#303 Preaching Words

As I prepare and preach sermons, I try to be consistent in prayer. I ask God to guide me to properly understand the text. I ask Him to help me explain each passage well, tie it to Christ Jesus, and connect it with the lives of His people today. Generally, I'm praying at the beginning of my study, as I transition into writing, and on Sunday morning before I deliver the sermon. Over the years I've landed on a consistent set of words for how I'd like to preach. I ask God to help me preach His Word

• Faithfully - This is the biggest one for me. I want to understand what God is saying through the Bible passage and communicate that truth to God's people. I don't want to stray into theological errors or start bringing my own ideas into the text. I hope my preaching accurately reflects who God is and what He has done for His people and what that means for our identity and lifestyle.
• Effectively - I want to use relatable words and images. I want to show how God's Word relates to the joys and struggles of our everyday lives. I hope and pray that those who hear me preach feel like they and their concerns are being addressed. God's Word should affect us and draw us closer to Him.
• Boldly - I want my preaching to be first and foremost about the good news of Jesus Christ. I want to be honest about our need for salvation and the fact that only Christ can save us. Where it's necessary, I want to expose the lies we and others tell us. I want to point out where God is at work in our world. I want to proclaim His message, even when it's not what I or others want to hear.
• Enthusiastically - I want to proclaim Jesus with joy and conviction. Our God is awesome. His love is extravagant. His faithfulness is overwhelming. No one can compare with His holiness, His righteousness, His patience, His wisdom. I want God's people to be excited about God.
• Creatively - This is least important one, but I want to express God's truth in my own words. I want to communicate something different with each different sermon. Sometimes even hearing a familiar truth in a new way helps us unlock better and fresher understanding.

That list is intimidating. I can't do that on my own, and I know I have lots of room to grow. So not only will I keep practicing, but I'll keep praying. May God be glorified when I preach.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#302 A Decade!

Last week Tess and I reached ten years of marriage. A decade! Since Tess and I were married on July 20, 2013, we've gained three children and lived in three different homes in two states. As a former math major, I noticed that our 120 months of marriage equaled the sum of our kids' ages. They were at 77 months, 41 months, and 2 months on July 20. That doesn't really mean anything, but I thought it was pretty cool.

That nice round number of ten years makes me want to reflect a little bit. In 2013 Tess and I were just out of college. We'd both had steady jobs during summers and consistent part-time work during the school year, but neither of us had had a "real" job before. I had spent a few months living in Indonesia, but we didn't have much experience living on our own in our own place. It would be an overstatement to say we moved from Wisconsin to Michigan without a safety net, but, like many newlyweds, we were figuring out a lot of adulthood pretty quickly in those first years. Seminary helped me—and, after a bit, us—with making friends. Tess found a job after a few weeks. We learned how to live together, how to plan our meals, how to coordinate our schedules. The move away from home had challenges, but I think it ultimately was good for us. Tess and I had to depend on each other and support one another as we navigated not just a new stage of life but a new place. We grew a lot closer together over those first few years.

Ten years after getting married, it's pretty hard for me to remember what life was like without Tess and basically impossible for me to imagine going through life without her now. She is my best friend, my closest confidant, my partner. After a decade, I am confident that I love her far more now than I did on our wedding day. I've learned so much more about Tess through the experience of life together, and I think I've learned how to love more over these years. I am so thankful that God has brought us together. He has given us ten wonderful years, and I am looking forward to what's yet to come.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#301 Dopamine

Let me tell you something: dopamine is a powerful thing. Now that it's summer, I do most of my running right away in the morning. I'm using a marathon training plan that only requires three runs a week, but calls for all of those runs to be hard. So I wake up, hydrate, and go out to work my tail off. By the time I'm done, I am drained and sore and… in a great mood. When the run goes well, I experience the thrill of conquering a challenge. Even when I fall short of my goal, my frustration quickly fades because I've still gotten the workout done. That dopamine floods my brain. It's a beautiful thing and enough to motivate me to get out there and keep pushing, even as the mileage climbs.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#300 What's in a Name?

We've hit three hundred posts! Let's talk about something near and dear to me.

The summer of 2008 was a big summer for me. I was in between my junior and senior years of high school. Over that summer I made a lot of great memories and also felt like I came out with a much clearer sense of who I was and who God was calling me to be. A large part of that was reading through the book of Jeremiah chapter by chapter. At seventeen years old I was beginning to feel God tugging on me. A few people in my life had planted the idea of leadership—specifically, ministry—in my head. I was pretty skeptical about that being a good idea for me. Jeremiah seemed pretty skeptical about God making him a prophet. I could relate to Jeremiah's doubts and questions and even complaints about God's calling on his life. Jeremiah felt too young, too unqualified, like I did. But God reassured the prophet: “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.” Those words were extremely comforting to me as well. I felt like God was answering my concerns and promising that He would be with me. Reading Jeremiah's words gave me hope that I wasn't alone, that I wasn't crazy, that God use me as a minister.

After Jeremiah made such an impact on me I decided that if I ever had a son, I would name him Jeremiah. This was more than a year before I met Tess, almost nine years before we had children, and basically fifteen full years before we had a son. But as I was starting to figure out back in 2008, God was calling me into pastoral ministry. So Jeremiah Hofman's name has special meaning to me. It's an ongoing reminder of what God has done in my life.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#299 Miles and Miles

This year I am training to run a marathon. It's my first time. (A lot of people are surprised to hear that, but I never really had the urge before.) I am registered for the Des Moines marathon in October. It works out really well because it's a couple days after a family wedding, so I was planning to be off that Sunday anyway.

Last fall I ran a half marathon, so—as you might expect—I never ran farther than the 13.1 miles I ran on race day. When I was in college training for 8000m cross country races as well as 5000m and 10,000m track races, I ran double digit mileage pretty regularly, but never more than 16 miles at a time. It won't be too long before I enter uncharted territory here.

Getting ready for a 26.2 mile race is going to require some serious mileage. My training plans kicks off one week from today. Each week's longest run will be on Saturday, so starting Saturday, July 1, I am going to be running somewhere between 10 and 20 miles every Saturday morning for 15 weeks. If you live in Northwest Iowa and have some free time, I would love to find some people to ride bike next to me while I'm out pounding the pavement. Tess and I have a couple adult bikes, so you wouldn't even need to bring your own transportation. I'll be working hard, but I won't be running very fast for a bike, and it would be great to be able to carry a water bottle on the bike. I'll be happy to make conversation, and I'll be a pretty captive audience if you want to talk to me. Let me know if you're interested and when you're free. Even if you can't commit to the whole run, any little bit helps.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#298 Brotherly and Sisterly Love

In my last post I argued that our sins—ALL of our sins—hurt us, even if they don't hurt anyone else (at least as far as we can tell). I used Christians' current debate about whether or not God approves of sex within same-sex marriages as an example. However, I don't want to leave the wrong impression here. People who identify as LGBTQ+, including Christians, have been hurt far too often by the church.

When I made my argument about sin hurting us, I DID NOT mean to say that we should kick LGBTQ+ individuals out of the church or avoid them as Christians. If I want to start kicking people out of the church for being sinners, I will need to start with myself and then move on to kicking out everybody else. (Now, I believe there are times when it is appropriate for congregations to exclude individuals from some privileges of church membership because those individuals refuse to heed the church's call to turn away from their sins to God, but we won't get into that right now.) Christians are redeemed sinners. We are sinners who are being made holy by the work of God, but we are still sinners. As long as we live in this life, we will not be perfect, though we keep striving to follow Christ's example, and He keeps helping us grow.

As a pastor, I end up talking about sin quite often. It's not something I always enjoy or get excited about. But I talk about sin because it's important part of talking about God's grace to us in Jesus. And I try my best to talk about sin out of love. I really believe that our sins hurt us, weakening our trust in God. And I can't just sit by silently and watch people I care about do things that hurt them. I wouldn't want others to sit by silently and watch me hurt myself.

Too often we act like the church is some sort of club for "good" people or righteous people. Too often we get this country club mentality where we want to keep others out. We should act like the church is a support group for sinners. We should want everyone to come in and hear about how Jesus forgives us and renews us and calls us to a new and richer life. We should encourage and challenge and accompany one another in following Jesus. But I think by and large the church in America is failing at this. I as a pastor and a Christian am failing at promoting and practicing this. Rather than viewing fellow Christians as brothers and sisters that we can journey with, rather than welcoming visitors exploring what Jesus is all about like family members, we so often see each other for a little while on Sunday and then go back to (hopefully) trying to live the Christian life—all on our own. So often we're weakening ourselves and hurting each other by not devoting ourselves to this brotherly and sisterly love. People who identify as LGBTQ+ have often borne even more of the weight of my and our failure.

So please, you and I need to take our relationships as Christians beyond the walls of our church buildings. We need to do and share life together. We need to wrestle with sins together. We need to be patient and kind. We need to love one another by helping each other follow Jesus more closely. We need to keep pointing one another back to Jesus' love. We need a support group. We need a family. Thank God that He gives us one.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#297 Who Does It Hurt?

Who does it hurt? This is a question we ask ourselves a lot when it comes to our behavior, our morals. Christians have a reputation for being uptight about things that most people would say don't really hurt anyone. A lot of us human beings think it shouldn't matter if we use pornography or have consensual sex outside of marriage. We think it's not a big deal if we call someone names behind their back or tell some "white lies" to serve a good end. Being envious of our friends' possessions or being a little materialistic and buying more than we need don't seem very problematic to us. Nor does neglecting worshiping God or placing God after our families and jobs on our list of priorities. We think these actions don't harm other people, so even if they're not exactly what God wants for us, they're not so bad.

Recently I've heard this argument made when it comes to same-sex marriage. Who does it hurt if two male Christians or two female Christians are sexually intimate within the context of a committed marriage? I have some sympathy for the argument. There are other sexual sins, like adultery and sexual abuse, that cause obvious and greater harm to other people. And being in an opposite-sex marriage does not mean that I or anyone else is sin-free. Part of me would like to celebrate any two people getting married and move on. However, as I've said before on this blog, I believe that God teaches us in the Bible that His will is that sex should only take place within marriage and that marriage should only be between one man and one woman. I have not come across an argument from Scripture in support of same-sex marriage that I find convincing. Others disagree with me, and I am not a perfect interpreter of God's will, but I really believe this is how God wants us to live. Let's proceed humbly and cautiously.

So then, if I am correct, and God does not approve of same-sex marriage, who does it hurt? I think the answer is the spouses in the same-sex marriage. I know that might sound ridiculous. What could be wrong about getting what you want in a committed relationship? But, assuming with me that same-sex marriages go against God's will, then being in such a relationship means teaching yourself to disobey God, to sin. It means elevating your own desires above what God wants for His people generally and you specifically. Ultimately, it means acting like you are God and you get to decide what right and wrong is for yourself.

Now—and this is extremely important—this is the way that ALL sin works. Other sexual sins, like premarital sex or even lust, mean the same things for us. Other sins, like hatred and greed and superstition, do as well. At its heart, sin is idolatry. We sin because—even if we don't consciously think this—we believe we can and should control our lives. We trust ourselves instead of God. Now—this, too is extremely important—I do not believe that sexual sins in general nor same-sex sexual sins in particular are worse in God's sight than other sins. Sin of any variety is dangerous because it leads us away from trusting and relying on God, the only source of life and salvation. Only Christ Jesus can save us from any sin, and He can save us from every sin, forgiving us and transforming us to live for Him in grateful obedience. Who does our sin hurt? It hurts us, so Jesus calls us to repent, turning from our sins to Him, because He alone can save, and He freely gives salvation to all His people.

[Don't stop here! Please go on and read the next post.]

Grace and peace,

BMH

#296 Meaningless!

This past Sunday I preached in another church, so I brought a sermon from the series I preached on Ecclesiastes last fall. Getting back into Ecclesiastes reminded me of some of the things I learned while preparing those sermons—things I had considered blogging about last fall but never got around to.

At the heart of the book of Ecclesiastes is a Hebrew word that gets repeated over and over again. Transliterated into our alphabet, the word would look like "hevel." This word is used to refer to a breath or a vapor, something that's transitory and doesn't last long. In Ecclesiastes, the word seems to carry a sense of futility and meaninglessness. (Older Bible translations used the word vanity, though today we tend to think of people being full of themselves when we hear "vanity.") The human author of the book laments that all sorts of things are "hevel," even saying that everything is "hevel."

The Bible also commonly uses "hevel" in one other way: to describe the worthless idols that people serve instead of the one true God. I find that really interesting because many of the things that Ecclesiastes dismisses as "hevel" are the kinds of things that we are easily tempted to make into idols: things like wealth, wisdom and knowledge, pleasure, work and achievements,  youth and energy. I don't think this is a coincidence. I think that through Ecclesiastes God is intentionally exposing our idols. God shows us that these earthly things fade and cannot last. These false gods cannot give ultimate meaning to our lives; only God can. These things can be good and enjoyable if gratefully accepted and used as gifts from God, but if we try to build our lives around them, they will only let us down in the end. Rather than chasing after things that are "hevel," God calls us to seek and enjoy Him, the eternal God who offers us everlasting life with Him through Christ Jesus our Savior. That's a message God's people—me included!—need to hear again and again.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#295 You Will See My Life through Your Eyes as Your Life Will Be Seen through Mine

We have a baby boy at our house! Jeremiah Brian Hofman was born on Wednesday, May 3. His birth was not nearly as surprising and stressful as Mia's birth, but it was eventful enough in its own way. Jeremiah was due on May 27, so he was born about three weeks early. Tess's blood pressure had gone up the previous Saturday, which put us on alert. Jeremiah continued to seem fine, so we were hoping to make it at least another week so that he could be considered full term. But on Wednesday Tess went in to meet with the surgeon and was informed that she was going to have a baby that day. I was home with Mia. Tess called me, came back to get me and some things, and about two and a half hours later we had baby boy. It wasn't as quick as the process with Mia, and I didn't feel so overwhelmed this time around, but this was still definitely not how Tess and I had planned things. Jeremiah weigned in at 5 pounds, 4 ounces, so he's pretty little. He's been on a special blue blanket/pad thing for the past couple days to combat a little jaundice, but we were able to stay in here in Le Mars, and he came home just three days after birth. We are very grateful to God for our healthy baby boy. God has answered many prayers.

We are still praying for growth and development for Jeremiah. He seems to be eating pretty well, but we'll feel better once he puts on a little weight and fits into his diapers better. Lanie and Mia are adjusting to having a little brother, and Tess and I are getting used to being outnumbered. Things are still in flux at the Hofman house, but God is good, and we are beyond happy.

Grace and peace,

BMH

P.S. This post's title comes from Superman the Movie.

#294 Sic 'em!

It's been a crazy few days, so I'm just going to tell a story this week: my favorite story from days running cross country in college. Toward the end of my senior season, I was out running with my friends Kyle, Andy, and Chris. We high-mileage guys were putting in something like eight miles that day, a pretty typical run for us. The first three-quarters of the run went by smoothly. We took a pretty unique route, but nothing out of the ordinary happened. The air was crisp and cool, the leaves were falling, and we cruised along. As we headed back toward campus, we cut through a sort of gated community, racing through backyards. On our left was a high chain-link fence (think little league backstop). Houses were on our right. The end of the community was drawing close: just past a regular wooden privacy fence was the city water tower. With only a few backyards left to go, we heard a voice boom out of one of the houses, "Fido (I have no idea if that's the correct name—it's not important), get 'em!" Adrenaline pumping, we kicked into high gear. Kyle went over the fence. Chris went over the fence. I sprinted up to the fence—and didn't make it over. Andy started freaking out behind me: "HOFMAN!" I cleared the fence with my second attempt. As Andy came over we heard the dog barking. It was some tiny little ankle-biter. All four of us cracked up, practically rolling on the ground. I don't know who that guy was, but he got us. He got us good.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#293 Easter Relief

Ask pretty much any pastor—pretty much any person involved in planning and leading worship for that matter—and they'll tell you that the time leading up to Easter Sunday is busy. Between Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday I feel like I lock in, spending less time on visiting and more time on worship preparations, focused on helping my congregation retrace Jesus' journey through death to life once again. As much as possible I try to move other business until after Easter Sunday because the extra services and gatherings take over my schedule. The week tends to go by in a blur.

Once Easter Sunday comes I feel like I can relax and breathe a little easier. And I think that's exactly the way I should feel. There is nothing more important or more wonderful or more reassuring than Christ's victory over sin and death and all the powers of evil. Easter is a constant reminder that Jesus has secured eternal salvation for His people. We Christians don't need to be afraid, no matter what may come, because nothing can separate us from God's love for us in Christ Jesus. Now it's true that we celebrate Easter a bit every single Sunday when we gather for worship. I shouldn't unnecessarily stress myself out at any time of year. But somehow the Easter good news seems to click a little more clearly for me each spring. Thank God for the hope and joy and peace He gives!

Grace and peace,

BMH

#292 Pregnancy Progress

Tess and I did some remembering and calculating last week, and as far as we can tell, today Tess is exactly as far along in this pregnancy as she was in her last pregnancy when Mia was born. Tess went to see the doctor this morning, and everything looks good enough. We know that things can change in a hurry, and we won't feel fully settled until Baby Boy is safely at home, but we are very grateful to have made it to this point. God has been answering our prayers thus far.

Every week—in fact, every day—that Baby Boy waits to be born is worthwhile. Our hope is to get him to make it to a planned c-section in about six weeks—that's just a few days before his due date. However, even making it four more weeks to May 8 would be a huge victory. At that point, we would be close enough for the pregnancy to be considered full term. The goal is almost in sight at this point. We're getting more and more excited. But in this instance, we are happy to wait.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#291 A-Puzzle-A-Day

This post is a little overdue. I got distracted with some other things, I guess. Last year my parents bought me one of these puzzles for my birthday. They showed up at my house with it on February 18, 2022, one day after my 31st birthday. I spent the next year rearranging the eight wooden pieces to uncover the proper month and day for every day of the year. The first few days were pretty tough, but eventually I learned some tricks that made me much more efficient. I took this picture after completing the whole challenge on February 17, 2023.

And before you ask, yes, I figured out how to get February 29, even though that date didn't come around in 2022. And yes, I also found solutions for the imaginary dates of February 30 & 31, April 31, June 31, September 31, and November 31. I made 372 different combinations.

Throughout the year Lanie was a constant motivator. Day after day she wanted me to show her the proper date. She forgot about the puzzle for a few days after my birthday, but then she asked me to keep going. I told her I've done it all before. The puzzle can wait until she's ready to take up the challenge herself.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#290 Medical Mysteries

Sometimes I think that my seminary training should've included a class on medical terminology. I spend a lot of time talking to church members about their health. I hear about chronic health conditions that they've been diagnosed with. I hear about different treatments and procedures that their doctors are recommending to alleviate their pain or sometimes simply to help with diagnosis. I hear about various ailments that land them in the hospital for a short time. But many times the words I hear go over my head. So I ask for clarification or try to look up the terms online. While that's helpful, I don't always end up with a very clear idea of what the future outlook is for these people whom I care about. Many times I wish I had a better sense of what was going on. Thankfully, I don't need to understand everything to pray for others. God knows what's happening and what's needed, even if my knowledge comes in scattered bits and pieces.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#289 Pastor Peeves

Friendly reminder: the last book of the Bible is Revelation. That's a singular word. There is no "s" in the name of that book. Please, please, please don't refer to the book as "Revelations." "Revelations" is incorrect.

Also, while the book before Proverbs is indeed Psalms (that is plural!), each individual chapter is a psalm. So you don't need to say "Psalms 23." You can (and should) refer to the twenty-third psalm as Psalm 23.

That is all.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#288 Hindsight

I've been reflecting off and on about how I and the rest of the council at the church I was serving responded to COVID-19 in 2020. Our church, like much of American society, tried a whole bunch of things that we'd never tried before. We stopped gathering for worship for a while. When we came back, we wore face masks and sat farther apart and didn't sing—at least for a couple weeks.

Looking back and having more information, I would do things differently than we did. Trying to meet for worship without singing was miserable. We quickly changed our position on that, but if we did it over again, I'm positive we would have sung together from day one. But the bigger change I would make is not asking church members to wear masks, especially children. We never fully required masks for the congregation, but we (and I in particular) encouraged them for everyone until late in the spring of 2021. I think I and we tried wearing masks out of a desire to love our neighbors and keep them from getting sick. We paid attention to guidelines from state and national agencies and to what schools and other churches in our area were doing. We wanted to keep each other safe. I hoped to set a good example. But with the benefit of hindsight and more data, I don't think the masks helped nearly as much as we hoped, and they often made our fellowship more difficult.

Now I certainly would not have told anyone they couldn't wear a mask at church, and we didn't tell anyone to come back to worshiping in person if they didn't feel comfortable. But I think it's important for me and for us to think through our past decisions. Part of leadership is taking ownership of the choices I've made and admitting when I was wrong or misguided. Even the best intentions don't always lead us the right direction. The early days of COVID-19 felt like nothing I'd ever seen before, but hopefully remembering them will better prepare me for future challenges.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#287 Anger Issues

I've been thinking about anger quite a lot over the last week. On Sunday I preached from Matthew 5:21-26, which begins like this: "You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘You shall not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to a brother or sister, ‘Raca,’ is answerable to the court. And anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell." Jesus interprets God's commandment against murder by teaching us that God wants us to get rid of the anger that's at the root of murder.

Jesus really doesn't give us much wiggle room here. He tells us that we're sinning if we're angry at someone else and so we deserve God's judgment. Now—before you object—it's true that Jesus doesn't mean to condemn absolutely all anger. There are examples of Jesus being appropriately angry, and the book of Ephesians instructs Christians not to sin in our anger, which implies that anger can be justified. But it seems that appropriate anger is extremely difficult to find. When Jesus gets angry, it seems to be about others being mistreated and not about Him being upset about what's happening to Him. He never loses control of His anger, and He doesn't stay angry for long. (That same passage from Ephesians also instructs Christians not to let the sun go down while we're angry.)

I know that I often want to excuse and explain my anger. Sure, I lost my cool, but do you know what he said to me? Yes, my words were harsh, but she had been aggravating me. Maybe I was spiteful, but they ruined my dinner or undid all that work I'd done. I want to believe that what I feel is right. But Jesus demolishes my excuses. Sometimes my feelings are not just wrong but sinful. I'm responsible for my reactions and responses; I don't get to blame others for my behavior. And even if I somehow have a legitimate reason to become angry, that doesn't give me the right to stay angry. If I'm angry at someone else, I'm already starting to murder her or him in my heart. I need to turn away from my sin to God.

I don't know how we can read Jesus' words and not be convicted. I don't know how we can look inside ourselves and not find sinful anger there. We can't save ourselves. We need Jesus to forgive us. We need Jesus to transform us and help us avoid anger. Thankfully, Jesus understands our temptation to anger. He not only calls us to way of perfect righteous, but He also goes on to give us a way forward when we fail and find ourselves in the midst of anger: reconcile. He tells to let go of our anger and make peace. Jesus' words aren't easy to live out, but He teaches us the path of life, the way that He Himself lived. I don't know about you, but I need to keep on working on following Jesus, and I need to keep asking for His forgiveness and help.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#286 Calvin and God

I've spent the last few months reading John Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion (Battle's translation of the 1559 edition if you care). Calvin has long been a favorite theologian of mine. When I was in seminary, I read large portions of the Institutes, particularly in my systematic theology courses, but with workload limits and the need to read other authors as well, we didn't get through the entire work. So I decided now was the time to go through the whole thing. I tried not to read too much at a time—no more than a chapter in one sitting—so that I could absorb and learn from my reading as much as possible. This seemed to be a solid strategy, though it did mean it took me a while to get through the two volumes.

Looking back, I think the thing that stands out to me most is just how big Calvin's view of God is. Calvin emphasizes God's control over all things, how He rules all events with His good will. And Calvin also stresses the immensity of God's grace, explaining salvation as only God's work from beginning to end. Now Calvin certainly isn't alone in thinking this way, but you can't help but notice how absolutely unwilling Calvin is to take anything away from God's greatness. Calvin would rather talk about God working out His purposes than about human freedom because he won't let us think our choices are able to thwart or be outside of God's plans. He'll emphasize our sinfulness and weakness again and again so that we don't trust ourselves in the least but only look to Christ to forgive us and make us new.

Hearing that we're broken and fallen and not in control, that we deserve death and hell for our sins is not pleasant. But hearing that God doesn't leave anything to chance, that He loves human beings and adopts them as His own just because He wants to, that He'll never let anything snatch His people out of His hands is beyond comforting. Such a big God is mysterious and mind-boggling, but only such a big God can give us the assurance that we are secure in Him, no matter what may come. Only such a big God can guarantee eternal salvation for mortal and morally deficient people. As further evidence of His love, this God stoops down to our level and communicates with us again and again in terms we can understand through the Scriptures and the sacraments. Only this great and gracious, infinite and tender God could be worth giving our selves to and living our lives for. Calvin talks about God in a way that fills us with awe and love and trust and devotion. I hope that my life and my teaching reflect such a high view of God.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#285 Girl Trouble

As the father of two young daughters, sometimes I just want them to sit on my lap and snuggle up to me. All the games and stories and stuff are fun, but once in a while it's nice to have them simply be with me. So when Lanie or Mia says she wants to do something with me, I'll often respond, "Snuggle?" Without fail, my suggestion gets shot down. So I've gotten in the habit of asking, "Why does Daddy have these little girls if none of them are going to snuggle with me?" Lanie and Mia normally just laugh it off, but now the joke seems to be on them. Tess and I found out we're expecting a baby boy. My girls—Mia especially—were disappointed by the news. (Mia actually asked Tess if she could change the baby to a girl for her.) But I'm telling them that this is what happens when they refuse to snuggle up to their daddy: they get a brother.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#284 Shoveling Thoughts

About ten days ago Le Mars got a bunch of snow—I heard as much as 9". (We also got a bunch of snow two days ago, but this story is from the earlier snowfall.) So I went out in the morning with my shovel to clear my driveway. I knew it was going to be a long process, so I told myself to take it a little bit at a time. Don't look at how much is left; just fill the shovel and focus and getting rid of that snow. Over and over and over again I hauled away shovelfuls until my work was done.

As I reflected on my shoveling, I started to think that it was a little bit like ministry as a pastor. There are always things that I can do. I could spend time with church members or getting to know unchurched people in my community. I could do my reading and sermon preparation or revise my sermon another time. There are administrative tasks to be done. If I think about how much I could do yet, I will without fail be overwhelmed. In fact, unlike my shoveling, the work of ministry doesn't have a clear end point. There is no end to visiting and praying and caring for people. My sermon could always be better than its current state. So I just need to focus on doing the next thing well: Work on this relationship with a church member. Try this activity in the community. Consult this resource or write this paragraph. Maybe by God's grace I'll be able to look back at times and think I've made good progress. And certainly I must stop and reflect and learn from my experiences as well. But I need to remember that there's nothing wrong with little by little if I keep following Christ.

Grace and peace,

BMH

#283 Heavenly Dessert

And we're back! The last couple weeks have been a whirlwind, and the time between posts became quite a bit longer than I intended. Oh well. Let's kick off the new year with a post that some of you might be tempted to take too seriously.

While back in Wisconsin for Christmas, Tess and I got some custard. I think custard is phenomenal. Ice cream is great, but custard is creamier and smoother and richer. So I started thinking about when the kingdom fully comes. I wonder if all of our ice cream will be transformed into custard (or something like it)—even more scrumptious than we can comprehend at this point. When we sit at the table for God's heavenly banquet, the wedding supper of the Lamb, we may very well have custard for (part of) our dessert. Now you may be thinking, Hold on. What about those people who prefer frozen yogurt? Will they eat custard, too? And, dear reader, the answer is simple: Of course they will; God will have fixed them by then.

Grace and peace,

BMH