Pastor's Ponderings: Old Testament bible study of Psalm 22:1-18 (June 26, 2025)

June 26, 2025:  Thursday Bible Study on Old Testament of Psalm 22:1-18

May the loving presence of Jesus Christ which surrounds all of us, fill you with hope each day.

This morning please keep Henry in your prayers. He is in the hospital for emergency surgery. He is a handyman who has done work for us at the church in the past. Right now, he needs to know how Christ surrounds his every breath in this difficult time. Offer a prayer of joy and celebration for our son Jesse. He has been looking for work for six months. Yesterday he got hired at the new Burlington store which is on the SE corner of Broadway and Kolb. He starts on Monday part time. He is really excited. Now prayers for our Josiah who is also in need of a job, and some energy in his search and applications. Reminder Sunday at 9Am is our donut, pastry, and fellowship hour before church. This week we will be in the parish hall. I will see you there. There will be an alternative veggie tray for those who need to be careful with their sugar levels. Also, tomorrow, Foodies of Faith will have lunch at IHOP on 22nd street at 11:30.

Today we begin our Bible study on the 22nd Psalm, verses 1-18.

Right at the beginning of this Psalm we read very familiar words of frustration, and perhaps even fear. "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?"  Words of Christ from the Cross on Good Friday ring in our ears. We are uncomfortable with them because our Savior speaks to them in pain and suffering, and we have read them before on the previous Sunday, which is called the Passion of Christ, or more commonly Palm Sunday. We are excited by Christ's triumphant entry into the heart of Jerusalem, and the LORD'S seat in the Holy of Holies in the Temple. But like David as he writes this Psalm, there are obviously signs of David's doubts about how God is handling things in David's kingship. Questions abound in the first part of this Psalm.  At the end of today's passage in verse 18 we read the words about the dividing of the clothing, so isn't this a prophecy about what is coming for Jesus in the distant future? I don't think it hurts anything if that is how you want to view this, but it might be better if we see in this Psalm, a devastating prayer for the faithful ones, who wonder why God has not acted when in the past He has been so close, and His strength has carried the Jewish community forward in the worst of times.  We need to remember that there were certainly worse times than those of David's life. The exiles of the North (Israel), and the later exile of the South (Judah and Jerusalem) were times of great terror and loss as Israel succumbs to her enemies. What we must always remember - no matter how devastating a time in our lives becomes, God is present, but in His Wisdom has chosen to not act in the ways that we have seen him act in the past. It makes great good sense when we realize that even in the mouth of Christ, our Savior must suffer and die if our sins are to be forgiven, and the healing of all of God's creation is to move forward. All of this may not be the answer that we are praying for, yet we must always acknowledge, God is ultimately right, and present with His children all the time. There is a God-plan for creation, and sometimes when we who are His children really mess things up, that God-plan must be adjusted to accommodate our errors and mistakes. In Christ's perfection He followed God's plan faithfully and completely, but it doesn't mean that it was easy. Suffering for the sins of the whole of creation could never be easy! Obviously, David would seem to be in a time in his own life when these words are offered out of his sense of the Father-Creator's choosing to act in ways that David is having trouble understanding. You and I need to realize that each of our lives is intimately a part of God's Great Plan for His Creation. His way is always the right way! We are the ones who must come time, and again, seeking the LORD'S forgiveness for moving against that plan, even when we don't have any way to see the fullness of His God-plan, and are called on to live in faith, sometimes wondering how our loving God can choose to not act as He has in the past.  Jesus, on the day of His Crucifixion, knows Psalm 22 very well, and finds its words right in the moments of His death. When life goes wrong, God is still always eternally in charge of everything.

With love in Christ, Pastor Kim

Pastor's Ponderings: Tuesday Bible Study on Paul’s letter, 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13 (June 24, 2025)

June 24, 2025:  Tuesday Bible Study on Paul’s letter – 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13

May Christ's Peace and Power, filled with compassion, be in, with, and around you today.

Please continue the prayer requests from yesterday, and a reminder that this Sunday we will have coffee, donuts, and juice fellowship hour before worship at 9AM in the parish hall. I hope that you will be able to join us. At this time, our sign-up list for those who will provide donuts and pastries is complete. Please continue to keep Tricia Don in your regular prayers as she receives therapy for her cancer. She is having some difficult days. This Friday our Foodies of Faith will be going out to the IHOP on 22nd Street at 11:30. It is east of Alvernon, about 4 blocks on the south side of the street. Call the office by Thursday morning if you want to be added to the list. (520-623-3661) This will give us the opportunity to have the right number of seats set up for lunch. Our July Journeys newsletter will be out this coming Sunday, so be sure to check your computer, or pick one up in the narthex at church. If you have not signed up yet for our July 6th carry-in lunch, please take the time to sign up at church, or call the office to get on the list. This July's meal theme is "The Great American Picnic". I hope to see you all there.

Today in 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13, we do not have a prayer commitment from Paul for this new church, or a request by Paul to have regular prayers offered on behalf of his ministry in its future work. Instead in our reading for today, Paul is telling the reader of this part of his letter that there are apparently a few problems in this new church community. The key word here is community. His concern is for the harmony that should exist in Christ, and yet that harmony breaks down sometimes. Or as Paul puts it, "Some People are stepping out of line". Perhaps our modern way of speaking would be to call them slackers.

Let's move now to speak about ballet! You might be asking what that has to do with what's happening in Thessalonica? I will get there. When our son Joshua, who is now 40 was in middle school and high school, he became deeply committed to dancing in a ballet troupe, practicing 5, sometimes 6 days every week, nearly every free moment that he had. I must admit I was indifferent about it initially. But watching practices and going to performances I became much more intrigued. Joshua was amazing! His posture, positions in different dances, and his leaps were incredible. However, I also noticed something else. There were some members of the troupe who did not have the same commitment to the troupe as Joshua did. Their dancing was lackluster, their timing was often not quite right, and you could see in them that it was being done because someone else had been forcing their practice and work. There certainly were times when Joshua's ballet team members really pulled every move, and its timing, and its beauty together. Those dances were amazing, but when someone who was not committed was on stage, it really drew the audience’s attention away from the integrity of the ballet performance. This is where we reconnect to Paul's concern in the church of the Thessalonians. There were so many who were completely committed to their new relationship with Christ, and to the gathered community, each providing from their resources of food and labor and money, the care for the entire community. But what did it look like from the outside, when some members were just kind of coasting along in their faith journey and were taking advantage of the gentle hospitality of the rest of the community. From this reading we discover that the community gathered around agape meals where everyone contributed in some way, yet there were those who came to take advantage. Paul tells them that if they do not work, they do not eat! In those few people, viewed by others, the picture of Christian harmony and love was incomplete in some ways. You might ask, well does that mean that the aged, the infirm, the challenged, there was not to be care? Absolutely not! Those members, the weaker ones, were always to be cared for, and they are still to be cared for today. But, the "slackers" who shared nothing of their time, talents, and resources to support the Body of Christ the Church, they were to be encouraged, and if there was no change, to be disciplined by the church's members and leaders.

Paul finished this section with an imperative, a command. "Do what is right"  Though it may be our brothers and sisters who see some members getting caught up in that "slacker" mind set, it is God who sees and knows, and judges with forgiveness the ones who have had that metanoia of the heart and mind which brings the tender change of Christ's love to all the aspects of the believers life.  Let's be honest with each other, in our world, just like it was in the world of the Thessalonians, "doing what is right", is difficult, and requires our openness to the Spirit's daily presence so that we too can find the strength, courage, and faith to have changed hearts and minds for Christ's way in our lives. 

May God bless you today, and always, 

In Christ's love, Pastor Kim

Pastor's Ponderings: Monday Bible Study on Paul’s letter, 2 Thessalonians 3:1-5 (June 23, 2025)

June 23, 2025:  Monday Bible Study on Paul’s letter – 2 Thessalonians 3:1-5

May our God of all hopefulness surround us all with his comfort, peace, and love today, and always.

Please pray for our members who have had pet incidents over the weekend. Pray for Sharyn and her family as her long-time pit bull, who grew up with her miniature dachshund, for some reason went after the dachshund causing her to need 16 stitches. Thankfully, this was all a skin wound. Pray too for Teri whose little dog went out at night before going to bed and on her outing was bitten by a rattler. She has been in emergency vet care since, and is supposed to be coming home today, and please pray for Sue whose eye surgery is slow in its recovery, and not at all what she expected for improvement of her vision quality. Of course, other prayers are needed as our government continues to make decisions about involvement in the war between Israel and Iran. Pray for clear thinking, and for safety for the men and women of our military who are on bases in the surrounding area. In all this worldly military action let us pray for the heart of Christ to be present in our decision makers, and for the faithful in other communities of world faith to be guided by the hope for peace that their religions call for in their own lives. 

Today we continue in Paul's second letter to the church in Thessalonica. In our passage for today 3:1-5, Paul requests prayer support from the new Christians there, indicating that not every community in which he has visited has been receptive to the Good News about the Savior of the world. It is obvious that Paul's journeys have not been as easy as we might be led to believe from other studies, but what really shines through for the letter recipients, and us, is that Paul places his full trust in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who has chosen in Paul's time to bring His Son to  pay the price for the sins of the world.  We have all had frustrating dreams, in fact they are a nightly occurrence for me. I find myself somewhere where I have been in the past, but things have changed, and I am unable to get to where I need to be. Imagine if in all our dreams we were unburdened by that "getting lost" feeling and set free to move about with confidence. In Paul's request for prayers in this passage, he is really asking that others who have yet to have the Word of God, and the teaching about His Son, set their hearts free from the burden of their sin, bringing newfound joy to their lives because the God of all things truly loves them beyond belief.  In fact, here in this request for Thessalonian prayers we discover that the conversion or these new Christians has been wonderful, surprising, and joyful beyond Paul's dream of spreading this great Good News. Obviously, in this passage Paul has been, and will be, faced with persecutors, the ones that he names as evil people, so his prayer request is that God keep him safe from the enemies of the Gospel. In our small congregation it is too easy to focus on attendance, budget, and property issues, just like it was easier for the new church to focus on persecution and staying quiet about the life-giving presence of Jesus. Paul tells us that we must always, first and foremost, focus on Jesus, knowing that His Love will always carry us, even in the most difficult times. Thanks for being with me today.

With the Love of Christ behind, before, and around us at all times, Pastor Kim