Howdy So one of our sister congregations in our
Lutheran Church circuit asked me if I wanted
to attend a men's retreat in Montana over Labor
Day weekend, and I thought why not I Like to
get away from Houston every once in a while all
the concrete everywhere. Let's be honest But
I wasn't sure what to expect but it turned out
to be an amazing time of fly -fishing and boating
and hiking and Shotgun practice and whatever
struck our fancy while we were up there some
guys went golfing But I have absolutely no golfing
skills. I'm barely even good at putt -putt But
and believe it or not though. I actually caught
five fish while fly -fishing So I was uh, that's
five times more than I've ever caught in the
rest of my life So, you know, that's pretty amazing
But on that Saturday, I stood on the edge of
a cliff about 40 feet in the air, looking down
into a river. From below, it hadn't really looked
all that high, but once I climbed up and stood
on the edge, I realized this is higher than I
thought. Now, I had seen a few people already
jump. Everyone was fine, laughing. Everything
was great. The depth, they checked, was over
100 feet. I had my water shoes. I was jumping
in feet first. Everything was fine. But my knees
started to shake. My heart started pounding.
My stomach dropped. I could not let go of the
rocks behind me. And I thought, what am I doing
up here? Now something you should assume about
your pastor is that he turns almost everything
into a spiritual metaphor. Of course I do, it's
my job. But I thought to myself, what if God
had told me to jump? He didn't tell me to jump,
but I'm just saying. Would I trust him? Would
I obey him even if I was afraid? Now I know God
doesn't work like that. He doesn't just tell
us to jump off of cliffs to prove our faith.
But I had been scared a lot when I was a kid.
I had avoided too many challenges that would
have helped me when I was younger. And since
then, I sometimes look for things that push me
out of my comfort zone to give me some of those
experiences. So that's where my mind went. If
God asked me to do something scary, knowing that
I would get through it, something that may not
have made much sense, but would I obey? And then
another thought hit me. Why even climb all the
way up here if I'm not going to jump? I had already
made the climb. The choice was right in front
of me. You can't just stay neutral. Was I going
to stand up there and make my friends wait another
hour and a half for me to jump? Yeah, I didn't
realize it was that long. It was that long. Or
was I going to leap? And so finally, I jumped.
Isn't it amazing how we take the simplest of
things and we make it into something complicated?
Moses faced something like that. He brought the
children of Israel out of Egypt out of slavery,
and yet the whole time they kept complaining.
It should have been fairly straightforward, right?
Wouldn't you like to leave that? He had brought
the children of Israel out of Egypt and they
kept complaining. But Jesus just wanted the people
to follow him. Of course it's going to be hard
going through a wilderness to get home, but they
couldn't seem to somehow just accept following
after the God who loved them. Moses showed them
that God's Word, it's not far away, it's not
unreachable. His commands are not impossible.
His will, it's accessible. When we realize that
we have a choice before us, life and prosperity
with God versus death and destruction without
Him, God calls His people to decide. See, we're
meant to choose life, not by looking for the
quick thrill of jumping into a river, but by
loving the Lord, walking in His ways and holding
fast to Him. See, that's what leads to life and
blessing. But that's also where the metaphor
of my cliff jump stopped being just a metaphor.
See, here's the thing. When I hit the water,
I didn't cross my arms the way that I probably
should have. See, somehow I must have leaned
forward just a little bit, and the impact caught
me right in the chest. The spot in my sternum
where my chest muscles were weakened years ago
by cancer radiation therapy, which nobody else
had, so nobody else would have thought to mention
it. And it fractured. Yes, I am preaching with
a fractured sternum. It's a lot of ibuprofen.
See, following, even in a silly practice metaphor,
it cost me something. It hurt, and it still does.
But that's the reality of the Christian life.
Following Christ isn't just about the moments
that work out neatly. They're not about where
the prayers get answered in exactly the way we
wanted. It's not where the paths are smooth,
because sometimes faith costs. Sometimes obedience
hurts. But the good part about Jesus is that
he doesn't hide that. In Luke 14, Jesus said
to the crowds, if you want to follow me, count
the cost. Whoever does not carry his cross and
follow me cannot be my disciple. He says it plainly,
count the cost. Don't pretend discipleship is
going to be painless. See, that's how life often
works, isn't it? We face these cliff edge moments.
We oftentimes want Christian faith to be the
default for normal people. just to be neutral.
We cruise along the river and watch the cliffs
from a distance. But there are these moments
in our lives when we find ourselves at a place
where we can't always be neutral. Neutral itself,
indecision itself, is a decision. Do we stand
up for people being oppressed? Do we tell someone
they've gone too far and that we cannot accept
it any longer? The question is always the same.
Are we willing to jump? Are we willing to take
the risk? And are we willing to pay the price
when we do? And often it's not the climb that's
the hardest part. We may talk a good talk, saying
what we would do if the choice was in front of
us, how we must be willing to choose what isn't
what others would accept. It's the choice at
the top that matters. when we don't feel the
ground under our feet and we have to keep moving
forward. See, life in Christ requires that we
choose Him daily. It's the moments when the cost
becomes clear, when we realize that this could
hurt, when we know that not everyone, maybe not
even those closest to us, will agree or understand.
And that's when faith gets real. But don't miss
this. Life is on the other side of the leap.
When I told my mom later on, yes, I told my mom
later on. See, I know how bad it would be if
she gave me a hug sometime in the next month
and I wince in pain and she's like, what's going
on? Why didn't you tell me? She was not very
happy. Didn't she teach her son not to jump off
of cliffs just because everyone else was doing
it? Her immediate response, why would you do
that? And then after a nice long pause added,
well, you're 45 years old. You can make your
own decisions. And she's right. Nobody could
make that decision for me. Not even the people
who love me the most. But isn't that the way
it is? with most important decisions anyway.
Jesus is very clear in Luke 14. He's walking
with the crowds, and He turns to them and says,
if you want to follow Me, count the cost. It
won't be easy. And it may mean putting Me before
your family, your possessions, your comfort.
It will cost you everything. That's a hard one.
It's one thing to cheer for Jesus when He heals
and when He multiplies bread and fish. Thanks
for feeding us. Thanks for taking away my limp.
But to follow Him? To really follow? When we're
called to eat His body and drink His blood? To
accept the sacrifice that He showed us on the
cross that now defines our lives? Putting our
lives in His hands. Even if it bruises us. Even
if it costs us. even if we lose everything, even
our own reputation, even if it kills us. And
then Jesus starts talking about salt. If salt
loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty
again? And isn't that so strange? How does that
make any sense? How is salt not... Salty have
you ever gone in the pantry and grabbed the salt
and like take it a little bit and taste it and
be like ooh jelly beans no Salt is salt. How
is salt not salty pure? Well, okay, I guess I
may figure it out see pure salt The kind that
we buy in the stores today. It's not gonna lose
its saltiness because sodium chloride You know
NaCl that table salt. It's not gonna stop being
Table salt. It's stable. If you put it on your
tongue in a hundred years, it's gonna still taste
like salt. But in Jesus' day, salt often came
from places like the Dead Sea. It was a mixture
of salt, gypsum, sand, and other minerals. If
the mixture was exposed to moisture, the actual
salt would dissolve away and leave a chalky,
tasteless white powder of everything else that
looked like salt. but tasted like nothing. It
was useless. Who knew? See, that's what discipleship
without commitment is like. It still looks like
the real thing, but it's lost its purpose. That's
what happens when we claim to follow Christ,
but we back down when others look at us and say,
ooh, why would you want to do that? A disciple
who loses their distinctiveness, their flavor,
becomes like that residue. We may look like salt,
but we're no longer useful. And that's what it
felt like on that cliff when suddenly a young
girl climbed to the top. Her father went up there
with her, and he jumped. Her older sister held
her hand and jumped only for the young girl to
let go at the very last second. I was like, man,
that was good. Yeah, well done. Someone even
tried to throw a rock to show that it wasn't
really all that far. Yeah, that did not help
at all. While I had already been up there for
an hour by then, she stood there with me for
half an hour while others were trying to convince
her to jump. They'd kind of given up on me. For
some reason, a comment made by her father who
climbed back up again, It brought to mind for
me a physics lesson which of course it did and
I started rambling about how gravity is you know
a law, but it's just the appearance of gravitational
acceleration in the universe when enacted upon
a Area that looks like a flat surface and the
girl looked at me and said Why are you talking
to me about this instead of jumping? Ouch young
girl ouch And 45 seconds later, I jumped. And
two minutes after that, she jumped with her family.
Why did that comment get me to jump? Because
we realize that the very thing that gets us to
do the hard things is when we realize our part
in living for the next generation. I didn't want
that girl to let my fear become an excuse for
her to avoid something she really wanted. Something
that maybe she needed. I've been there and I
didn't want that for her. I wanted her to be
brave in ways that I wasn't when I was a kid.
We come back to church often times when we have
our own children. We walk away from abuse because
we can't let others see that as an example of
how to live. We leave our dream job so we don't
miss out on spending time with nieces and nephews.
We stay with a lower paying job so we can spend
time with the kids who need us the most. But
salt isn't something that changes how salty it
is over time. Deciding to lose its saltiness
during college and then finding its way again
after the fun years end. It's either salt or
it isn't. Are you salt? And if you are, where
is your flavor? So here's a question. Where are
you standing at the edge right now? What cliff
has God brought you to? Maybe it's a decision
to forgive someone who hurt you. Maybe it's a
call to give more generously than feel safe.
Maybe it's speaking about your faith in a place
where you'd rather keep quiet. Maybe it's letting
go of something you've been clinging to. But
standing on the edge is scary, and frankly, the
leap may bruise you. It may even fracture something.
It may mean that people close to you shake their
heads and say, why would you do that, Christian?
But the leap is where faith becomes real. It's
where life with Christ begins. And as a church,
that's our calling too. Not to jump off the cliffs,
but to follow Christ. We're called to be salt.
Not to look like salt, but to live with flavor,
with distinctiveness, with faithfulness that
endures. We are called to be a people who don't
just stand on the edge of a cliff, admiring the
view but who leap into the waters of God's promise.
Because here's the truth. Choosing life in Christ
is not about avoiding pain. It's about trusting
that the life He gives is greater than any cost
we could bear. Moses said it long ago. Choose
life so that you and your children may live.
Jesus says it even more clearly. Whoever loses
his life for my sake will find it. So may we
not hesitate at the edge. May we count the cost
and still leap. May we choose life by choosing
Christ. And don't forget to cross your arms when
you jump. Thanks be to God.