The Meyer Minute

The Meyer Minute for October 31, 2011

Today is Reformation Day, a day many Christians remember Martin Luther posting 95 theses on the door of the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany.  Much of Luther’s work reclaimed the simple teaching of Ephesians 2:8-9 – “It is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no one can boast.”

A characteristic of life today is compartmentalization.  For whatever reasons, what we do in one area of our life doesn’t carry over to others.  So we may go to church and hear that forgiveness of sins and eternal life is God’s gift, purely God’s gift, but come Monday morning grace and faith seem far away, irrelevant.  Need not be!  Working with Luther was a scholar named Philip Melanchthon.  About life in the workaday world, the struggles, the frustrations, all that you and I go at again today… Melanchthon wrote, in these God “wills to develop our faith and worship in the midst of our common perils and labors.”  That is, the works that are not easy…who could be saved by our weekday slog?  All this pushes us to grace, pushes us to trust God’s promises.  What you deal with today is why Sunday is relevant.  Happy Reformation!

 

 

The Meyer Minute for October 28, 2011

“Happy Halloween, Pumpkin!” said the card from my mother.  Most appropriate because that’s what she called baby Dale, “pumpkin.”  Could that have been because I was 10 pounds and 24 inches when I was born?

Years ago I worshipped at St. Paul Lutheran Church in Auburn, California.  Auburn is near Sacramento.  Pastor David Poganski included the following in the Sunday bulletin.

“A woman was asked by a coworker, ‘What is it like to be a Christian?’  The coworker replied, ‘It’s like being a pumpkin.  God picks you from the patch, brings you in, and washes all the dirt off of you.  Then He cuts off the top and scoops out all the yucky stuff.  He removes the seeds of doubt, hate, greed, etc., and then He carves you a new smiling face and puts His light inside of you for all the world to see.’”

St. Paul said it this way, “Whoever is a believer in Christ is a new creation.  The old way of living has disappeared.  A new way of living has come into existence.  God has done all this.”  (2 Corinthians 5:17-18)

 

 

 

The Meyer Minute for October 27, 2011

No minute for today

The Meyer Minute for October 26, 2011

The story goes that a Montana sheepherder got sick and was taken to the hospital in Fort Benton.  His sheep dog followed his master to the city and kept watch outside the hospital door.  When the sheepherder died, his body was taken to the train to be shipped back to his family in the east.  The dog, Shep was his name, appeared at the train station, cried for his master and vainly chased the train down the tracks.

For the next five and a half years, Shep met every train that came into Fort Benton, hoping that one of the passengers getting off would be his master.  Shep became well-known and kindly people took care of hi but he refused to be taken to anyone’s home.  He had but one devotin: waiting for his master to return.  Shep’s devotion did not waver until the cold winter day in 1941 when he died. 

It’s a true story and when I read it, I couldn’t help but think, if only I, if only we, could demonstrate that same unwavering devotion to our heavenly Master.  “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”  (Matthew 22:37)  Lord, have mercy.

The Meyer Minute for October 25, 2011

Today Concordia Seminary celebrates the 200^th anniversary of the birth of Dr. C.F.W. Walther.  Born in Germany, October 25, 1811, Dr. Walther immigrated to the United States in 1839.  Walther and his fellow immigrants sought freedom to preach and teach the Bible as the Word of God, something they could not do according to their convictions in Germany.  To that end, Walther and the immigrants established a log cabin school where they could teach the Bible and other necessary subjects to the next generation.  Today that school is known as Concordia Seminary, 173 years old.

Throughout his 76 years, Dr. Walther showed the heart of a pastor and teacher.  He had personally experienced the relevance of the Bible, and he wanted generations after him to be pastors and teachers shaped by God’s Word to share God’s Word.  He once said this to Seminary students, “I wish to talk the Christian doctrine into your very heart, enabling you to come forward as living witnesses with a demonstration of the Spirit and of power.  I do not want you to be standing in your pulpits like lifeless statues, but to speak with confidence and cheerful courage, offering help where help is needed.”  (Law and Gospel, p. 9)  Oh, don’t we need that encouragement today!

 

The Meyer Minute for October 24, 2011

“Difference of religion breeds more quarrels than difference of politics,” said Wendell Philips in 1860.  James I of Great Britain knew that very well.  Riding to London to assume his new throne, a delegation of Puritans met him so that they could be the first to give the new king their view of things.  They didn’t like making the sign of the cross.  They didn’t like certain liturgical vestments.  And they didn’t like wedding rings.  Of course, the religious establishment of the Church of England disagreed.

On this date, October 24^th in 1604, James announced a conference of “bishops and other learned men” to deal with religious issues.  When the conference met the following January, James said, “I assure you we have not called this assembly for any innovation…but…because we have received complaints….our purpose therefore is, like a good physician, to examine and try the complaints.”  (Burke, “Translation that Openeth the Window,” p. 64)  

In fact, one innovation did come out of that conference.  James ordered a new translation of the Bible, what we know as the King James Bible.  Even in religious quarrels the promise of Romans 8:28 is proven true again.  “We know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose.”

 

The Meyer Minute for October 21, 2011

From the Bible’s Second Book of Chronicles:

King Jehoram “did evil in the eyes of the Lord.  He passed away, to no one’s regret, and was buried in the city of David, but not in the tombs of the kings.”  (21:6, 20)

“Because Judah had forsaken the Lord, judgment was executed on (King) Joash.  His officials…killed him in his bed.  So he died and was buried in the city of David, but not in the tombs of the kings.”  (24:24, 25)

King Ahaz “did not do what was right in the eyes of the Lord.  Ahaz rested with his ancestors and was buried in the city of Jerusalem, but he was not placed in the tombs of the kings of Israel.”  (28:1, 27)

King “Amon did evil in the eyes of the Lord.  He did not humble himself before the Lord; Amon increased his guilt.  Amon’s officials…assassinated him.” (33:22-24)

Adolph Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Joseph Stalin, Pol Pot, Saddam Hussein, and now Moamar Qaddafi.

Most Americans don’t take hell seriously.  All roads lead to heaven.  Do we imagine that God did not judge these evil men to hell?  And if God did, what about other evil people?  And if evil does deserve hell, what about the evil in me, in you? 

The Meyer Minute for October 20, 2011

My name is Drew.  I am the newest member of the writing team for the Minute, 7 months old.   Yesterday I flew to St. Louis.  Brought my mommy with.  Why am I in St. Louis?  That’s the subject of my Minute.

I am not here to go to the World Series.  Go, Cardinals, but go without me.  I am here to spend time with my Oma and Opa.  It is interesting to watch how they spend time.  Oma has been waiting for weeks for me to come.  She bought a little stroller.  Today we will walk around the campus.  That is, when I’m not crawling around the house.  Watch me go!  Oma bought me Cardinal clothes.  I like the little red feetie pajamas she got me, of course with the Cardinal logo.  Oma is all about being with me.

Opa is different.  Opa loves me too but Opa has trouble sitting still and just being with people.  He is driven to work.  I can see when he is struggling.  This is family, he thinks.  I should love this time while I can.  But Opa’s so used to working that it’s hard to sit still.  Do any of you big people know that problem?  Do you shortchange your family because of work?

 

The Meyer Minute for October 18, 2011

Last evening Dr. Stanley Hauerwas delivered the annual Carondelet Lecture at Fontbonne University in St. Louis.  Professor of theological ethics at the Divinity School of Duke University, Dr. Hauerwas spoke about disability.  The term itself is problematic, that we should label other people “disabled” all the while assuming that we are 100% able.  The term “vulnerable” is no better. 

Dr. Hauerwas said prevailing societal attitudes toward suffering are terribly flawed. “We now want to believe that whatever besets us is purposeless.  And so we ask physicians to relieve us.”  “We must eliminate suffering,” popular thinking goes, “to get on with being human.”  So we look at suffering as a medical problem to be eliminated, and thereby we open the door to a terrifying totalitarianism.

That suffering has no purpose leads us away from love, from giving of ourselves to others in community.  “Suffering,” he said, “is God-given as an outreach to God’s love.”  So whether it’s our attitudes toward the, quote, “disabled,” or other trials of your day, “suffering,” he said, “is God-given as an outreach to God’s love.”

Good theology opens our minds to see that we are all dependent creatures.  Dr. Hauerwas said, “Today people believe an inadequately trained priest cannot harm you but an inadequately trained physician can.”  That’s scary.

The Meyer Minute for October 17, 2011

Pundits had speculated that Mitt Romney’s Mormon faith would become a campaign issue.  I wrote about it last week.  Yesterday’s New York Times ran a story about it on the first page.

“God moves in mysterious ways His wonders to perform.”  Yesterday’s Old Testament lesson was from Isaiah 45, God’s words to the Persian king Cyrus.  Cyrus ruled in the 6^th century B.C.  He was not an Israelite, obviously not a Christian.  But what did God say to him?  “I have taken hold of your right hand to help you capture nations and remove kings from power.  I will give you treasures hidden in dark and secret places.  Then you will know that I, the Lord God of Israel; have called you by name.  Cyrus, you don’t even know Me!  But I have called you by name and highly honored you because of Israel, My chosen servant.”  (45:1, 3-4)

Cyrus the non-believer released the Israelites from their captivity in Babylon.  Jesus teaches, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s; and to God the things that are God’s.” (Matthew 22:21)  Cyrus, Caesar, presidents…God mysteriously uses them all for His purposes.

Sometimes something happens in church that fits real life.  Yesterday was like that.  We’re trying to teach our students to do that every Sunday.