When I was in seminary, I spent a year serving under a chaplain at one of the major hospitals in Atlanta. Once a week I had to walk past the halls of the neonatal intensive care unit. More than once I wondered: where is God?

Maybe you have looked at the suffering of the world around you and wondered the same thing.

John begins his gospel: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God... And the Word became flesh and lived among us." (John 1:1, 14)

And this Word hungered, and thirsted, and bled, and died.

This speaks to a mystery at the heart of the Christian faith — that God was fully present in Jesus.

It's hard to get my mind around that. But there is something beautiful in it.

Last week I mentioned Jesus' last words from the cross in the Gospel of John: It is finished…

Even after years of study, I admit there are aspects of our theology around the cross I don't fully understand. But I hold this close to my heart: we worship a God who knows what it is to suffer — who, in Christ on that cross, is forever with us in our suffering.

God is with those who serve on the front lines, in refugee camps and war zones. God is with the mother holding her child in the ICU. God is with the lonely, the hungry, the heartbroken.

I'm reminded again of Jesus' last words. No longer can we think we suffer alone. That way of thinking is finished.

Prayer: We thank you for your love for us, O God. We thank you for becoming as we are, for walking as we walk, suffering as we suffer. Be near to the brokenhearted and to those who need you most. We ask in Jesus' name. Amen.

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A hospice worker named Bronnie Ware spent years caring for people in the final weeks of their lives. Along the way she began writing down the things they most often said they wished they had done differently. She eventually published her observations in a book called The Top Five Regrets of the Dying.

As a pastor, I have heard echoes of nearly every one of these regrets, sitting at bedsides over the years. Here is what she found people said most often:

I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
I wish I hadn't worked so hard.
I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.
I wish I'd stayed in touch with my friends.
I wish I'd let myself be happier.

None of those regrets are about achievements missed or money never made. They are all, in one way or another, about the same thing — a life lived too cautiously, too guarded, too consumed by what others expected.

The Psalmist prayed, "Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a wise heart." (Psalm 90:12) That is not a morbid request. It is an honest one. Most of us live as though we have unlimited time to get around to the things that matter most — the honest conversation, the reconnection with an old friend, the courage to live as ourselves rather than as someone else's expectation.

Friend of Dial Hope, whatever stage of life you find yourself in, I pray that God would lift any sorrow or self-judgment you may be carrying over your own past. Instead, may you learn what you can from it and trust God to lead you into a fuller future.

My friend Hunter Camp once wrote: "In most instances, life allows U-turns. In all instances, God allows U-turns. While we can never take back time that is lost, or erase moments of our past that we regret, we can amend our lives so the future looks less like the past and more like the life of our dreams."

Prayer: Loving God, we remember today that life is short and fragile. Grant us the courage to live not to please others, but to please you. May we express what is on our heart. Release us from any bitterness, guilt, resentment, or anger that only makes us sick. Help us make wise choices with our time. And set us free to fully enjoy this life, which is a gift. We pray in the name of the One who walks with us, even now. Amen.

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Today’s message was written by Rev. Roger Kunkel, founder of Dial Hope.

Friend of Dial Hope, one of the common mistakes in religion is made by people who try to live on negatives, people who are whiners. They are against that but do not seem to be emphatically for something of their own allegiance. They can tell you with deep emotion what they are against, but if you ask them what they are really for, they have no clear answers. To be a Christian is not to be against things; we must be positive in our faith and action. We must be filled with joy and hope. We must be for Christ and his truth and his way of life. Life is never boring, never ho-hum...it is always TA-DA! 

Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, "I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving! To reach the port of heaven we must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it - but we must sail, not drift, nor lie at anchor." 

In the New Testament, Paul wrote in Il Corinthians, Chapter 1:20, "For in Jesus Christ, every one of God's promises is a YES." 

Let us pray: O God of china-blue skies and dazzling sunrises, we thank you that this day is filled with promise and possibility. Grant us boldness to move beyond security to the risk of faith, the joy of service, the laughter of love. So often we are like Jonah. We hear your call, then resist your Word, running from you as far as we can. We think that you cannot possibly use us. But we forget that where we see no way, you can create one; that when you call someone, you also provide gifts of service. Forgive our resistance and excuses. Enable each of us to see where our call lies, and to serve you with contagious enthusiasm, spontaneous emotion, and unrestrained joy. Reshape our hearts until every fiber within us yearns to do your will. Through the grace of Jesus.

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A friend of mine once gave me a stack of old comic strips she had saved over the years. Thumbing through them, I found two sitting right next to each other that formed a striking contrast.

The first was Winnie the Pooh. Pooh asks Eeyore, "Why do you always expect the worst, Eeyore?" Eeyore answers, "You've got me all wrong, Pooh. I don't expect the worst — I depend on it."

The second was Peanuts. Snoopy's cousin Spike is writing home from the desert: "Life here in the desert is hard but wonderful. Sometimes it is very hot..." — and there's Spike, tongue out, eyes crossed, sun beating down. "And the nights can be very cold. Sometimes we have rain and sudden flash floods. Sometimes it even snows. But there are always beautiful places to walk and things to see. And when I return home, I always have a place to hang my hat." In the final frame, his hat is hanging on a cactus.

Same circumstances, more or less. Heat, cold, flooding, isolation. But two completely different postures toward them.

Eeyore has decided, before anything happens, what the world is going to give him. Spike has decided something else — that even out in the desert, with nothing but a cactus to his name, there is still beauty to notice and a kind of home to be found.

I don't think Spike is naive. The desert is genuinely hard — he says so himself. He isn't pretending otherwise. He has simply chosen where to rest his attention. The hardship gets named. And so does the gift.

The Apostle Paul, writing from a prison cell, said something remarkably similar: "I have learned, in whatever state I am, to be content." (Philippians 4:11) Not because his circumstances were easy. Because he had learned where to place his gaze.

Most of us are not stuck being Eeyore. We get to choose, again and again, whether we depend on the worst or look for the cactus to hang our hat on.

Prayer: God of Grace, it is true that life is often hard - but also wonderful. Even when we get beat down by the weather, by our health, or by ugly circumstances give us eyes to see beauty and grace and love at work. Remind us of all that you have done for us that we would be filled with gratitude. Thank you for your providence and love through Jesus Christ. Amen.

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Yesterday I shared that in the Gospel of John, Jesus' last words from the cross are: 

It is finished…

His human life on earth, finished.
His ministry in person, finished.
The pain and suffering, finished.

But there is more, isn't there?

I have a friend, about my age, who some years back was going through serious health issues — clearly suffering. He couldn't work. He lost his job. I remember talking with him on the phone during that season. He told me that ten years earlier he had made a huge mistake — that he had betrayed a friend's trust, and it had hurt the man deeply. Then he asked me, "Do you think God is punishing me for that now? Is that what this is about? I've prayed many times for forgiveness. I've apologized. I've tried to make amends. But I don't know."

Ten years in the past. And it was still heavy, heavy on his heart.

One of the most powerful things the cross does is show us this: in Jesus, God experiences the worst of what humans can do. He fully bears our sins in his body — the violence, the betrayal, the injustice. And he loves us anyway.

This is a love that knows fully what it is to suffer, to be broken and betrayed. It is a love that takes on our sins, and a love that provides the means for a way forward.

The prophet Isaiah put it like this: "By his wounds we have been healed." (Isaiah 53:5)

Early in John's Gospel, John the Baptist, pointing to Jesus and to what was to come on the cross, said, "Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world."

As I mentioned yesterday: no longer can we think of God as one who punishes, dominates, smites. That way of thinking is finished.

No longer do we need to hold on to old sins and guilt and shame. We've been set free to make amends and start anew. It is finished!

Prayer: We thank you for your love for us, O God — unconditional, undying. Help us to accept that love, mercy, and grace, and to live our lives in response. In Christ's name. Amen.

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