billboard music charts? Actually, anyone who has paid much attention through the years to the ways that biblical poetry inspires and encourages people. Especially when it is set to music with the kind of melody that gives birth to earworms.

As I’ve shared before, our daily readings come from a resource that we use in our congregation every Sunday, the Taking Faith Home bulletin insert. I don’t choose the verses. They just show up. I read them, process what I hear, and share my reaction to them with you. So, oddly and fittingly enough, these are our verses for today.

Also, without reading ahead, I talked about the book of Ecclesiastes yesterday with our confirmation families in our learning about the wisdom literature of the Old Testament.

Imagine that, Ecclesiastes showing up, unannounced, two days in a row in my life. What do I do with that…other than dealing with the earworm certain to follow me throughout this turbulent week?

My sense in reading Ecclesiastes is that the overall mood of the work is gloomy, cynical, and depressing. So these famous verses about time could be heard in two ways. We could read them and come away with a sad “nothing much matters, the more things change, the more they stay the same” or with an optimistic “the sun will come out tomorrow” vibe. Which will it be?

I very definitely have a preference in tomorrow’s election but I’ve already made that known. Even though I wanted to vote on the ACTUAL day, the convenience and short lines of early voting got me this year. My vote has been cast. I’ve made my choice. I’ve done my part.

As for the people who win their election to office? They will be my elected leaders. I will pray for them. I will pray for their safety, their wisdom, their judgment. I’ll pray that they not abuse their positions of power and that they never lose sight of what will be good for children, widows, orphans, and strangers. And I won’t be the only one praying such prayers. We pray for our governmental leaders every weekend in worship. We’re all in this together.

To everything there is a season. No matter who gets elected, Christ remains my king. And the sun will come out tomorrow.

Let us pray: Gracious Lord, thank you for the opportunity to participate in the common life that we share with others. For the privilege of voting, for the privilege of supporting our common life through doing our part, paying our taxes, and practicing good citizenship, even when that means protesting what we believe to be wrong. Remind us, again and again, that you are always with us, through all the times that come. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt—a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord.

But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and remember their sin no more. Jeremiah 31:31-34

Growing up in North Dakota I was all about the Minnesota Twins. I was vaguely aware of a team called the Chicago Cubs. A bit like my awareness today of the Florida Marlins. They exist but I know nothing about their history of their fan base.

My only connection with Chicago Cubs fans would be my memory of the 1987 Twins. They snuck into the World Series after winning only 85 games in the season. I remember the growing fever pitch around town and the organist in our seminary chapel, Mark Sedio, playing a fugue based on the Twins theme song when we gathered for worship the morning after the Twins won.

Yes, baseball is trivial compared to life for the people of Israel who languished in Babylon with their fading memories of “back home” and the stories of the brutality their elders faced following the destruction of Jerusalem. The early chapters of Jeremiah detail the slow burn of an invading army outside of the city gates demanding tribute from the Jewish leaders. Until finally the Babylonians had enough. The army was needed back home. So to hold their territory, they took vast numbers of Israelis on a forced march back to Babylon with them. The Exile.

That pain was real pain, far more devastating and humiliating than waiting 108 years for another World Series title. But hopelessness is hopelessness…yet neither the people of Israel nor true Cubs fans ever completely lost hope. Their day would come. God wouldn’t forget them.

So the tenor of the book of Jeremiah changes. From the warnings and the attacks of the earlier chapters, suddenly Jeremiah speaks out from the midst of the exiles. God will not forget you. A new day is coming. God will not turn his face away from you forever.

No one is born a baseball fan. Someone has to teach that. It begins with a ball, years have to pass before a glove and a bat are added. Anyone can learn to throw and catch and hit. Some are “naturals” and others will either never be interested or never be that great. It takes time to learn the rules, a lifetime to learn the intricacies. But to truly love a team, to live and die with a team, to yell at a television screen, or tell everyone around a radio to hush so you can listen, to drive the miles to a stadium, to lay the cash out for a ticket (or to know the right person who has access to tickets) – all of that has to be learned. It is modeled in our elders. It is passed down through stories. It becomes our heart language.

The promise here in Jeremiah is that devotion to God is passed on just like devotion to baseball. But metaphors are metaphors and they all break down. I can’t remember who won the World Series three years ago, I would have to look it up. But the assurance that God will never let us go, that God has brighter days ahead for us, that God is forgiveness and love – that has been written on my heart. I don’t have to look it up to be reminded. I just need to see it modeled even as I model it for others.

Let us pray: Gracious Lord, our lives today are so good. There is so much we take for granted. We know there are so many today who experience life so differently – terrified refugees climbing into boats or walking down dusty roads to places that don’t want them and don’t have room, starving Haitians still digging out from what a hurricane left behind, people struggling in the face of disease and poverty, people living in their own version of exile. Where ever there is such suffering, we pray that you bring hope, bring help, bring healing. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry). On account of these the wrath of God is coming on those who are disobedient. These are the ways you also once followed, when you were living that life.

But now you must get rid of all such things—anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language from your mouth. Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have stripped off the old self with its practices and have clothed yourselves with the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of its creator. In that renewal there is no longer Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and free; but Christ is all and in all!

As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.

Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful.

Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly; teach and admonish one another in all wisdom; and with gratitude in your hearts sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Colossians 3:5-17

A couple of years ago Kelley and I joined a class at church that wanted to teach us to be better stewards of our bodies. It involved a weekly Bible study, more regular exercise, and watching (and recording) what we ate. It was truly a holistic experience led by the kindest and most encouraging teacher in our congregation. When we did what we were supposed to do we actually lost a few pounds and felt much better about ourselves.

I’m thinking today about that experience because I remember, in our first gathering, we took our “BEFORE” pictures. The idea, of course, was that at the end of the class we would take our “AFTER” pictures and feel great about how well we did. Let’s just say that it didn’t quite work out that way. We petered out before it was through. We somehow forget to take our “AFTER” pictures.

Truthfully, we slid back into our old ways and didn’t want the shame of the “AFTER” picture to remind us. I pretty much have forgotten about that (pushed it forcibly out of my mind) until Paul reminded me of it this morning.

Paul, and frankly most of the earliest Christians – and plenty of modern Christians as well – clearly could remember his “before Jesus” days, his “after I met Jesus” days, and how different they were. Many of the people I serve tell me that they don’t have memories like that. They were born, baptized, raised in the church, maybe strayed a bit in college, but came back home and have been active Christians since. They would tell you that they don’t remember a time in their lives “before Jesus.”

I, on the other hand, clearly remember when God and the church had little to nothing to do with my life or the life of my family. And I clearly remember when God suddenly and dramatically turned my life around on a dime.

And yet as I remember that today, aware of how I have slipped and slid and backslid and forward jumped and fallen off and climbed back on the Christian journey that God keeps me on, none of that matters. Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow might come. All I really have is NOW.

So it really doesn’t matter how we came to where we are now, the Christian faith will always be a one day at a time walk. We will always have things we are working on, things we are letting go of, things that refuse to let go of us, new experiences that the Holy Spirit needs to use to help us become the “us” that God has in mind. Along the way we catch glimpses of the mystery that we are both “already there” and that we will “never get there” at the same time.

Along the way that journey is much more fruitful, scenic, and rewarding if we share it with others. If we sing together. If we read the words that God has given us. And if we realize that the road and the destination are both called “Love.”

Let us pray: God, thank you for calling us to join you and to be mindful of your presence as we make our way down this road of life. Thank you for holding us close, for helping us let go, and for loving us though we fail. Thank you for the church, this laboratory of love, where we can learn the tools that help us make it through. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

We who are strong ought to put up with the failings of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Each of us must please our neighbor for the good purpose of building up the neighbor. For Christ did not please himself; but, as it is written, “The insults of those who insult you have fallen on me.” For whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope.

May the God of steadfastness and encouragement grant you to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus, so that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Welcome one another, therefore, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God. Romans 15:1-7

I love to teach our confirmation classes at my church. I’m not saying that I’m all that great at it, just that I love giving it a shot every week that we meet. We expect every young person to bring at least one adult, preferably a parent, ideally both parents, and then I get to teach the whole crew. We all become students. As the teacher, I have to think about how I will present the topic and I learn by doing that. The students have a chance to learn something new, and frankly, so do their parents.

The “secret sauce” to it all is the realization that parents are just big kids with more responsibilities. No matter how old we are, or how much we have accomplished in our lives, or how hard we have worked to grow up, there is always, and will always be, that “middle school aged” part of us that we will never fully leave behind.

Usually, that part of us is what feels pain the most deeply. And that is the part of us that needs Jesus the most.

Do you remember your middle school years? Growing into your own body. Sprouting pimples. Worrying about fitting in. The cruelty that kids inflict upon one another. Trying things, especially the things you weren’t supposed to try. Still being a child even as you know that your childhood has suddenly slipped by. School becoming more challenging. Seeing those mysterious classmates who actually seemed to have quit caring about anything that matters. Stepping into the lunchroom and wondering where you would sit. Old friends deciding they don’t want to be friends with you anymore. Your first painful tastes of romance and rejection.

Just starting to break away from your parents but not yet old enough to drive so you couldn’t break far enough away. Curfews every night. Dormant addictions gradually moving in and taking over, even before high school – that’s what happens, according to the experts. And we saw it happen. Those were some tough years.

I believe we carry those years in us for the rest of our lives. The stakes get higher but we still play the game. And then Jesus comes along and changes the whole game.

Jesus tells us that our identity isn’t a function of our race, our class, our parents, our ethnicity, our hometown, our clothing, our sexuality, our gender – our identity is rooted in being a unique and blessed child of God, loved powerfully and eternally.

Jesus tells us that he doesn’t grade us, or keep a scorecard, or even remember our sins. He gives us a fresh new start every morning.

Jesus tells us that we are always welcome at his table for dinner. We have a new family called the church that lives in virtually every neighborhood and every city and we are at home in any one of them.

And then Jesus invites us in joining him in sharing the experiences that this new game creates in our lives with others. To make way for the new kid. To live in harmony instead of competition. To worry about the needs of others more than our own. To put others first, not because we have to but because we want to, because we want them to know that they matter just like we have learned that we matter too.

Let us pray: Dear Lord, we all want to know that we matter, that we count, that there is a place where we will be welcomed, where we will know that we belong. Bless every effort in your church to be that place, and to share that experience, with all you send along the way. Teach us anew that it is in loving others where we will feel most deeply loved. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed throughout the world. For God, whom I serve with my spirit by announcing the gospel of his Son, is my witness that without ceasing I remember you always in my prayers, asking that by God’s will I may somehow at last succeed in coming to you. For I am longing to see you so that I may share with you some spiritual gift to strengthen you— or rather so that we may be mutually encouraged by each other’s faith, both yours and mine.

I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that I have often intended to come to you (but thus far have been prevented), in order that I may reap some harvest among you as I have among the rest of the Gentiles. I am a debtor both to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish —hence my eagerness to proclaim the gospel to you also who are in Rome.

For I am not ashamed of the gospel; it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who has faith, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed through faith for faith; as it is written, “The one who is righteous will live by faith.” Romans 1:8-17

Welcome to November – and month that ends, and with today’s words from Romans, begins – with thanksgiving. Paul begins his letter by thanking the Romans for their faith, which encourages him in his own. All of this is rooted in the gospel. In the good news that, in Jesus, God is bringing salvation, wholeness, healing, to all people who become willing to trust him.

This message of God’s inclusive love holds the power to make right so many things that are wrong in our world today. Faith in Jesus has moved Paul from the tribalism he grew up with to a new place where he can finally see that God ignores the boundaries that humans set up, “to Greeks and to barbarians, both to the wise and to the foolish,” are expressions of this reach. He says the same thing in other ways in other letters but he is always making the same point. Everyone means everyone.

There will always be a tension between individual agency and responsibility and communal agency and responsibility. What in life is about me and what in life is about us and how are we going to figure this out? This is part of the impasse between political groups who view life so differently. Paul holds this tension together with the reminder to the Romans that we are all in this together. We need each other. We do better together.

Paul quotes from Habakkuk 2:4, “The one who is righteous will live by faith.” In this he holds together the revelation from God that is the Hebrew scriptures and the message of Jesus which has become the hope of the world. To read that chapter is to see again that the opposite of living by faith for Habakkuk is living by pride, arrogance, wealth, and domination. Yes, we have problems with all four and faith in Jesus turns us around.

I read these words from Paul this morning and I wish I was that kind of pastor who writes spiritually flowing and flowery words to his people. I’m not. Never will be. But I am grateful for Paul’s words which continue to bring encouragement and instruction to us as they did first to the church in Rome. We are all in this together. We do need each other. Christianity is a team sport. And God has made room for us all. Trust that.

Let us pray: Thank you, good and gracious God, that you have come out of hiding in Jesus and that you use people like Paul to bring Jesus into our lives. Thank you for the power of faith, the power to help us do what we cannot do on our own. May that power lead us into lives that are happy, joyous, and free. In Jesus’ name. Amen.