searching

search

Google.  Bing. Yahoo.  We search. We are searching all the time.  For recipes.  For answers to questions.  For knowledge.  For news.  For images. For friendships.  We are searching in a new way today, using amazing tools that give us access to an ever-expanding world of information.  We are searching.  What we find may or may not be what we are looking for. We find what is out there, because when we search something inevitably pops up.  All of us have searched for a thing and found something else. We are aware that one must be careful what one searches for, lest you get something you don't want to find.
I read a story about searching this morning.  It is a bible story.  From the Gospel of Luke, New Testament.  It is the only story in the New Testament that features neither an infant nor an adult Jesus. It features a 12-year-old Jesus and his parents, Mary and Joseph.  They have gone up to Jerusalem for the Passover festival.  Passover is the cultural and religious festival celebrating that story of Jewish liberation from Egyptian slavery recorded in the Hebrew Scriptures, book of Exodus.  It is the story of Moses, the ancestral God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (YHWH, by Hebrew name), the Egyptian Pharaoh, and the enslaved people of Israel.  It is a story of political power and a coup d d'etat, through which GOD overcomes the power of Pharaoh and liberates His people.  It is the story of God's compassion for an oppressed people and their release.  They become refugees and asylum-seekers. They spend 40 years in the wilderness before occupying the land of Canaan, where Israel is established through war.  The Passover story is the heart of Jewish faith, believing in the liberating compassion of GOD for God's people.

gun violence and the common good

I have said nothing about the gun violence issue. I am not a gun owner. I don't believe I will ever own a gun. I don't think I need one. I do not hunt. I do not participate in shooting sports. I trust the police for my protection. I've never been robbed. I'm not afraid.
Since the public consciousness has been reawakened by the shooting of children in an elementary school in Connecticut, a debate has ensued. I have stayed out of it. I have an opinion like everyone else, but I'm not sure it matters all that much. As a Pastor, I have not used the pulpit to address the issue. But I am glad that I am part of a church with leaders who are speaking to it. There was a rally in the state capitol in Harrisburg last week about gun violence and one of the Bishop's in our region (Claire Burket, Southeastern PA synod) was a speaker. I am glad she was there. Her faith compelled her to speak out against gun violence and in favor of increased government regulations to reduce it in PA.
Here's my two cents today. Gun violence is a problem in this country. I don't think there is one solution that will satisfy and eliminate it. I'm concerned about guns. But I am equally as concerned about violence. What causes it? How can we reduce/prevent it in civil society? The peoples' right to own firearms is protected in the Constitution. This freedom comes with a tremendous cost, as do all freedoms. One of the costs is the possibility that people will die a violent death at the hand of a lawful gun owner. We must count the costs as a nation. Thousands of people die by gun fire in the U.S. every year. When two dozen children are slaughtered in a first grade classroom in a small town, everyone pays attention. I am the father of a first grader. I wept for those families who lost children in the week before Christmas.