Gethsemane Newsletter Bloopers

They say laughter is good for the soul. So, with that in mind, this week we bring you church bulletin bloopers as part of our Weekly Newsletter. We hope these bring you joy and laughter!

Here are a couple for this week that we find creative/especially funny!

• What was Moses' wife, Zipphora, known as when she'd throw dinner parties? "The hostess with the Moses."

• How are toddlers and those who attempted to build a tower to Heaven similar? They all babble.

• How do you know that atoms are Catholic? They have mass.

If you have jokes or funny things you would like seen in the Newsletter, feel free to click the email link attached to Jacob Nehrbass as well as share them with Pastor Jeff!

1 “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. 

2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? 

3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. 

4 You know the way to the place where I am going.”

5 Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”

6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 

7 If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”

8 Philip said, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.”

9 Jesus answered: “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father’? 

10 Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work. 

11 Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves. 

12 Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. 

13 And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 

14 You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.

But (Jesus) answered and said, “Every plant, which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up.” (Matthew 15:13)

I’ve never been good at gardening, although I love to look at, and take pictures of, all sorts of flowers, plants, bushes and trees. One of my favorite garden flowers is the sunflower, which I used to see in abundance in the fields of my dad’s childhood farm in Hiawatha, Kansas. The way the flowers turn their faces towards the sun, and follow it each day, like a community of the faithful following God’s son, Jesus Christ.

The first year we moved into our home we planted sunflowers (by the seed) into new soil that we had purchased by the yard and dumped into our south facing garden. By the end of that summer we had Jurassic Park-sized sunflowers that reached as high as our second story. The squirrels loved to climb their sturdy stems and sit on the seeded center eating away. When I’d tap on the window they would freeze as if thinking “if I don’t move…she can’t see me?” 

By the first freeze, the now seedless flowers had collapsed in on themselves, stems toppled, cracked in half, and their beauty fell back to the earth. Each year since then, I’ve tried to recreate the gigantic sunflowers but we are lucky if tiny ones grow. Must have been the perfect timing, the right soil, the right kinds of seeds, the ideal amount of sunlight. Or maybe they wanted to grow big enough to not be squirrel food? 

I don’t have a green thumb like my mom, my husband, or my good friend (who comes each year to help me plant new things). And, with my dad gone this year, the task of watering all the flowers will be up to me; and boy that is a worrisome thing. But I will do my best. I will water and I will pray over them—and even talk to them, good pep talks encouraging them to grow. I will even try to weed around them and keep my fingers crossed that I don’t pull out any new growth.

My husband asked me why I don’t weed (he’s a good weeder), and I told him that I don’t know a weed from a plant. They look an awful lot the same. This summer, I might get a fancy phone app that identifies a weed from a sprout by a simple picture. I kinda blame my parents who in the last years of their lives had “weed” gardens everywhere (and they were actually pretty). They took over their backyard garden, the side raised beds, and even one giant weed—that looked like it had landed from another planet—took over the berm. My dad didn’t want to pull it, and it grew as tall as him; perhaps because of respect for all plant life or maybe awe at the odd looking thing. Or could it be that, like me, my dad (the son of a farmer) didn’t know a weed from a plant? I doubt that. 

Still, my husband is good at it, and has called for reinforcements this year with a service that has a special spray to fertilize the lawn AND kill the Creeping Charlie. A concoction that supposedly promotes healthy growth while at the same time prevents bad growth from running rampant. We spent a lot (I mean a lot) of time last year getting new sod down, adding hostas and ferns, lilac bushes and even vines to grow on our fence. It was the “year of the yard” my husband said. And this year it is the year “we grow everything” (that should grow) and get rid of what offends the yard (and us). 

There is a metaphor here folks. If I take time to look at my gardening and weeding and transfer it to my spiritual life something interesting happens. If I don’t know how to grow a healthy spiritual life, don’t recognize the bad from the good, and get a bit lazy or ignorant about pruning and pulling the weeds from my thoughts and behaviors, I might run into some trouble. My garden, with its sunflowers, vines, and newly green lawn that hides the seeds of Creeping Charlie, might not make it. There is a sort of vigilance, and education, that is required to be a good gardener of one’s garden and lawn, as much as there is of one’s spiritual life and internal thoughts and desires, behaviors and words. It all starts with knowing what is a weed (bad) and what is new growth (good). Because gosh, it is sometimes difficult to tell the difference if you aren’t spending enough time in God’s Word. The Bible, and the guidance of Jesus, are far better than the best phone apps for helping us discern our personal weeds from our plants. 

So how do we really know in ourselves what is a deceptively “harmless” weed that might take us over or really just new growth in our spiritual life that needs time to take hold. Good news: we have Jesus. The parable of the weed and the wheat that Jesus tells in Matthew is one that reminds us that God is the ultimate gardener in our lives, planting what is good and pulling up that which is not. Like the special concoction that is now being put on my home’s lawn that is both fertilizer for the good grass and toxic to the sneaky weed, God has a good handle His Garden, and every plant in it; we just need to be open to God’s help with the pruning and the weeding. We need to trust that through Jesus the new growth in our lives will sprout, will flourish, and grow as tall as giant Kansas sunflowers. Giant sunflowers with our faces always following the Son.

Amen

15 “If you love me, keep my commands. 

16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— 

17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. 

18 I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 

19 Before long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. 

20 On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you. 

21 Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.”

22 Then Judas (not Judas Iscariot) said, “But, Lord, why do you intend to show yourself to us and not to the world?”

23 Jesus replied, “Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. 

24 Anyone who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.

25 “All this I have spoken while still with you. 

26 But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. 

27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.

28 “You heard me say, ‘I am going away and I am coming back to you.’ If you loved me, you would be glad that I am going to the Father, for the Father is greater than I. 

29 I have told you now before it happens, so that when it does happen you will believe. 

30 I will not say much more to you, for the prince of this world is coming. He has no hold over me, 

31 but he comes so that the world may learn that I love the Father and do exactly what my Father has commanded me.

Mothers Day is that day where we celebrate how much we love our mothers. For those of us who have mothers with us, it is a day of flowers and lunches and is a day we will be taking moments to express with gratitude how much we love our mothers. Mother’s Day is a very special day, because with mothers we learn so much about love; we learn so much about what it means to be loved, to love, and know love. Our Mothers tend to scrapes and bruises and bring life into the world. Mothers are able to whip together a meal out of nothing and give some of the best hugs when we are sad. We celebrate moms on Mother’s Day as well as the love they always give us. Mother’s Day is an example of how we love. 

On Father’s Day, we do the same thing. It is the day we celebrate how we learn love from our fathers too and how they teach us about loyalty, standing firm, and protecting those who we love. Fathers Day is a day we appreciate how fathers teach us how to build a life for ourselves, and teach us to do the right thing. We learn so much about love and we give thanks to mothers and fathers equally for how they give us love. 

Valentine’s Day is another holiday we learn about love. This day is about a very special love between two people; a love that unites couples in a way that is self sacrificing, romantic, unconditional, and special between two people. We learn to be in relationships that last months, years, or till the end based on this kind of love. Valentine’s Day, and other days like it, teach us how romantic love turns into a consistent faithful love that lasts forever. 

Now these days are not the only instances of love in our world. We lift up all relationships that teach us about love. We name cities over love like Philadelphia. There is so much love in this world! 

This book of John talks about the character in which we live with God. It also asks the question how do we walk that path with God and how is it that we talk about how to be a living disciple of Christ. The answer is that our lives as disciples are lived in love, and because of that, how we relate to God is in love. With love, that is how we walk our walk. If you love me, Jesus says, you will learn how to work and know how to do the right thing. If you love me, then I will go and prepare a place for you. If you love me, I will show you the Father, so that the Father can love you as I love you. 

One of the great mysteries of our faith is that the Trinity makes up the wholeness of who God is, and that between three whole parts there is one whole loving being. The relationship between the three parts interact in love. That is why God so loved the world, He gave his one and only son. Jesus said He will send another advocate to us, so that we may never be outside of the love of God again. Within this relationship of love, as represented in the Trinity, We know God. We live with God. We celebrate God in the ways that we love; in the way we love our moms, dads, romantic partners, and in the way that we love our siblings. We love the unique relationship of God as three parts. 

The book of John references love 57 times, and the word friend is mentioned much more than that. So, with that being said, how have you loved today? Have you had an opportunity today to love. Did you miss out on an opportunity to love? We are not obligated to love, we do not have to do it. However, I encourage you to choose to love, as Christ loves us. It is the secret sauce to relationships that seasons our lives. If you love me, Jesus says, then you will live in love. People of God, live in love.

Amen