Month: August 2017

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PWTE Daily Devotion

What Do You Mean It’s Not about Me?

Dueling Hummingbirds, Colorado Springs, Colorado
by Rev Douglas Brauner

Making room for each other in the Christian Community.

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

“All of Moses’ Teachings are summarized in a single statement, ‘Love your neighbor as you love yourself.’ But if you criticize and attack each other, be careful that you don’t destroy each other.
Galatians 5:14-15 God’s Word to the Nations

It would seem that these two hummingbirds are gracefully approaching the feeder to share a meal together. There are five holes through which these birds could drink of their sweet nectar. There was more than enough room for them at the dining table. They could even rest their wings while perching on the feeder to make the experience more enjoyable.

Dueling Hummingbirds, Colorado Springs, Colorado

What could be better than joining your friends in a leisurely meal?

Instead of enjoying a late afternoon meal with each other, these two birds flew at each other trying to keep the other bird from drinking. Two other buddies, not pictured, were doing the same thing. As soon as one bird stuck its beak in the hole another bird would dive bomb it, driving it from the much-needed nourishment.

They expended more energy in keeping each other from eating than they received from the sugar-water.

Paul warns us against such behavior. When we forget the command to love each other as we love ourselves, when we bite and devour each other, we’re committing community suicide. There is no community, Christian or non-Christian, that can survive ongoing personal attacks, insults, and abuses.

Instead of biting and devouring each other, our call in Christ is to love, support, and nourish each other even when that is difficult to do. We have not been called by the Holy Spirit through gospel to think only of ourselves, but to live for each other and for the community. Instead of chasing each other away from the nourishment of God’s Word, we carry each other to that Word. We make room for each other.

Gracious Lord, as you have called us to experience your compassion, may we be instruments of love so that others receive nourishment from you. Amen.

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado

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PWTE Daily Devotion

A Cold Reception

by Rev Steve Nickodemus

Refusing to Give Up.

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

“Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” Romans 12:21

If you have ever been to the Oregon coast, and tried wading in the water, you know how cold that water is!  When kids first put their toes in they scream with the shock of the frigid temperature, and the surprise at that first cold encounter.

Yet again and again the children rush back into the water yelling, jumping, and laughing, until they begin to overcome that first shock, and they actually begin to enjoy the encounter.  What started out as a painful meeting ends in fond memories.

Isn’t that so often true in our encounters with difficult people in our lives?  In our first encounter with them, we may experience them as angry, reactive, negative, and even downright mean.  We may jump back in emotional pain, and reaction, to them meeting our good will with such venom.

Then we get to make a decision.  Will we continue to love that person, with that stubborn love our Lord Jesus has for us, or will we run away and avoid them?  Will we continue to pray for them, and love them as Jesus loves us, or will we sit afar off on the beach and sulk in our hurt feelings?

The Lord Jesus has loved us, and overcome our stubborn sin and rebelliousness against Him, how shall we do any less?  As we learn to love those who are difficult, we may experience a “strange warming,” even a delight in overcoming evil with the goodness of God.  Our Heavenly Father desires that all would come to know His truth, and be saved. Even the difficult people we encounter.

Dear Lord, grant me faith and stubborn love in caring for those who meet me with coldness.  Warm up my heart, and theirs, that they too might experience the love of Jesus in their lives. Amen.

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado

Categories
PWTE Daily Devotion

A New Song

by Rev. Steve Nickodemus

The Old Order Has Passed Away.

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link.

“He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God.”
Psalm 40:3a

Marvin and Mike came to the little house, where my Mom and Dad lived for the last 30 years of their life, and moved my Mom’s piano out.  The beautiful Steinway is going to my youngest sister’s house and will make beautiful music there.

However, it is the end of an era of my Mom playing that piano, all of us in the extended family singing Christmas carols, and the house being full of music, songs, and laughter.  As the moving truck drove away I could not get the words out of my head, “The day the music died.”  Mom and her gift of music is gone from my sight,  and I grieve.

Soon, and very soon, I will be singing a new song along with Mom and all the saints.  “There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.  He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!”” (Revelation 21:4-5)  The Lord Jesus has risen from the dead, and I too will rise with Him.  There will be a new heaven, a new earth, and a new song!

When we sang together as a family, we sang a song of faith, a song of joy in spite of pain, sorrow, sin, and death.  In heaven, all of us in God’s family will sing, not looking forward to that which is to come, but in the eternal present reality of being with Jesus forever.  There will be no more goodbyes, and no more tears, only a forever hymn of praise that never ends.  Hallelujah!  Mom and Dad, that time is coming soon, and the circle will be unbroken…

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado