Trinity Lutheran Church

  On Thursday and Friday, I went down to IL to see my best friend Ryan. Ryan and I have been friends since high school and we have experienced a lot together.  He was best man in my wedding and I performed his wedding.  He was there when my Dad died and the one person I wanted with me when my engagement ended.  I was there when his wife had heart surgery.  When he was baptized, I was his sponsor.  We have been there for every up and every down.  I mean, we made sure we saw every new “Star Wars” movie together on opening day, whether it was him coming to MN at the time or me going down to IL. There is no one on this planet, aside from my wife Amy, who knows me as well as Ryan.

However, despite this, we rarely get a chance to see each other.  I hadn’t seen Ryan in just over two years.  His son, Aaron, is 18 months old and I just got to meet him.  We were set to get together a year ago right after Aaron was born but he had to cancel due to illness, one that eventually landed him in the hospital.  We want to get together more but often can’t due to work obligations, family commitments, and just plain ol’ distance.

Yet, when I got there, it didn’t take long for it to seem like I hadn’t seen him in two years.  We fell right back into it like we had just seen each other a few days before.  We had a great time talking, laughing, and hanging out.  It was great and we talked about how we have to try to get together more often and you know when Star Wars Episode VII comes out on December 18, 2015, we will figure out a way to watch it together.

I’m sure many of you have that close friend, the one who knows you so well and you know so well that it doesn’t matter how long it has been since you seen them, when you do it just picks up right where you left off like no time has passed.  This kind of friend you know will always be there for you, no matter what.  The kind of friend who knows every foible, every gift, every failure, and every success about you.  The kind of friend you can lean on, count on, and talk to.

Did you know that Jesus is that kind of friend to you?  Jesus knows everything about you, good and bad.  Jesus has made a promise to always be there for you, to listen to your concerns and your celebrations, to cry with you and high five you.  Jesus has promised to be with you ALWAYS.  And always means just that.

That means Jesus is there to be your friend during those times when you are strong in faith and those days when you are not. Jesus is there to be your Savior no matter how long you have been away from him.  No matter how long it has been since you have talked to him prayer or worshipped him in church.  Jesus is the kind of friend who always be there with open arms, always ready and waiting when you are ready to have a relationship with him.

Jesus is waiting this day to be a friend to you.  If you have been far away from him for a while, the door is always open.  Jesus is ready and waiting to remind you that you are loved, forgiven, blessed, and saved.  Jesus is ready to hear your joys and sorrows.  Jesus is ready to remind you that you will have no greater friend than him because this friend gives his life for yours.

I know that no matter how long it takes between visits with Ryan and I that he always has my back and I his.  And I know, no matter what, that my Savior Jesus Christ is with me as well and that I always have a friend in him.  For great friends in our lives and for our wonderful friend and Savior Jesus Christ we can say, “Thanks be to God!”  Amen.

  It is tempting, when thinking about the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and Wanblee, SD, which was the site of our mission trip this past week, to see only statistics.  Things like:

• Unemployment is 85%
• Per capita income is $4,500
• Suicide rate is twice the national average, and teen suicide is FOUR times the national average
• Alcoholism rate is estimated to be 80%
• Life expectancy is the 2^nd lowest in the Western Hemisphere.  Only Haiti has a lower rate.
• Diabetes is eight times the national average and for heart disease, it is double the rate nationally.
• Many homes are the size of a small trailer from a trailer court and many don’t have electricity or running water.

   Sometimes, we only see the statistics, which are so stark, grave, and disturbing.

But this is what I saw:

• I saw little kids from Wanblee run up to our youth and others and give hugs, ask for piggy back rides, and smile.
• I saw kids who just wanted to be loved and who gave love in return.
• I saw a girl, Jean, who is three, whose smile was so bright it would melt the polar ice caps.
• I saw someone who was so grateful for our help getting their trailer repaired that they brought a note and a cake as a thank you.  He will put his other seven family members into that trailer.
• I saw a man who was successful off the reservation who came back to make a difference in the lives of his people, one person at a time.
• I saw youth who, despite bitterly cold showers and sleeping on air mattresses in crowded rooms, gave their hearts and their strength to the people and who never whined and complained.
• I saw youth who, despite not all being in the same social circles, treat each other with respect and reach out to people different than themselves.
• I saw looks and smiles of gratitude from adults who were thankful we were there.
• I saw a Youthworks staff member break down because she was so thankful for our work, our attitude, and our faith that it reminded her why she was doing what she was doing.
• I saw amazing countryside, amazing sunsets and sunrises, and the beauty of a rainbow.
• I saw youth who didn’t want to leave, whose hearts were breaking when they left the people and kids of Wanblee.
• I saw Jesus.  I saw Jesus everywhere.

  There are times in life, even for a person like me, when an experience cannot be summed up in words.  It can’t be summed in pictures.  It cannot be adequately expressed, it can only be felt and lived.  Our time in Wanblee was one of those times.  The shared experiences I had with our amazing youth and adults are something that I will carry with me every day.  It is something they will carry with them every day as well.

   But mostly, I will remember all the ways I saw Jesus at work in and through our youth, in and around that community, in and through the adults present.  And for that, I will always be thankful.  Because despite the statistics, despite the harshness and pain that exists there, God is there.  And God is doing good things.  Thanks be to God!

  As I looked out at the vastness of the ocean during the last day of our cruise Amy and I took during our vacation, I had the same feeling that I have had when I stood at the top of a volcano in Hawaii or when I looked out at the majestic Yosemite Valley or those times when I look up at the beauty of the stars on a clear night: “Wow, the world is a BIG place.”  I get this sense of overwhelmingness (I just created a word), of feeling very, very small and insignificant compared to the majesty of this world and of God’s creation.

   And in the midst of that feeling, I hear the words of Psalm 8 in my head:  “When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have established; ⁴what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them?”

   Because we often spend so much time focused on our own little bubble, on our own wants, needs, concerns, and that of our immediate area, we can be shocked when confronted with the BIGNESS of our world.  And in that moment, we might feel insignificant.  Unworthy.  We might feel very alone, that our life doesn’t really make much of a difference and that we don’t make much of an impact in the grand scheme of it all.

     I know that sometimes I feel like that and sometimes that happens in those moments like on the cruise.  It fills me with profound sadness and despair.  And then I remember the next verse of that psalm, Psalm 8: “Yet you have made them a little lower than the angels, and crowned them with glory and honor.”  In the midst of God’s fast and majestic creation, God has blessed us, crafted us in God’s own image, and sent his one and only Son Jesus Christ to save us.  In the midst of the vastness of this world, God promises to hear OUR prayer, to walk with US every day, to give us a future with hope, and to be with us till the very end of the age.

   And so, that feeling of sadness is replaced with a feeling of joy, of thankfulness, of blessing.  I am reminded that I am God’s child, saved by the grace of God through Jesus Christ, and called to be God’s servant in this great big world we call home.  I am reminded that my life does make a difference in the world because I share love with other and that love, like everything else, comes from God.

    The same is true for you.  You are a child of God.  You are loved and forgiven and redeemed and blessed by God.  You are a servant of Jesus Christ and you do make a difference in the world.  Every day.  YOU are not only blessed, YOU ARE A BLESSING.   You are blessing to your friends and family, to neighbors and strangers, to your community and to the world at large.

    As I write this, I’m not looking at an ocean or standing on the top of a mountain.  I’m looking at a parking lot and some trees and houses.  Yet, I am reminded that it is a great big wonderful world out there.  And, by the grace of God, I get to be a part of it.  And so do you.

    So I am again reminded of verses from Psalm 8, the first and last of that Psalm: “O Lord, our Sovereign, how majestic is your name in all the earth!”  How majestic indeed.  Thanks be to God!  Amen.