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God Values Life – Abundantly

January 22, 2023
By Paul Emmel

A clipping from the Start Tribune newspaper

 

"I have come that they may have life and have it abundantly."
- John 10:10 ESV

God knew you and saw you before your mother even knew she was pregnant. Isn't that incredible? From that first moment of conception, God kept you safe and healthy. He even knew the plans for all the days ahead of you. When we think of how intricately God has made us, we rejoice with David in saying, "Wonderful are Your works!" (Psalm 139:14).

Our present American culture wants to rank life in order of "importance." But every human life is worthy of life because God creates and values life. He values the life of the tiny unborn baby, the child in foster care, and also the woman who chose abortion. He values the lives of people with disabilities and people in nursing homes who struggle to remember their own families. He even values the lives of people who seek to destroy life!

God calls us as His children to speak the truth in love to others. He calls us to tell them that their life and all human life is precious in the sight of their Redeemer who gave up His life to save them, forgive them, and give them abundant life.

 
Paul Emmel

Sanctity of Human Life Day
January 22, 2023

This article is adapted from Portals of Prayer, January 22, 2023, by Emily Hatesohl.

Paul EmmelPaul Emmel is a retired pastor in the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod, having served as a parish pastor, a correctional chaplain for the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, and a hospital chaplain and a community counselor. As a retired pastor, Paul continues to serve the Lord and His people, including establishing the Minnesota South District’s “Pastors to Prisoners” ministry.  

 

Lord of the Stump

November 15, 2022
By Paul Emmel
A clipping from the Start Tribune newspaper
A birch tree actually growing out of a cedar stump near our cabin

 

In less than a minute, a chainsaw makes an ugly stump out of a beautiful 100 year old cedar tree.  The sharp teeth of the saw rip through the tough trunk like a hot knife through butter. The tree is fatally amputated. Next year it will be firewood. Death wins again.

So it seems. Yet, wherever I walk in the forest, I see evidence of new life coming out of deadwood.  Without human intervention, sprouts and saplings break forth from rotting wood and become the next generation of forest growth. It's Nature's way of creating renewal and new life.

Likewise, life itself makes us vulnerable to sudden cuts and losses that within minutes alter the trajectory of our future.  For example - a fatal accident, a crippling diagnosis, being victimized by crime, a raging fire, a stroke, an unstoppable virus -  tear into the fabric of our lives and we are helplessly left with nothing but an ugly stump. Being "stumped" in this fallen world happens all the time. 

Faced with barren stumps, however, we dare not despair. We must trust the promises of The Lord of Life to generate new life out of the  deadwood of our past. Rather than giving in to hopelessness or bitterness, we trust that God is " Lord of the Stump."

Jesus appeared to be stumped on the cross. He suffered cruel lashing and sharp spikes that lacerated His flesh.  He breathed his last and died. A perfectly innocent human cut down in the prime of life. It looked as if cruelty and death triumphed again.

Incredibly,  He surprised everyone by rising from His tomb and the Spirit of the Lord rested on Him. From that Good Friday stump grew His new people enlivened by the Spirit. The Apostles were fruitful and gave birth to a new generation, called The  Church. Motivated by the Gospel, they changed the course of  history. A New People, grew out of the deadwood  and failure of the past.

Isaiah prophesied in chapter 11:

"There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse,
and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit.
and the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him,
the Spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the Spirit of counsel and might,
the Spirit of knowledge
and the fear of the LORD."

 

New life arising from dead stumps!
A birch emerges from a cedar!
Who could have imagined!
Who knows what new life
He will bring from our old stumps?
We trust Him even when our lives are suddenly amputated.
Where there is loss and death,
He brings new life.
We witness this again and again
throughout our lives.
He is truly "Lord of the Stump!"
Thus, we bless His holy name!
 
 
Paul Emmel

November 13, 2022
The Twenty Third Sunday after Pentecost

This essay is dedicated to the blessed memory of Charles Rodman Partridge (1934-2022).

Paul EmmelPaul Emmel is a retired pastor in the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod, having served as a parish pastor, a correctional chaplain for the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, and a hospital chaplain and a community counselor. As a retired pastor, Paul continues to serve the Lord and His people, including establishing the Minnesota South District’s “Pastors to Prisoners” ministry.  

 

For Everything There Is A Season

October 19, 2022
By Paul Emmel
A clipping from the Start Tribune newspaper
 Last wildflowers the day before the first snow

 

The seasons come and the seasons go.
Everything happens at the time
 God has appointed.
All created things have a certain time
to begin and to end.
 
 
 
Fallen pine resting in autumn's glory

 

The wise grasp the rhythms of life
and live in agreement with them.
So teach us to number our days
that we may get a heart of wisdom.
 
 
 
Lake Superior stones shaped by eons of time

 

"Before the mountains were brought forth,
or ever You had formed the earth...
from everlasting to everlasting
You are God."
 
 
Season's End
 
 
 
Paul Emmel

The Nineteenth Sunday after Pentecost
October 16, 2022

Images were recorded in October 2022 at the Encampment Forest Association located on the North Shore of Lake Superior, west of Two Harbors, Minnesota.. Verse was inspired by Ecclesiastes 3, Psalm 90 and Saint Gregory of Nazianzus (d. 390).

Paul EmmelPaul Emmel is a retired pastor in the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod, having served as a parish pastor, a correctional chaplain for the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, and a hospital chaplain and a community counselor. As a retired pastor, Paul continues to serve the Lord and His people, including establishing the Minnesota South District’s “Pastors to Prisoners” ministry.  

 

Behind the Violence

August 30, 2022
By Paul Emmel
A clipping from the Start Tribune newspaper
An August 21 clipping from the Minneapolis Star Tribune describes the rapid increase in the city's violent crime.

 

 One of America's most livable major cities, Minneapolis, is now becoming among the most violent. Although the same trend is true from coast to coast, citizens of Minneapolis take little comfort that their violence is not unique. Violent crime negatively impacts community life from corporate to personal dimensions. It is difficult to discuss underlying causes in seminars while lives are being endangered on the streets.

Nevertheless, there is one aspect of urban violence that is being ignored by the media and political leaders: the spiritual roots of murder, robbery and corrosive corruption.  Upstream from violence is a disdain and ignorance of the Laws of God as detailed in the 10 Commandments, particularly the Fifth Commandment: "YOU SHALL NOT MURDER".  (Exodus 20:13)

The central thought of this commandment is that God has created us to care about other people and to help them in their time of need. Or, as Martin Luther explained in his Small Catechism: "We should fear and love God so that we do not hurt or harm our neighbor in his body but help and support him in every physical need".

In other words, at the heart of America's crippling problem of violence is a willful and ignorant disobedience of God's will toward life itself. God creates, preserves and protects all life. He is caring and compassionate toward all He has made and He calls us to be so also. He forbids acting violently or abusively toward a child or spouse, engaging in reckless and self-destructive behavior. He forbids hating, despising and slandering other groups of people (prejudice, racism, and so forth).

As long as America continues to ignore and disobey The Fifth Commandment, few of its laws, legislation, law enforcement and government programs will make a dent on its overwhelming problem of violence. I regard this as a realistic prediction, certainly not progressive.

That does not mean that just laws and enforcement are unimportant but that they are very limited in restraining violence at the heart of the matter. The law restrains and accuses its citizens; it does not give them new hearts. Civil governments simply lack the ability to regenerate selfless thinking and behavior. I have witnessed this principle for 30 years in our prison system.

Nor should we expect people of little or no faith to suddenly have high regard and respect for God Law or will.  The responsibility of the Church is to preach and teach God's Law to the extent that followers seek repentance, new hearts and minds, so that the power of the Gospel can enable them to obey The Fifth Commandment.

Sadly, many churches neglect this function of the Law and focus on "other things" while their membership continues to disobey the Commandment in its subtler forms. Thus, they become part of the problem of violence in America rather than part of its solution. There is a special judgment reserved for such "churchly" neglect.

My urgent appeal is for people to stop and desist from viewing the problem of violence simply by its symptoms. Rather, deal with the ultimate cause behind it. Otherwise, we continue to get what we've always got: more of the same and it will only continue to get worse.

 
Paul Emmel

August 28, 2022
The Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Paul EmmelPaul Emmel is a retired pastor in the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod, having served as a parish pastor, a correctional chaplain for the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, and a hospital chaplain and a community counselor. As a retired pastor, Paul continues to serve the Lord and His people, including establishing the Minnesota South District’s “Pastors to Prisoners” ministry.  

 

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