Peter Didn't Want Him to Go

Scripture Lessons: Exodus 24: 12-18 and Matthew 17: 1-9 Sermon Title: Peter Didn’t Want Him to Go Preached on February 19, 2023 Many of you know Robert Hay, Jr. He is a child of this church who now works for the Presbyterian Foundation, a financial institution that serves Presbyterian Churches throughout the Southeast and helps them finance building campaigns or plan for their next stewardship seasons. He is also one of Rev. Robert Hay, Sr.’s two sons. Many of you know Robert Hay, Sr. He was an associate pastor here, working with our youth group for several years back in the 1990’s. If I were to name the top five people who shaped and changed me so that I became the person I am today, Rev. Robert Hay, Sr. would be at the top of that list because of the influence he had on me while I was in this church’s youth group. That’s what I was telling a man sitting next to me a few years ago at a conference that Robert Hay, Jr. and I were both attending. I wanted this man to know how Robert and I knew each other and that we’ve known each other for a long time. Then Robert said, to introduce me to this man, “If we were to look back on that time and name the top five kids from that youth group who we thought were least likely to become Presbyterian ministers, I’m not saying that Joe would be at the top of that list, but he would certainly be in the top five.” Now, how could I go from Robert’s list of the top five least likely to become Presbyterian ministers to becoming one? Well, people change. I’ve changed. You’ve changed. The revival in Kentucky happening right now reminds me that God acts in our lives, and if we step out in faith, we may move away from the people we were and toward the people we’re called to be. Remember, though, not everyone wants us to go. It’s been said by old country preachers that “God loves you as you are, but God loves you too much to want you to remain as you are.” God’s love calls us to change. God loves us too much to allow us to stay right where we are, and this morning I want to preach about the problem this change causes in our relationships, for the minute we start changing, we often hit a wall in the form of people who are afraid they’ll lose us if we change. I remember Rev. Robert Hay, Sr. once saying that sometimes for high school students to turn over a new leaf, to get out of trouble, and to get away from drugs or alcohol, they must change their playmates and find a new playground. Surely their old playmates didn’t want to see them go, but this is the cost of change, this is the cost of discipleship, stepping away from people who don’t want us to grow and change. I’ve told you before that years ago I would skip confirmation class. My friends and I would get dropped off by our parents, walk through the glass doors, wait for them to drive off, and walk back out of the church to socialize along the railroad tracks. There wasn’t much to do, but it was fun to be with my friends. In fact, at some point, I started to feel guilty about not being in confirmation class; however, going to class would mean risking my friends’ acceptance. If I walked away from them and went to class, would they still like me? If I walked away, would I still have a place in their circle? Likewise, Peter didn’t want Jesus to go, and surely there were some of my friends who didn’t want me to go either, so I told them I was going to use the bathroom and would be back, only then wandered back into confirmation class. Bob Bomar, one of the confirmation class teachers, welcomed me in, no questions asked. I’ll never forget that. When he died just weeks ago, I thought about how he had been there to help me make the hard choice to be changed, to be transfigured, to do something different from what my friends wanted me to do, and to be someone different than who my friends knew me to be. I want you to know that Peter didn’t want Jesus to change; Peter wanted Jesus to stay the same, but God provided Moses and Elijah to help Jesus become who He was called to be. Jesus was up on top of a mountain with Peter and James and His brother John. While there, Jesus was transfigured before them, His clothes became dazzling white. Next to Him were Moses and Elijah, both known to be long dead. I heard a Sunday school teacher ask, “How did the disciples know they were Moses and Elijah?” And someone from the class shouted out, “Maybe they had on nametags.” I don’t know that they did, yet while this story is supernatural, and while you may have never heard of Transfiguration Sunday before today, think with me about how many movies have copied this exact scene where the hero must do something that takes great courage. In Harry Potter, right before our hero goes to face the evil Voldemort, do you remember who shows up to help him? He’s all by himself, prepared to turn himself over to the Dark Lord in the hopes of saving his friends. Alone in the woods, he says the words, “I’m ready to die,” and out from a golden ball comes the resurrection stone. His mother, long dead, appears to say, “You’ve been so brave, Sweetheart.” He asks the godfather who slipped away right in front of him, “Does it hurt, dying?” He hears his father say, “You’re nearly there, Son.” One final look at all of them, he pleads, “You’ll stay with me?” and one points to his heart, saying, “We never left.” The same thing happens in Star Wars. Do you remember? Before Luke Skywalker goes to fight Darth Vader, who shows up to encourage him? Dead people. Obi-Wan Kenobi, long dead, shows up glowing and dazzling white, but before I go on to reveal how many more sci-fi/fantasy movies I’ve paid too much attention to, let me get to the point: When heroes face impossible tasks and the encouragement comes from people long dead and dazzling white, remember this moment from the Gospel of Matthew, this Transfiguration. That’s where the authors and directors got it from, for just before Jesus takes His first steps towards Jerusalem, Moses and Elijah show up to encourage Him. Why them? Why Moses and Elijah? I tell you, someone had to help Jesus because Peter certainly wasn’t going to do it. Peter didn’t want Him to go. Something about the whole experience made Peter say, “Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings here, up on top of this mountain, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” Why would Peter say such a thing? What I assume is that suddenly it became obvious to Peter that Jesus was even more than a teacher, even more than a miracle worker, and perhaps He would even have to do what He just said He would do: go to Jerusalem to be crucified. If you notice, our second Scripture lesson began: “six days later.” Six days later from what? If you look up this passage and read just two paragraphs up, you’ll read that the Transfiguration occurs six days from the moment Jesus told them He’d have to go to Jerusalem to be crucified, and they, if they were really His disciples, would take up their cross right with Him, so suddenly, it seems to Peter that Jesus is who He says He is, that He will be going through with this plan to be crucified, and if he, Peter, is really one of the disciples, he must go face death along with Him. Whoa! Wait a minute! Peter didn’t want Him to go. Once Peter realized that Jesus was serious, Peter didn’t want Him to go. It was about the same with Moses. Moses takes center stage in our first Scripture lesson. I once saw a bumper sticker that read, “Even Moses started out as a basket case.” That’s true. He did. Born into a family of enslaved Hebrew people, Moses was placed in a basket by the mother who loved him so much that she made every effort to save him from an early death by the hand of his people’s oppressors. He floated down the river in that basket and was saved by Pharaoh’s daughter. Through a series of other miracles, he became a leader of the Hebrew people, leading them from slavery and into the Promised Land. In today’s first Scripture Lesson, he was up on a mountain with God for forty days and forty nights. Maybe you remember that he came down from the mountain changed by this experience. His skin was glowing. He was transfigured. The way he looked was different just as it was with Jesus. However, maybe you remember that while Moses is changing, so many of the Hebrew people are staying the same. Will you be changed? Peter wanted Jesus to stay, asking, “Why don’t we just stay right here? I’ll build three dwellings: one for You, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” Come on, Peter. No one gets to stay on the mountain top, do they? No. We all must be changed. I have five friends from college I get together with for one weekend every year. One is a lawyer. One is a counselor. One is in sales. One works for BMW. Two of us are Presbyterian ministers. Every time we get together, I remember sitting in our old townhouse for the very last time. We had just graduated. We had to clear out, and I knew that nothing would ever be the same. Peter didn’t want Jesus to go. Do you know why? My dad told me that he remembers the moment I drove out of the driveway at 16 years old. He said he thought to himself, “There he goes.” Peter didn’t want Him to go. Do you know why? My mother helped her father move from his house to independent living at the Presbyterian Village, then from independent living to assisting living, and then from assisted living to memory care. Every move, there was less stuff to take. Every time he moved, he was closer to the end. Peter didn’t want Him to go. Do you know why? I remember at the end of the school year having friends write in my yearbook, “Don’t ever change.” Do you remember that? Do you remember wishing that nothing would ever change? Yet everything changes. Change is the constant. We cannot make for ourselves and the people we love shelters on mountaintops because the world keeps on spinning, the Spirit keeps on calling, and our hearts push us onward, so Jesus walks down from the mountain. Peter didn’t want Him to go. Yet Jesus walked down from the mountain, and every step He took from this point on brought Him closer to His death. More than that, every step He took brought Him closer to His purpose. While Peter didn’t want Him to go, Peter needed Him to go. As He moves toward the cross, He proves to us that the death we fear is not the end, but our destiny. Our salvation. Our redemption. Forward and not behind is the pathway to eternal life. But will you have the courage to go with Him? Amen.

Jesus' Commandments

Scripture Lessons: Deuteronomy 30: 15-20 and Matthew 5: 21-37 Preached on 2/12/23 Sermon title: Jesus’ Commandments I’m blessed by a friendship with Rabbi Larry Sernovitz of Temple Kol Emeth, a synagogue in East Cobb. Rabbi Larry and I get lunch. Sometimes he comes here to the church, which is a delight for two ladies on the staff who think he’s cute, but getting lunch with Larry also causes me a little bit of anxiety because, it seems, I have an engrained pattern of picking food that Rabbi Larry can’t eat. I may have inherited this pattern of serving non-kosher food to Jewish friends from my mother. When I was a young kid living in Virginia Highlands, my best friend was Jewish. We played together all the time, only he started going home to his house before dinner was served at mine after one fateful evening when my mother served him pork roast. I haven’t taken Rabbi Larry out for pork BBQ or fried shrimp, but the first time he attended the breakfast that our church organizes for local clergy in the community, he was served a nice big helping of breakfast casserole, bacon included. Last time he ate here, I ordered take out and tried to be more sensitive. I ordered salads, hold the bacon bits, only he still couldn’t eat what I’d ordered because along with the grilled chicken was a hardboiled egg. I didn’t know it at the time that it’s against kosher guidelines to eat the mother with her chick. Last month when we had lunch, we went out so he could order for himself. I ordered what he got. The problem was solved, and aren’t you Presbyterians glad we don’t have to worry about dietary restrictions? I bet you were glad until you read the second Scripture lesson for today. Here in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus is clear that His commandments will take Moses’ a step further, for He continues the sermon we heard last week, saying: You’ve heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not murder’ but I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment. You’ve heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery’ but I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. With these commandments, Jesus calls us not just to guard our actions, but our thoughts; therefore, I say that for us Christians, so much more is required than abstaining from certain foods. We must be ever mindful of how our words, actions, and even the thoughts inside our heads can affect our relationships. But wait, there’s more, for to sum all His words up under one neat yet challenging theme, notice that Jesus is here commanding us to make our broken relationships right rather than walk away from them. There is no easy way out of relationship, He says. I don’t like that idea because when I was in 5th grade, my nose started bleeding, and everyone around me accused me of picking my boogers, so as soon as I got home, I announced to my mother that I’d not be going back to that school again. That’s what I wanted. Rather than walk back into an embarrassing situation, rather than talk a misunderstanding out, rather than air grievances and find resolution, I find myself wanting to just walk away. Personally, I’d say that what Jesus has for us this morning is an even greater challenge than avoiding bacon. I’d give up bacon, ribs, and BBQ if I could just walk away from the people that I’ve hurt or who have hurt me. I’d never eat another fried shrimp if I didn’t have to go and apologize to the people I’ve wronged. In fact, so strong is my resistance to reconciliation that years ago, my friends and I were asked to leave the neighborhood pool by the lifeguard. I could hardly force myself back to the pool to make it right again. This is how it all unfolded. When I came home from the pool early that summer afternoon, my mom asked me why I wasn’t still there. “No reason,” I said, and slunk off to my room. Only smelling something suspicious, she called me back to the kitchen to pull the truth out of me. I told her that we had been asked to leave by the lifeguard for not following her instructions. Rather than sitting out of the pool during adult swim, we kept on swimming. When my father got home (Was it that way in your house? Mom would say, “Wait until you father gets home.”), he had a conference with mom while I waited in the living room. They decided I needed to go apologize to the lifeguard. Well, I didn’t want to apologize. They countered, “If you don’t apologize, you can’t go back to the pool for the rest of the summer.” “Fine! Then I’ll just not go back,” I told them. Now, can you imagine that? A 10-year-old boy, all that hot Georgia summer, staying home while his friends swim in the neighborhood pool. This is just how hard it was for me to go back into such an uncomfortable situation. I’d rather walk away, which is foolish. Fortunately, dad saw my attitude as short-sighted. He drove me up there. I walked up to that lifeguard and told her I was sorry for how I had behaved, which took all the courage I could muster. I imagined she’d yell at me or judge me harshly. I don’t know what I was so afraid of, but the last thing in the world I wanted to do was go face that lifeguard I had wronged. Only do you know what happened when I did? Do you know how she responded to me with those tears of shame in my eyes? She responded to me with compassion. She offered me grace. I tell you all this just to say that for me, again, I’d rather give up bacon, ribs, and BBQ. I’d even rather give up going to the pool for an entire summer than face someone I’d disappointed, but every time I’ve done it, every time I’ve put my vulnerable self out there to really apologize and make it right again, it’s been so much better than I’d feared. Has it ever been that way for you? Rev. Dr. Joan Gray was the interim pastor here back in 2016. I’ve heard her say, “What people don’t know, they make up, and what they make up is almost always worse than the truth.” When I don’t know how someone will react to my apology or my attempt at reconciliation, I make it up. I imagine they’ll yell at me, hate me forever, or something like that. Only how often have I been forgiven? How often have you been forgiven? How often have you received grace? That’s what’s at the heart of this long passage from the Gospel of Matthew. Don’t think you can walk away. Try to make it right again. That’s what Jesus commands. Therefore, I say to you, Christians, that Jesus doesn’t mind so much if we eat shrimp or bacon or BBQ ribs, but He commands us to keep on accepting grace, to keep on asking for it, and to offer it to others who don’t deserve it either. Did you hear all that? I said that He doesn’t mind whether we keep our heads uncovered. He’ll be OK if we work a little bit on the Sabbath. He’ll even live if we put a little bit less than 10% in the offering plate, for the main thing for Him is that if you bring “your gift to the alter” then remember “that your brother or sister has something against you, you must leave your gift there before the alter and go.” “First be reconciled to your brother or sister,” He said, for reconciliation matters more than your gift. Reconciliation matters more than what you eat. Reconciliation matters more than what you drink. Reconciliation matters more than where you go to school or what you do to pay the bills. Therefore, if you think for a minute that you can call yourself a Christian because your kids go to a Christian School and you have a Jesus fish on your car, but you hold a grudge against your neighbor and tattle on her to the HOA without speaking to her first, then you had better ask yourself who you really think you’re following. Did you read what Jesus said? “Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you are on the way to court with him, or your accuser may hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the guard, and you will be thrown into prison,” yet when the fights happen among people like us, everyone starts calling his lawyer. You know, lawyers take a lot of heat. There are more jokes about them than any other profession. I heard someone say that “the difference between a lawyer and a catfish is that one is a slimy bottom-dwelling scum sucker… and the other one is a fish.” I have more. Surely you do, too. We make these jokes about lawyers; however, we’re the ones who hire them. Jesus isn’t sure we should be so quick to do so. Therefore, He questions the practice of dismissing your spouse, saying, “It was also said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’” That’s how they used to do it. That’s what Moses said they were allowed to do. Just call the lawyer and pretend the marriage never happened. Say to your spouse, “I wish we’d never met,” then act like you never have. “Wait a minute,” Jesus says. If you have children, you can’t pretend you’ve never met, and while there are plenty of good reasons to get a divorce; while I’ve counseled plenty of couples to go their separate ways, you can’t ever stop treating a person like a person, especially when they’re on the other side of a lawsuit from you. Now that’s hard to do, but Jesus commands it. Jesus doesn’t mind so much if we eat shrimp or bacon or BBQ ribs, but he commands us to keep on accepting grace and giving grace, to keep on asking for it, and to offer it to others who don’t deserve it either. While I’m just as short-sighted now as I was that summer when I faced the choice between apologizing or not going to the swimming pool for the whole summer, and while I’d gladly give up eating shrimp or bacon or BBQ ribs if it meant I never had to face the people I’ve hurt or who have hurt me, I want you to know that I have been blessed again and again when I finally summed up the courage to pick up the phone to apologize or face my accuser remembering that he or she is a child of God. Do you know how rich life can be when we treat each other like children of God? Last Friday, Sara sent me into Publix to buy peaches. Somehow, I’m checking out and the total is $138. How did that happen? You know how they ask, “Did you find everything you were looking for?” Well, I found a lot more than that. I asked the man who was bagging if he could use paper instead of plastic. He said, “Ask and you shall receive.” I thought to myself, “This is about to be good.” “That’s somewhere in Scripture,” he said. “I’m not so good at quoting Scripture. Some people can tell you the verse and who said it just Bam Bam Bam.” I said, “Yeah, I’m not too good on that either.” Opening up a little, he said, “Now, I go to church every Sunday, but I’m not so good at quoting Scripture, chapter and verse.” “Where do you go to church?” I asked him. He said, “I go to Saint Joe’s not too far from the Square, right by the hospital.” I told him that my next-door neighbors go there, too. “Meg and Jamie Tuck, do you know them?” He said, “I don’t, but I go the 7 AM service.” “That explains it; they go on Saturday night, I think.” As though he weren’t quite sure that “that explains it,” he said, “You know, it’s the strangest thing. I go out into the parking lot after the services, and sometimes I see people rushing to their cars, fiddling with their keys, as though they’re trying to escape that place as quickly as possible, without having to talk to anyone they’ve just been to church with. It’s right after the service just as we’ve received the body of Christ, and yet people are all trying to get into the car just as fast as they can.” At that, I looked at his name tag, and said, “Gregory, it’s true, and that’s about the worst thing in the world. I’m a preacher, and I’d really like to quote you in my sermon if you don’t mind.” He said, “Well, of course I don’t mind. And the peace of Christ be with you.” After that, I sat in the car and cried for just a minute because it was so beautiful. My friends, it is always so beautiful to make a relationship with somebody. It’s very hard to maintain a relationship, but it is so beautiful to keep one. Doing so matters more than what you eat. It matters more than what you drink. It matters more than what you wear. It matters more than what you do on Sunday morning. It matters more than where you send your kids to school. We used to sing with Mrs. Vivian Stephens down in the church basement, “They’ll know we are Christians by our love,” for when we treat each other like the body of Christ is within each other, that’s when the good news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is proclaimed. The peace of Christ be with you all. Amen.

Say It Like You Mean It

Scripture Lessons: Micah 6: 1-8 and Matthew 5: 1-12 Sermon Title: Say It Like You Mean It Preached on January 29, 2023 Our daughter Cece’s favorite restaurant is Chick-fil-A, and I don’t mean that her favorite fast-food restaurant is Chick-fil-A, I mean that if she has the choice between a pack of Chick-fil-A chicken nuggets and a $60 steak from Mac’s down the street, she’ll take the nuggets, so we eat there often. I like the spicy chicken sandwich and the ice they put in the tea. I’ve also grown to appreciate how they’ve revolutionized the drive-through. At most places, you talk to a speaker to make your order. Now, when you pull into the parking lot at Chick-fil-A, you see a huge line, but in an instant, some nice young person appears at your car door, smiling, taking your order on a tablet, and saying, “It’s my pleasure” all the while. Here’s the thing that really gets me: They say, “It’s my pleasure” like they mean it. Years ago, I read an article titled: “Corporations make employees use customer-service scripts, but what do customers think?” The author was talking about the likes of Chick-fil-A, where every employee says, “It’s my pleasure” or the drive-through at Taco Bell, where, as soon as you pull up, they’re supposed to say, “You can order when you’re ready” because the higherups at Taco Bell corporate believe asking “Can I take your order?” puts too much pressure on the customers. The one the article mentioned that I’d never heard before is at Kohl’s. If you call them on the phone, they’re supposed to answer saying, “How may I help deliver greatness today?” “How may I help deliver greatness today?” might sound a little aspirational, but Tim Omarzu, the journalist who wrote this article all about these scripts that corporations are making their employees use, wrote that we can all recognize the benefit of these scripts when we consider how not everyone is naturally polite. Some people need to be trained in how to respond to customers appropriately, so a restaurant manager should teach her workers how to speak with customers just as she should teach them how to flip burgers. Accoring to Omarzu, though, customers don’t like it when the people taking their orders sound fake. That’s a most important thing. You not only need to know what you’re supposed to say. For your words to have impact, you must say it like you mean it because if you don’t mean it, your fake words can do more damage than had you said nothing at all. For example, years ago I had to go and apologize to my sister. We were little. I stole her dolls, and hung them up in a tree, just to be mean. My mom made me take them down and hand them back to her. Mom was standing right behind me with her arms crossed, waiting for me to say the magic words. Looking down at my shoelaces, I just kind of spit the word out: “SORRY.” That wasn’t going to cut it, so Mom said, “Say it again, and this time, say it like you mean it” because it’s not just a matter of saying the words. You can’t just say, “It’s my pleasure.” You can’t just say, “I’m sorry.” Moreover, Christians can’t just say, “I’m blessed.” Have you ever heard a Christian make that claim? This is a good thing to say. It’s the perfect response to the question, “How are you?” based on the second Scripture lesson that I’ve just read where Jesus says again and again, “Blessed are you even when you suffer, even when you are oppressed, even and especially when you face hardship.” On the one hand, while there could be no more appropriate thing to say, the words are just words unless you say them like you mean them. I can remember numerous times when just this word, “blessed,” brought tears to my eyes because the one who said to me “Have a blessed day” really meant it. How many times have I asked the mourning, the impoverished, the afflicted, the oppressed, “How are you holding up?” only to hear them say, “I’m blessed” in defiance of their pain? That word “blessed” is worse than empty unless you say it like you mean it. How can you say it like you mean it? Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are the meek. Wait just a minute. Blessed are the meek? What about in the airport? Have you seen what happens to meek people in the airport? A couple of weeks ago, an Ohio woman assaulted flight attendants and police officers with a fire extinguisher at Hartsfield-Jackson Airport. Did you hear about that? Or let me ask you a better question. After standing in line, going through security, watching people cut in front of you, feeling pushed around and prodded, only to then hear that your flight is delayed, have you ever been tempted to reach for a fire extinguisher? The meek get runover in the airport, yet Jesus says, “Blessed are the meek.” Can you believe it? Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Say that to the parents who are watching their kid play basketball, watching the ref call traveling on their son after ignoring the kid on the other team who picks up the ball and runs down the court with it. How can you see the blessing in thirsting for righteousness without getting it? It’s hard. Parents get escorted out of games these days for demanding righteousness. Some would say especially the parents whose kids go to Christian schools get escorted out of games for demanding righteousness, yet Jesus says that those who don’t receive it are blessed, so shouldn’t we Christians be the first to face hardship with something more than base, human anger? A friend I run with asked his middle school son how he felt after seeing a teammate’s dad escorted out of their game. “It looked like your friend was embarrassed. Are you OK? Do you ever feel embarrassed when these parents go crazy yelling at the referees?” His son said, “I’m just glad those parents are on our side.” Now that’s seeing the blessing in an unfortunate situation. Can you see the blessing in the unfortunate situation you’re living in right now? Can you say, “I’m blessed” and mean it? That can be a challenge. The more likely thing I’m feeling during hardship is regret, saying to myself, “How did I get here? What could I have done differently?” Looking back again on my childhood, I can remember how much I loved hitting the reset button on video games. A game I could play for hours, Civilization it was called, started with this one settlement. Then you’d move around colonizing other parts of the world, until you were either wiped out or achieved world domination. What I would do when I played this game is I’d send out my little colony, and occasionally the native inhabitants of that land would attack my colony, taking it over, and whenever that happened, I’d just hit the reset button on the game and could start over with a clean slate. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to do the same thing with life? Hit the reset button on your dinner party so that you could start over with the roast that ended up burnt. Hit the reset button so you have the chance to not say the mean thing that you said. Hit the reset button on your day, hit the reset button on an argument, hit the reset button and go back to see the doctor before it got so bad, hit the reset button to go back and do it all over again. Wouldn’t it be nice to just start over and do something to avoid the outcome that you’re stuck with? Jesus points us towards something other than a reset, though. His is a step beyond regret and wishing you could do it all over to see that even in times of hardship, still we are blessed: “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” “Blessed are the meek.” “Blessed are those who mourn,” Jesus says. Why? How? After my dad’s mother suffered a stroke - a stroke that put her in a home, led to her losing her ability to drive, her ability to paint, then her ability to remember, and finally took her life, my dad would look back on the year leading up to the stroke and wonder what could have been done differently to have prevented it all. He would say, “If only I had been there when she fell.” “If only I had taken her to her doctor’s appointments and helped her take better care of herself.” “If only I had been there when the stroke happened, then we could have gotten her to the hospital faster.” “If only, if only, if only I had a reset button,” yet those regrets are so different from what the Lord said. “Blessed are those who mourn,” he said. Why? Because while we wonder why bad things happen and wish for a way to avoid them, to start over and steer around tragedy, the Lord says, “Open your eyes and see that you are always surrounded by God’s blessings.” Blessed are those who mourn, for those who mourn are surrounded by people who love them. Blessed are those who thirst for righteousness, for righteousness is on the way. Don’t waste time on regret. Don’t spend your time looking backwards. Open your eyes to the blessing that surrounds you even when you walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Even there He is with you. From the cross, He said to the criminal crucified beside Him: “Today, you will be with me in paradise.” Paradise awaits my friends. It’s just ahead, around the corner, and so it is what’s waiting for us that must hold our attention, not what might have happened in the past. Give up on regret. Instead, look for blessings in this moment, and remember always that our tomorrows will be far brighter than our yesterdays. Know that, and you will always be able to say, “I’m blessed,” and mean it. Amen.