Vicissitudes

One of the things that struck me within the first few months of going away to college was how frequently a day or week could cycle. What I mean by cycle is looking back over a certain period and being amazed at the number of highs and lows in that time frame. Perhaps it was having left the comfort and stability of the home I’d known for eighteen years and now having to sort through these things by myself that made the highs and lows that much more stark. I’m certain they’d always been there.

These thoughts back to me as I was reflecting on the past weekend. At our worship services we rejoiced in the news that Aaron and Haley Hickey would be joining our fellowship with Aaron becoming our associate pastor. During those same services we bid farewell and Godspeed to Jen Roettjer as she was leaving to serve at another church in Huntsville, Alabama, after having spent the last seven years in ministry here at Redeemer.

Even this morning is an example. It was a good start to the day: great exercise on a beautiful morning! But I’ve just gotten off the phone, learning the news of the death of a young lady, twenty-five years of age. Funeral planning will take place very shortly.

It is the constant message that “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever” (Hebrews 13:8) that helps keeps things in perspective in any given day, week, or year. This is the Savior Who loved us so much that He willingly took our place in condemnation. This is the Savior Who is victor over death, itself. He is the rock on which life is to be built – an ever-present help in trouble.

God grant you peace, whatever it is that this day has in store for you.

Spring, 2021

Winter has always been my favorite season, followed by autumn. But I find myself excited about this spring more than usual. Of course ,spring always brings with it a sense of rebirth, with signs of renewal throughout the countryside. On the farms planting is taking place, along with calving and lambing. Plants and trees are budding, their fragrances filling the air.

But with this spring of 2021 there are even more new things coming our way. As a congregation we have the seminary call service, tonight, during which we will learn who our new associate pastor will be. For the community of Peoria it seems that along with the rest of the country things are opening up and people are a bit more optimistic, health-wise, with vaccinations taking place at a good clip. On a personal note, Jami and I are awaiting the birth of another grandson in about a month.

Many are the reasons for thanksgiving this spring. Thank you, Lord.

Remembering Good Friday

Here is a quote from G. K. Chesterton regarding Good Friday’s wonder:

Endless expositions have not come to the end of it, or even to the beginning. And if there be any sound that can produce a silence, we may surely be silent about the end and the extremity; when a cry was driven out of that darkness in words dreadfully distinct and dreadfully unintelligible, which man shall never understand in all the eternity they have purchased for him; and for one annihilating instant an abyss that is not for our thoughts had opened even in the unity of the absolute; and God had been forsaken of God."

– G.K. Chesterton ("The Strangest Story in the World," The Everlasting Man)