Pastor's Message
Have you ever thought about the paths that your life has taken. It might have been otherwise. There have been numerous ways to go another way, yet you went the way you did. Was something—or Someone—guiding you? Are you curious about the ways you did not take? Do you ever regret having taken the ones that you did? No matter. If you had not followed the paths you did, you might not even be thinking these thoughts now. You are who you are, and you are here. There will be more ways to choose. The important thing now is to exist and live your life.
In Tom Kempenski’s play Duet for One, a powerful drama about a musician who has been crippled by multiple sclerosis, begins seeing a psychiatrist. The musician breaks down and becomes very bitter about his condition. In course of counseling, the psychiatrist turns out, was imprisoned by the Nazi’s and lost her family in the death camps of World War II. Provoked by his anger, she gives him a stern lecture about life. That life is always worth living. So what if you come to the end of the road that you are traveling? You must then go back the way you came until you find a fork in the road and go the other way.
We should give thanks for the ways that we have come, and use them to learn about ourselves and our life. There is something special and sacred about any way. Life itself is special and sacred. Thinking about our paths can make us more sensitive to the holy places along them. It can deepen our awareness of God. It was in John’s Gospel that Thomas, one of the disciples, he asked Jesus “How can we know the way? Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life
Blessings on your faith journey,
Pastor Mike
come to her house for dinner, and they had forgotten they were coming. “I’m writing to you this now,” she said, “before I forget it.” That woman has a graceful attitude toward her memory. She knows that life is full and beautiful, but can’t all be retained in our heads.
We might even thank God that we can forget. What a gift. For God forgets and forgives us all our faults and sins if we just ask. Each new day or each new year (or in this case this time, a whole new decade) that God gives us the gift of time. That God blesses us with another day, another new year and the opportunity to move forward. To leave the past behind; what is done is done!. For our God is a God of new life, and that is why God sent Jesus to teach us all about living an abundant life. In fact, that is one of the many blessings that Christmas reminds us of, that faith and love are real
Blessings to you in the New Year and this new decade,
Pastor Mike