Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Well.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Extending a caring prayer quilt is one of our churches
many caring ministries.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
This is Bill Greg. Bill Greg received the first.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
Prayer quilt almost nineteen years ago and hundreds of quilt
have been given as a tangible symbol that we are in.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
This thing called life together. We're in it together, and
we care.
Speaker 2 (00:49):
Because God cares. This last week, Pastor Jackie and I
met with the family of John Miller. Many of you
do not know John, but John has been a member
of this church for ten years, and quite a bit
(01:12):
of that time. He's been worshiping in the last recent
years with us online. And he passed away last week
and so a week from today, next Sunday afternoon, we'll
be having his memorial service here. And as we were
talking about how that should look and what should be
included in it, the whole question of the quilt came up,
(01:37):
and Carol said, Pastor Lining, he's been cremated with the quilt.
He would never give it up. It was so important
to him in all that he had gone through. And
so this morning, in a way, figuratively, I would like to.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
Create a kind of quilt. Perhaps you could think of.
Speaker 2 (02:08):
It as a tapestry, a tapestry and a quilt for
our congregation of words from Scripture to embrace and cover ourselves.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
In tough times. Because we're in tough times.
Speaker 2 (02:35):
And as we come together this morning, with all that
has been going on and continues to go on, we're
carrying weight. Regardless of your political persuasion.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
The tragic and violent death of Charlie Kirk. It leaves
us shocked.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
And not only shocked, maybe a bit fearful. For many
of us, it feels too close. It's so raw. Some
of you told me that this last week, how the
dynamic of our time has stirred up old griefs that
you've been harboring. Others have talked about the heaviness of
(03:29):
living in a world where something like this can happen.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
And has happened far too often. So one thing I
don't want to do. I don't want to ignore it.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
And rush us past the pain. I think we need
to recognize it, be honest about where we are, and
at the same time.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
To remember.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
What God has to say to us in his word
about the emotional dynamics that's present today, violence, fear, justice,
and hope.
Speaker 1 (04:32):
What does God have to say about that.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
We heard the remarkable reading that Eddy you did of
Psalm forty six, and it reminded us that God is
our refuge and strength, a very present help and trouble.
Speaker 1 (04:56):
Therefore, I will not fear. What a promise.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
Now, when you look at that, you gotta take it
very literally. There, it's not denial of the dynamic. It
is the defiance of it. The defiance of it. It
is saying, even though the ground is shaking under.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Me, I will not let fear be my master no way.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
And that theme, my friends, is throughout the scriptures and Romans.
The Apostle Paul said, do not repay anyone evil for evil, okay,
and do not take revenge the word of God.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
It's hard, isn't it. But it's the word of God.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
It's hard because everything in us we want payback. But
Jesus shows us another way, and it is a way
of trusting our future. Two of all things, the sovereignty
of God. How sovereign will you allow God to be
(06:27):
in your life, in your world, in our land?
Speaker 1 (06:35):
How big is God? How big is your God? I
was thinking about that. My mind goes back.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
To It would have been about twenty three years ago.
We're at a movie theater. And after a few months,
this group of people that didn't have any real reces sources,
nothing really, we acquired thirty two acres this campus.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
And I before we acquired the.
Speaker 4 (07:11):
Acreage, I met with the city planner, Harlan kikred Beard,
And one concern we had was the journal, Milwaukee Journal
had a feature article on how the city of Milwaukee
had just turned down a rezoning request by the Presbyterian
(07:33):
Church who had been meeting in a school for a
number of years, and they bought land and they were
wanting to have it rezoned, and they turned them down,
and they left.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
And so my meeting with the city was with the
new kid on the block. So I just wanted to
meet with you, Harln. I read the article, how steadfast
is the city on rezoning.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
I'll never forget his response.
Speaker 2 (08:02):
He said, well, Pastor, it all depends on how big
your God is.
Speaker 1 (08:10):
I did not expect that.
Speaker 2 (08:12):
Now he's a Christian christ follower, but still the city
had a history of you know what, they said, we
do not need any more churches.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
Can you imagine? That was the line.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
So about six months after that meeting, we acquire the property.
Speaker 1 (08:31):
I go back to city hall. I meet with Harlan.
I said, hey, we we.
Speaker 2 (08:37):
Just bought thirty two acres. You what, I hope you
have a contingency on that. I said, absolutely not. Whether
we can use it or not.
Speaker 1 (08:49):
It's ours. And so Harlan, you said it all matters
depends on how big God is. So I think God's
pretty big, don't you. And it took eighteen months, and
they wanted to.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
Give us a conditional use so we could use it,
but still be at the decision whether they want a
church said no, it's going to be a result.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
God is big to me. That was the thing saying,
you know, God is big.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
The sovereignty of God is at play violence. We take
it how we're going. The times we're going through today
may take innocent lives, but violence does not.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Have to take our hearts. It doesn't have to do that.
In times like these, you know, rumors.
Speaker 2 (09:45):
Spread fast, half truths, angey, angry words. And we live
in a time where people will tweet before they.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
Think, they will post before they pray, and they will comment.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
Before they are still and realize that God is here
before they breathe. But the Bible I read says cool,
your gents, slow down, James remind us be quick to listen,
(10:25):
not to talk, slow to speak, and slow to become angry.
Does it say don't get angry? Else your apulsive be angry,
but don't sin. There's a place for the right kind
of anger, but not when it makes you do.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
The same wrong.
Speaker 2 (10:42):
And I want to underscore what says here in James
in that last sentence, human anger does not produce the
righteousness that God desires. Okay, be weary of the angry
person who has a plan. And then this tapestry we're building.
(11:06):
Jesus also said this.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
We've heard it many times.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Blessed are the the underscore peace makers, for they.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
They're God's kids.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
Now, note the word peace maker, it doesn't say peace keeper.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
There is a difference. We don't keep peace. How can
you keep that? We make it? We make it by
being engaged.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
And that is our mission as a community of christ
followers and all things.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
That really takes courage. It does.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
It means stepping into broken spaces and in the midst
of the broken space saying.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
There is a better way here, gang, there's a better way.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
Because we're just repeating the same thing over and over again.
Speaker 1 (12:09):
That's insanity. And yet we live in.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
The tension of the harsh future reality that Jesus underscored
where he said, hey, gang, in this world, you are
going to have trouble.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
It's not going to end. You're going to have trouble.
But take heart, for I have overcome the world. That's
the stuff starts a movement.
Speaker 2 (12:51):
I wish Jesus would have said, maybe you'll have trouble,
maybe you might.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
Dodge it, but no, that's a promise.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
I'm sorry, and we're all going to go through it,
but we're not going to be alone in it. It's
a promise. But however, violence and loss and even death itself.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
They don't get the last word.
Speaker 2 (13:29):
If God is sovereign, and if we believe in this
project that God has been doing since the creation of
the world.
Speaker 1 (13:42):
For your pastor.
Speaker 2 (13:45):
Recent days, they have been like an extended Good Friday
of Holy Week, just hanging out in the darkness.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
Of what happened on.
Speaker 2 (14:01):
The cross, not the empty cross, but what we look
at on Good Friday, the agony, the darkness. And I
also was thinking, here's that line, it's Friday, but Sunday's coming.
(14:29):
I've got to hang out on Friday for a little bit,
but I also have to have my eyes on Sunday.
Sunday is coming, and where is all of this taking us.
Let's go to the last book in the Bible. It
sums it up pretty well. In the twenty first chapter
of Revelation. It says God will wipe away every tier.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
Let's let God do it.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
There will be no more death, there will be no
more mourning or crying or pain for the old order
of things. They're gone, they are gone, they have passed away.
Speaker 1 (15:13):
That's where the story is heading. Right now.
Speaker 5 (15:17):
We grieve, we grieve, but one day, one day, every
broken thing, by God's word, it will be made whole.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
And so we pray for.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
All victims, for their spouses, their children, and to pray
for the silence in their home that feels unbearable. Right
(16:00):
now it must feel unbearable, and the the haunting.
Speaker 1 (16:11):
Can come back. Every violent shooting, every.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
Death of it brings the ghost back.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
So you may not know this, but my wife's father
he died.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
He was assassinated for political reasons. He was shot in
the back as he was leading a revolution against a dictatorship.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
And all my wife has.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
His old movie films and tattered art articles on her father.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
There is, there is, and.
Speaker 2 (16:57):
On the right procession the main city of Leone, going
to the largest cathedral in Central America. Thousands of people there,
marching for his funeral. So, friends, a lot of people
are crying, a lot of people hurt, and just as
others we've heard about, here's mom with nine brothers and
(17:22):
sisters left behind, and the baby in her lap wasn't
even born yet before his father was killed. It's not
a republican problem. It's not a democratic problem.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
It's a sin.
Speaker 2 (17:46):
Problem, a sin problem, and we need to call that
out as a people of God.
Speaker 1 (17:59):
For what does it say in the scriptures the wages
of sin? It is death?
Speaker 2 (18:07):
So what's going to rule your life? Because the scriptures
continue to declare for the wages of sin is death.
The gift of God.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
Is life. So we refuse, as.
Speaker 2 (18:24):
A community of Christ followers to let hatred and despair
plant roots in our hearts. Because God is doing a
new thing, because Sunday's coming. We are even in the
(18:50):
month of September. We're an Easter people. We're an Easter
people pause every year during Holy Week to recall what
it takes to be an Easter people. But Friday is
not going to define me, and I hope it will
not define you.
Speaker 1 (19:11):
We are people of justice.
Speaker 2 (19:13):
We are a people of mercy, and we are a
people of hope and resurrection.
Speaker 1 (19:18):
People. They are to shine.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
As lights in the darkness, not because the darkness isn't real,
because the darkness is real, Gang, but we shine because
Christ is greater, greater. Would you please stand, let us
(19:44):
pray together before we have our concluding him By Heaveny Father.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
We come before you.
Speaker 2 (19:58):
As men and women who long for your wisdom, for
your peace, and your healing hand in the face of
violence and division. Our hearts are heavy, and we confess
(20:21):
that we don't always understand why these things happen.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
But we know that you are sovereign and you are
near to the broken hearted.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
So Lord, we uplift everyone affected, the families, the friends,
the communities who are shaken. We ask for healing of
wounds seen and unseen, but anchored in Christ. Strengthen us
(21:00):
to be leaders who model compassion without compromise, and who
do so by walking humbly with you, and remind us
that in Christ, the darkness will never overcome the light.
Speaker 1 (21:26):
Amen.