From the Pastor’s Study

Hello! I’m Ken Schurb, Pastor of Zion Lutheran Church just south of Moberly High School. For eight years now, Moberly has been home to me, my wife Lana and my kids Ana-Maria and Luke. I am delighted to have the opportunity to write this column for the Moberly Mirror, and grateful too. Sometimes I find myself answering the question, “What has the Church done for you?” There are several ways I could go about responding, but let me approach this very personally.

For one thing, my Church gives me the opportunity to say “Thanks” to God. It is only realistic to give credit where it is due. It’s only fair to express gratitude when it is appropriate, like my gratitude for the invitation to write this article. Well, what do I have except what God has given to me? If I teach my kids to say “Thank you,” shouldn’t I do the same before the One Who gives all and knows all?

Second: through the Church, God keeps giving to me. He gives me guidance and strength. Church affects the way I live. I can tell you after years of experience in the Church that the effect is for good.

Third: speaking of my kids, I am very much aware that they need these same things. My Church provides me much-needed help to keep them spiritually centered and strong.

These are all great things. Yet none of them is the most important thing my Church has done for me.

The most important thing my Church has done for me is: it has gotten me ready to die. It’s smart to prepare for major events, right?

Well, I am going to die. “The wages of sin is death,” says the Bible, “but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23).

I will die because I am a sinner. It’s not that I am a sinner because I sin. No, I sin because I am a sinner. This is the fatal condition that has infested all humanity since Adam and Even fell into sin. It’s my condition too. “Death” in this case means not only heart stopping and brainwaves going flat; still more, it means eternal separation from God.

“But the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Jesus, true God and true Man, purchased and won me from sin and from death. This is the most important thing that God has done for me, or for you. The most important thing the Church has done is to point me to Christ. Thereby it has gotten me ready to die . . . and to live in Him.

Death gets its sting from sin. Sin gets its power to from God’s Law, which shows how bad sin is. “But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:57).

As a pastor, I point people to Christ. That is what I will try to do in these columns this month.