St. Luke United Methodist Church

I’ve done enough counseling with couples to know that many couples don’t know much about mature love. Most are still stuck in the emotional side of love. When one person says “I love you,” it usually means they have a squishy feeling inside like a bowl of jello. When two people say “I love you,” it means there are two sets of squishy feelings.

When it comes to Valentine’s Day and other times we emphasize love—I try to stress that love is a decision. What is the biggest part of that decision? The big decision is to honor another person. As it says in Romans 12:10, “love one another with mutual affection, outdo one another in showing honor.”

Unfortunately, many of us make an age old mistake. We spend most of our time thinking if our spouse would change, every problem in our relationship would disappear. Usually the spouse is thinking exactly the same thing.

It’s like the wife who noticed the new neighbors who moved in across the street. Every evening, she peeked through the curtain and watched as the husband came home from work. She couldn’t miss the fact that nearly every night, this man would bring home flowers or a little gift for his wife. She’d run to greet him as he got out of the car, and he’d hand her a gift. Then they’d hug and kiss until they walked inside.

One night after watching this same gushy scene repeated over and over, the poor neighbor finally reached the breaking point. The moment her husband walked in the door, she said, “Have you noticed we have new neighbors across the street?”

As he dropped his briefcase on the floor and fell into the easy chair in front of the television, he replied, “Yeah, I’ve noticed we have new neighbors.” “But have you noticed what they do every night?” “No dear,” he answered, “I haven’t noticed.”

She continued, “Every night when he comes home, he gives her a big kiss, he hugs her, and he almost always brings her a special gift.” Then she added. “How come you don’t ever do that?” Her husband stared at her with a puzzled look on his face and said, “Honey, I can’t do that, I hardly know the woman!”

This age-old battle of trying to get your mate or friend or child or boss to change may win a few minor battles. It never will win the war of unmet expectations. Still, it is the primary way most people try to improve their marriage and other relationships.

What is the foundation for all healthy relationships? It is a decision to honor our mate or friend or parent or child. Honor is an attitude that someone is valuable.

A lot of people get this concept when they see a list of what it is to dishonor someone. Here’s a few ways we dishonor others: 1) Ignoring or degrading another person’s opinions, advice or beliefs. 2) Burying ourselves in the newspaper or television when someone is trying to talk to us. 3) Creating jokes about another person’s weak areas. 4) An unwillingness to admit we are wrong or ask for forgiveness. (Thanks to Gary Smalley for some of these thoughts today.)

Prayer: Our Lord, we have a lot to learn about honoring you and others. Amen.

Pastor Dan Safarik serves St. Luke United Methodist Church in Lincoln.

When our daughter Laura was four years old, she would sing a song we both enjoyed.  The words go something like this. “There was a little story, which went walking down the road. He met a little squirrel and he asked the squirrel, ‘Would you like to be in my book?’ So the squirrel jumped into the book.” Then the second verse goes: “There was a little story and a little squirrel, which went walking down the road. They met a little…..”

Laura added more and more animals to each verse which are included with the little story. The song reminds me a lot of the Christian faith. The little story could be about Jesus walking this earth. Jesus meets a lot of people along the road and He invites them to be included with Him. He invites everyone He meets to be in the book of life which is the story of history that is being written even now. As the song goes on then more and more people are added in each verse.

The saddest verse of the song is about those who never really joined in the walk. They’ll sing the song and say it sounds good but they won’t jump into the book and be included in the verses as a disciple walking with Jesus.

They may say, “ I believe in God, but mine is a very private religion and I don’t show it like some.” Those who never quite join in with Jesus might say they belong to a certain church, but they aren’t involved in the church and don’t attend very often.

They may say they care about their family but they don’t make the family their top priority. In other words, they talk about a lot about love, but they don’t do loving things.

The highly respected anthropologist and social philosopher, Ashley Montager, once remarked to a college audience, “Love is the answer to the problem of being human. However, today, in the midst of our super-abundance of love-talk, there is a super-absence of love-action.”

A psychology professor who had no children of his own would frequently reprove a neighbor scolding a child, saying. “You should love your boy, not punish him.” One hot summer day, the professor repaired his concrete driveway. Tired after several hours of work, he laid down the trowel, wiped the perspiration from his forehead, and started toward his house.

Just then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a mischievous little boy putting his foot into the fresh cement. He rushed over, grabbed him and was about to spank him when a neighbor leaned from a window and said, “Watch it professor! Don’t you remember? You must love the child.”

At this, the psychologist yelled back furiously, “I do love him in the abstract, but not in the concrete.”

Prayer:  Our Lord, help us not to just talk a good story but follow our words with our actions.  Amen.

Pastor Dan Safarik serves St. Luke United Methodist Church in Lincoln.

People have tried many ways to find happiness.

One such story is an oriental folk tale about Tasaku, the stonecutter. He was a poor man who cut blocks of stone from the foot of a mountain. Tasaku envied the local price and wished for his wealth. The great spirit granted his wish. Tasaku was happy until he saw the sun wilt the flowers in his garden. He wished for such power; his wish was granted, and he became the sun.

Tasaku was happy until a cloud obscured this heat. Tasaku then wanted to be a cloud. Thereafter, Tasaku was a cloud with the power to ravage the land with storms. He was happy until he saw the mountain standing in spite of his storms. So he demanded to be the mountain.

The great spirit obeyed, and Tasaku became the mountain. Now he was more powerful than the prince, the sun or the cloud. Tasaku was content and happy until he felt a chisel chipping at his mountain feet. It was a stonecutter working away.

How do we find happiness? The world tells us it comes with power, or status, or fame. The Bible tells us it comes through relationships with God and others. The Apostle Paul shared some very wise words with his friend Timothy when he wrote, “There is great gain in godliness combined with contentment; for we brought nothing into the world, so that we can take nothing out of it; but if we have food and clothing, we will be content with these” (1 Timothy 6:6-9)

Most of what the world defines as happiness is based on things we can easily lose. A magazine cartoonist depicted two well-dressed businessmen having lunch in a posh restaurant. One of the men has a look of horror on his face as he says to the other, “I had the most terrifying dream last night. I dreamed the value of the dollar had slipped so low that it was no longer worth worshipping.”

What we worship says a lot about who we are and how happy we will be. Jesus didn’t say money or material possessions were bad. God knows we have material needs, but we also have spiritual needs. We have become such a consumer society that we have tried to find contentment in what we want. The emphasis in the Bible is that contentment is found not in what we can get but in what we can’t lose.

Once in a while, we need to hear what St. Francis of Assisi said a long time ago. In one of his writings, “Canticle of the Sun,” St. Francis expresses gratitude not for his mind, his riches, or his good luck, but for the things that belong to everyone, things that cannot be taken away: the sun, the moon, the stars, the wind and weather “by which the Lord upholds life in all creatures.”

No one has ever seen a hearse pulling a U-Haul trailer. Anything we can put in a U-Haul will not give us lasting happiness.

Prayer:  Our Lord, may we be transformed from a mall mentality to a healthier balanced of material and spiritual needs. Amen

Pastor Dan Safarik serves St. Luke United Methodist Church in Lincoln.