Pastor's Message

September Spirit Steps

I am I and you are you.  If by chance we meet, it is beautiful; if not, it can’t be helped.
Fritz Pearls

Fritz Pearls is known as the father of Gestalt Therapy and when I was in training as a Gestalt therapist this quote adorned the walls of our meeting room.  I didn’t like it.  It seemed harsh, a cop out for working on relationships, looking for common ground, searching for compromise.  Today I see these words in a completely different light.  Today instead of a cop out, I see wisdom in these words, the truth about a reality that allows for an organic whole.

We each are unique, endowed by the Creator with a unique set of genes and personality.  We are as individual as our fingerprints.  Each of us has our own history, our own life experiences that further contribute to our uniqueness.  It is through the eyes of this uniqueness that we come to view each situation and each event that we confront.  It is through this uniqueness that we come to interpret and make sense out of each moment of history.   It makes sense then that each of us is going to see things slightly differently, interpret things in a slightly different way and that wholeness of truth, wholeness of reality is contained not in a single perspective but in the sharing of all perspectives, the sharing of all interpretations. 

Each of us also has an “ego” that contributes to our uniqueness in the most positive sense and in a negative sense would have us see ourselves as “correct”, having the “right” perspective, having the right and true interpretation.  It is our ego that would have us see ourselves as the center of the universe (which is what I believe Scripture refers to as original sin).

Understanding this, helps me to see the wisdom in the policies that were adopted by the ELCA as it met in National Convention in Minneapolis this past week.  After eight years of careful, thoughtful, and prayerful study it changed a number of positions regarding human sexuality.  Although there was extensive study and prayerful research that prompted these changes, it was recognized that not everyone would agree and so it allowed for differences in individuals and in local congregations.  It broadened its policies to allow for greater inclusion while allowing individual congregations to determine the extent to which they would or would not implement the changes.

The eyes of the religious world are now focused on the ELCA to see whether or not it can survive as a single church body living out its core belief that we are the body of Christ in the world, a single body with many parts or if we will break up into many warring fragments.   

We face the same issues whether it is within individual congregations, or family, or in any relationship.  May God grant us the wisdom to see that the Truth lies not in any one perspective but in our organic whole.  

May you have peace in your day.

Pastor Bob