Pastor's Ponderings: Monday Bible Study on Acts of the Apostles 3:1-10 (August 18, 2025)

August 18, 2025:  Monday Bible Study on Acts 3:1-10

Good Monday morning dear friends in Christ.

If your house is like ours, that means that you also got no real rain over the weekend. However, the church building was hit with a microburst with downpour rain, and 70 - 80 MPH winds. We had some damage, but considering the strength of that storm, we faired pretty well. My personal thanks to Robert and his nephews, Barney and Glenn. They worked to mop up and take care of minor repairs, including the church roof which came up on the east side of the Sanctuary. It lifted just a bit, and Robert was able to get it reattached. That was just one corner. Let's give thanks to God for the minor damage to our church building and pray for people who had much more damage in the neighborhood. I have my new phone now, but it’s taking some time to get used to it. I can get calls and messages now, but the changed formats mean it’s hard to find some things as easily as the phone that quit last week. In our city it is a time of great change once again as U of A students start their move-in this week. Our family van will be taking Logan Burt’s move-in items to Flagstaff where he is enrolled in NAU for the fall semester. That drive up will be Wednesday afternoon, with our return during the nighttime hours to Tucson. I am Praying for The LORD'S Speed in our travels this Wednesday, and for Logan's getting settled in easily as he gets ready for classes to start. In our reading for today from Acts 3:1-10, there is another who is moving too, but in quite a different way. This time it will be a move from infirmity to mobility and great joy.

In previous weeks we have talked about the kinds of messages which the disciples will bring to the people as the new church begins to take shape. In today's reading we discover that the leaders of the new Christians are still attending the temple in Jerusalem for prayer every afternoon. Considering how threatened the temple authorities were by Jesus when He was there, it is really a wonder that his followers are still allowed to enter the temple in any way! In the Jewish faith in Jerusalem there were three times each day when the "rules" called for prayer. It could be offered anywhere at 9AM, or Noon, or 3PM, but for the faithful Jew it was always a double blessing if those prayers were offered at the temple during those times. So here are Peter and John coming to the temple for prayer, which I am confident they had watched Jesus do frequently when He was in Jerusalem, and I am certain that they had been with Him, or close enough to know what was happening.  So, Peter and John were still holding to their training in the Jewish faith, and yet, it does seem clear that they also knew that for their mission to be a success there would need to be a lasting connection between their Jesus cult and the traditions of the people in the temple practices.  But now there is something new. It is not the words of Peter's and John's speaking that will move people on this day! We will see Peter and John at the Beautiful Gate to the temple, entering for prayer, but there is a man at the gate who begs for money every day, brought by his friends and set in that place, and it is here that the disciples take that next step in proclaiming the Gospel Truth of the Living Christ.  With no money to give, probably a sign of things to come for the disciples in their mission to the Jews, Peter chose to act to bring healing to this man with the very same confidence that was Christ's. He spoke words in the Name of Jesus, that this man should walk, and he did! Not only is the man at the Beautiful Gate healed, but he also enters the temple filled with joy and excitement, walking and leaping like a young boy. His joy and excitement are all that is needed for the people to know that something extraordinary has taken place, and they have been, and are, close to it. Like us, they too, are all curious about what must have happened, after all, they have seen this man's physical challenges every day as they went to prayer, buy they were not expecting the miracle of God's answer to prayer to be amid their prayers that afternoon.  In this text we see the power of Peter's and John's faith in Jesus Christ. They have come to know that this is their power too, and in our reading for today they have used it. There is no doubt that there will be questions, people are shocked to see such a thing. They will come to Peter seeking answers about this. And Peter is prepared to offer answers to all these questions. That will be our reading for tomorrow. I wonder how Peter will handle it. Will he address the crowds with the compassion and gentleness as Jesus did? We will see. I can tell you that many years ago a very spiritual individual, one who was able to sense the Spirit's presence in others, came to me, telling me that I have the gift of healing. In only one instance did I see it take place. I was in a hospital in Ann Arbor, and as I passed a room, a woman suffering with brain cancer lay in her hospital bed with her entire head like it was on fire. She was literally burning up which I assumed was from her radiation treatments. I stepped into the room where the family was gathered around her and asked if they would like a laying on of hands and prayer for this woman. They invited me to do what I had suggested. I moved around to the head of the bed, laid my hands on her head, and prayed while closing my eyes. When I stopped praying and took my hands from her head, there was normal skin tone all over her head. Before I left the room to continue to my other calls at that hospital, the fire red had returned, but for those few moments God gave her relief in her struggle. I have never had another such experience, but I do know that very same healing is present in my preaching too. It is by God's grace that I have shared His gift in my life of exhortation and preaching. I will tell you, that is not where I thought my greatest gifts would be, but I know today, what Peter knew 2000 years ago, it is the Spirit's present gift of Christ in our lives, that makes it possible to move beyond ourselves, and to reach out with the words of faith in Christ which calls us all to be His Living Presence today for all people!

Please be reminded that if you are doing the Psalm study with me on Thursday, there will not be one this week. I will be on the road until 2AM on Thursday morning coming back from a late move-in into the dorms at NAU. So, I hope to be resting on Thursday morning.

With Love in Christ Jesus our LORD, Pastor Kim

Pastor's Ponderings: Old Testament bible study of Psalm 27 (August 14, 2025)

August 14, 2025:  Thursday Bible Study on Old Testament of Psalm 27

Blessings and Peace be with you this morning.

I hope that you received some of that rain that we got on the East Side last night. It rained hard for about 30 minutes. It is the most rain that we have seen all summer long at our home. I am still praying for more today, tonight, Friday, and Saturday, and won't the reduced temperatures be a real gift after all the heat we have had here in Tucson? A reminder that on the last Friday of this month our Foodies of Faith lunch bunch will be headed to the Cheesecake Factory at Tucson Mall. That date is Friday, August 29th, and we will meet at the restaurant unless you need a ride. Please sign up at church, or you can call the Church office and leave a message. Melody and I will both be driving that day if you need transport to get to the meal that morning. On that same weekend we will have our Donut and Coffee fellowship hour before church on August 31st at 9AM. You can sign up to come and bring donuts or appropriate dietary food to meet the needs of those who can't really eat donuts. We will have that Fellowship hour set up in the Narthex of the Church. Next Wednesday, Melody, Jesse, and I will be helping get Logan moved up to NAU in Flagstaff. We will not get home until sometime after midnight since Logan must wait until 5:30PM that day to get moved in. So next Thursday morning I will be taking the morning off, so there will not be a Psalm study next Thursday. Thanks for understanding. Please keep Logan and Sharyn in your prayers as they both must adjust to some new realities in their lives. We keep telling our young men that for every hour of college classes you are in, on most days you should plan to study 4 hours to support your learning curve in that class. I think that this feels overwhelming for them when they are just getting started. College studies are really a full-time job, and working to pay the bills must be added on top of that. I know all about this, and residential graduate school, committing the whole family to it means even more study and more hours of work to make ends meet, and then you are faced with the costs you just can't cover. Four years of graduate theological training cost us over $100,000 forty years ago. I just can't even begin to imagine how students and graduate students do it today. Well, that's enough of my attempts to bring a reality check to students and parents alike. Today we are getting into Psalm 27. I am amazed at how far we have already come in our moving through the Psalms!

Having been in graduate studies in Chicago and Des Moines for four years, having to learn worship, music, fellowship, and covering the bills when as an intern you were only given $500 to live on, means that there has to be a lot of multi-tasking taking place on the part of the student, their spouse, and all of the people who are committed to helping prepare that student for ordained ministry in the church.  Yes, this is a particularly Lutheran approach to how a student is prepared for ministry in Christ's Church. But in all that was going on back then for us, there was one thing that was most important to the preparation for ordained ministry. That one thing, in the face of everything else was the heart of faith which the presence of the Spirit brought into Her alongside journey with both Melody and Me. In Today's reading of the 27th Psalm, it becomes clear quickly that King David is buried in multi-tasking every day. Sometimes that means he is off battling some army trying to usurp the promised land, and to take over its wealth and Israel's people, and sometimes it means that David is maneuvering through the ins and outs of the people themselves and any intrigue and dissatisfaction that might be moving against him at home.  And for David, as we well know, it may have had to do with personal relationships too. Running a nation was no picnic for David or any other leader, and it certainly is not today in our overly complicated world. But David found that "One Thing" that he needed to find comfort in. For him it was living his life and leading the people of Israel while living in the presence of the Holy One of Heaven and Earth. David uses the terms of living in God's house, but David really does not mean living in the Temple, which was waiting to be built by Solomon later. He is focused on the living presence of His LORD. That "One Thing" means that David can be confident of all the assistance that the LORD provides for him every day. We call that having hope. But hope without the promise of the inbreaking Spirit, and the LORD'S intervention at every turn, is really no hope at all. If someone had just talked to us through their personal development of theology and materials written from opinion, where would our faith and hope in Christ be? There would be no confidence in the promise. It seems that was only some contrivance of a person. But you and I have the eyewitness of the disciples, and the witness of over 2000 years in the hosts of witnesses who can speak to us about their real experience of the Holy One, Jesus Christ, and their lives have been filled with Christ's promises before the Cross, on the Cross, and after the Cross as He revealed everything about the Love of His Father in heaven for His created children.  But there is more here to that "One Thing" than meets the eye. In Philippians 3 Paul says "One Thing I Do", In Mark 10, Jesus tells the rich young man, "There is One Thing you lack", In Luke 10 Jesus says to Martha when she is so busy around the house, "Only One Thing is needed", and in John 9, the blind man who has been healed by Jesus says "I know One Thing"  That One Thing is the real hope we know through our Savior and Lord.  When David says for "Just that One Thing I have asked" we already know what kind of a man David is in his life. Yes, he is certainly fallible in many ways, but in the tribulations of his life, David is the LORD'S king who leads his people because of the LORD'S steadfast faith in his life.

In your own life do you know what your "One Thing you need, or want, or have already, and for all of us this is the real answer to the whole of our living faith experience?

Thanks for being with me today. I hope that our "One Thing" is always Jesus Christ.

In His Love, with strong hope, Pastor Kim

Pastor's Ponderings: Tuesday Bible Study on Acts of the Apostles 2:42-47 (August 12, 2025)

August 12, 2025:  Tuesday Bible Study on Acts of the Apostles 2:42-47

Blessings, Joy, and Peace be with you on this beautiful desert morning.

I am still praying for some rain in our area of town. I got the car washed this morning after dropping the boys off for school. Sometimes that seems to tempt the rain! Please keep Mark and Linda in your prayers. They are home in Wisconsin where there has been a great deal of heavy rain. For them let's pray that they and their family and friends, as well as their church congregation are all doing OK in that inclement weather. Prayers for Pastor Ron and Becky as they spend their summer in Minnesota. That area of the country has also had some rough weather. Please pray too for Steve and Annette who are on their belated honeymoon. Steve will be coming home to some surgery and likely further tests for his lung health. Please remember that we have last Sunday of the month coffee and donut hour before church at 9AM on the 31st. We will also be doing a HOTDOG picnic for our Gospel Music first Sunday of the month carry-in. The cost will be $1 per person, and the hotdogs will be all beef dinner franks from Costco. Please sign up at church, and bring a picnic dish to share, side dish or dessert. The hot dogs will be grilled on Saturday and warmed at church for the meal. If you need chicken franks instead, please let Pastor know, and add it to the sign-up sheet. Meals like this are part of being the church.

Let's look now in our passage for today at how the earliest church began in Jerusalem.

First, we are told of the great joy which filled the hearts and minds of the newly Baptized, and that the numbers of people who participated grew as the days and months passed. Everyone chipped in, and all were happy to have the opportunity to do so. Some even chose to loosen their lives from the bonds of possessions, using the money from the sale of their belongings to support the new church. The members ate many of their meals together, with everyone helping to bring enough for people to share. You and I see this all the time at our carry-in meals. Goodness, the food is always abundant, and tasty. In fact, it is so good that we all really look forward to sitting down in fellowship, taking time to eat and having wonderful conversations too. The model for these meals is found in the miracles of Christ, and in the Holy Meal of Communion as well. Meals bring us all together in both simple and profound ways, and the health of any congregation is to be found in the simple meal of bread and wine in communion, and in the meal events of the congregation. In both situations we are truly blessed through the living presence of our Savior. Jesus had told Peter that he would be the Rock on which the Church would be built. With few instructions for the physical shape of the Church, it was the content, the joy, the peace, the freedom of being welcomed and loved without judgement that drew people in to become believers. Our invitations for others to come and know the Christ of God who has saved all people, and then to really experience the Holy Hospitality of the believing community, these are the ways in which the Church continues to move forward in its growth.  So often these things are present in a mission congregation. There is the excitement for what is happening through the Spirit and Christ creates a sustaining energy which draws others in. But, every church, new, middle aged, or old should have that very same energy when members gather to celebrate the Living Christ amid His people. Isn't it always easier to be with people who are excited about their lives who are immersed in the Love of the Lord, and whose love isn't some fake on the surface experience, but it is the Love of Christ which fills lives with truly amazing energy, bringing others to know the fullness and power of the presence of the Lord in every moment of every day.  This is what powers the joy we all know. We are set free from the burden of our sin, because Christ has lifted it from our very being, making us right with His Father in Heaven. I can tell you that Melody and I have experienced the greatest Love of Christ through the friends we have known in Christ. And yes, every one of you, are a part of that community, and we have lived having the joy of being the very same kind of people, filled with the compassion and generosity and kindness and love which we have known in Him, and through the hearts of our brothers and sisters in Christ.  We are together, the Body of Christ, the Church! Let's live every day confident in the Savior who calls us to be His people today.

1. In the church it is the Cross of Christ, who has lifted the burdens of everyone through His willing sacrifice for our sin and brokenness.

2. Praying every day is critical in the life of Christ's people in the church.

3. In the church we are caught up in awe and wonder for God's acts of Love for us.

4. The church is where the signs and wonders of Christ's Love are seen and experienced, EVEN TODAY!

5. The church is a community of sharing, where loving assistance is freely given.

6. The church is a worshipping community, gathered often to give praise and thanksgiving to God.

7. The church is a community of happiness and joy; it is our persona in Christ.

8. No matter how well we do in the world, when we live in Christ, and gather in His Name in worship, others discover that there is something about us that they are missing in their own lives! That is because we are the church!

Thank you for letting me share with you this morning. God bless you and hold you in His care.

With Love in Christ, Pastor Kim