Mail Archive of the old Santa Clara Valley Lutheran Parish

I adjure you by the Lord that this letter be read to all the brethren. (Thessalonians 5:27)
Subject: Devotion for November 13
Date: Fri, 12 Nov 2010 10:46:03 -0800 (PST)
From: David Bonde <pastorbonde@gmail.com>
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Date: Fri, 12 Nov 2010 10:46:03 -0800 (PST)
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Subject: Devotion for November 13
From: David Bonde <pastorbonde@gmail.com>
To: SCVLP <scvlp@googlegroups.com>
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This devotion is written for the congregation as the lead to our
annual report this year.  I thought it lost something when I tried to
delete the references to our congregational life, so I am giving it to
you as I gave it to the congregation.

---

Some years ago I was sitting at a kitchen table visiting with a family
at the death of their father.  It was the year after Anna had been
killed, so we sat around that table, cradling coffee mugs, not as a
religious leader with answers to give, but as fellow travelers on one
of the painful roads of life.  There, at that table, one of the
daughters unburdened her own story of her family out riding bicycles
with their toddler in a bicycle seat on the back, helmets on, enjoying
the warm summer day, when a car veered off the road, struck her, and
killed her child.  There are no answers for such things, only the
shared wounds of a broken world where the incomprehensible happens,
and where death stalks us all.

But there is more than shared wounds, we were sitting at that table as
people who had heard a message that the grave was open, the crucified
one risen.  The ache of grief is not our inheritance; God has promised
grace and life for the world.

Congregations are funny things.  As any collection of human beings, we
are communities with all the usual human failings.  We can be petty.
We gossip.  We get territorial over stuff.  We gripe.  We
pontificate.  We are afraid.  We are jealous.  It=92s the nature of the
human beast.  But we can also be kind and generous.  We weep for one
another, pray for one another, visit one another, care for one
another.  That, too, is the nature of the human creature.

There is a lot of pressure for the church to be a meaningful social
agency in the community: to have healthy programs for youth, for
families, for seniors; to help the homeless, to feed the hungry, to
contribute to those in need, to visit the sick; to have vibrant
worship, inspiring preaching and good coffee.  But the truth is we are
ultimately a community gathered around the kitchen table sharing the
story of an empty tomb, a Holy Spirit, and the healing of the world
that has already begun.

There have been a lot of good things that have happened here in
2009-2010 =96 the first steps in implementing the new mission statement,
the gifts for the playground, the preparations to build that
playground, the preparations to be able to host a school, the initial
work on a long range vision for our building and the brainstorming on
our organizational structure.

There has also been sadness: some who have died, some who have moved
away, some who have been injured or ill.

And there have been new people participating in the life of our
community, participating in worship, attending activities,
participating in Bible studies.

I thank those who have contributed so much of their time and energy to
our life together =96 I wish I could name them all.  And I also thank
those whose work of witness, whose acts of kindness, whose prayers for
others are hidden from view but are no less valuable to our life
together.  But in the midst of all this, my job is above all to remind
us that we are not just an organization with a people and a program,
but a community with a story to tell: heaven has touched earth in
Jesus and our healing has begun.

Pastor Bonde
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