Saint Matthew's

I received a couple of telephone messages over the past two days concerning our church’s rejection to meet with the Borough of New Milford mayor and council concerning the T-Mobile cellular flag pole that could be erected on a small part of our church property. Under advisement of my personal attorney, I will not respond to issues relating to the flag pole. But after speaking with him this morning, my private attorney (not Saint Matthew’s attorney) approved the following for publication here on the blog:

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“Pastor, you were mentioned in the newspaper today. What do you have to say about that?”

“Really? This isn’t some April Fool’s joke, right? Uh, my reaction? Um, did they at least spell my name right?”

“Of course, but what you do have to say about it? I mean, you’re being attacked, again.”

“Well, as long as they don’t accuse me of being a closet Boston Red Sox fan, I guess they can print what they want. I mean, even though it is in the newspaper, it doesn’t mean that it is true.”

“But they said some really bad things about you. What are going to do?”

“What am I going to do? I am going to get ready for church tonight at 7, and tomorrow night at 7, and Sunday morning at 10. I am going to prepare for our Easter egg hunt on Saturday at 11. And, of course, I am going to bring Christ to our shut ins. All of this is a heck of a lot more important to the kingdom of God than spending endless amounts of time responding to my name being mentioned in the newspaper.”

“Come on, Pastor! You’re accused of being a bad person. You have to say something.”

“There is only one thing I can do and that is to be the best servant of the Lord as possible. People can smear my name, attack me, accuse me of being a bad person, but in the end, my faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and my deeds in our church and our community tell a lot more about who I really am than some fiction that is written about me in a newspaper letter to the editor.”

“You mean you’re not bothered by it?”

“Are you kidding me? Bothered by some letter to the editor? Come on! I say it again, if I was accused of being a closet Red Sox fan, or even worse, being accused of being an Islanders’ fan, then I would be bothered.”

“Aren’t you the least bit upset?”

“I am upset that the good people at Saint Matthew’s are being dragged through the mud yet again. Saint Matthew’s is home to a wonderful growing congregation, all of whom don’t deserve to be smeared.”

“What are going to do about it?”

“Years back when I was working in politics, I learned a wonderful lesson from former New York Governor Malcolm Wilson. He once told me that not everyone is going to love you, no matter what field you work in. The best thing to do is to try and be the best person possible. As a pastor, this is magnificent advice. Since it apparently brings a weird kind of joy to the heart of this letter writer to smear my name, then let them have their fun. I am bigger than that. I better go now. I have to bring real joy to the hearts of God’s children, and that is bringing the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Many members of Saint Matthew’s received a disturbing and harassing letter several weeks ago from a neighbor of ours here on Center Street attacking our church and your faith in Jesus Christ. Sadly, I have been notified that many of you are once again going to get another letter in the mail, a letter that is going to be an attack letter against me. And yes, once again our stolen church directory is going to be used to harass you in your homes.

According to the email I received this afternoon, the letter writer is sending a copy to our district President, Rev. William Klettke, and to the Twin Boro News, which in my opinion, is a sad effort to embarrass and attack me.

As I wrote to you once before, my faith in Christ is unwavering. No matter the senseless, untrue attacks leveled against me, my trust and hope in our Lord Jesus Christ will never be shaken. When we Christians are senselessly attacked, we show ourselves to be better people.

I don’t know what kind of fiction will be woven into the letter, but needless to say, I have a feeling that the letter will be quite ugly when it comes to me.

My prayers will continue to ascend for the letter writer and her family.

(NOTE: I’ve locked the comments on this post and deleted those with personal attacks. Things were getting a little out of hand. This is still a church blog.)

A while back, I was asked what the difference was between a priest in the Roman Catholic Church and a pastor in the Lutheran Church, specifically in the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod. When the person’s eyes started to glaze over, I knew I lost them.

They weren’t looking for theological issues as to the differences in the view of being a clergyman.

I knew what they were after – they were wondering how the Roman Catholic view of church governance differs from how we Lutherans “run” a church.

In a nutshell, we Lutherans believe that the pastor is a pastor, God’s undershepherd who guides and protects His flock. We preach. We teach. We comfort. We love.

A pastor is not the CEO. Pastors don’t run the church; we leave that up to a church council, a Voters’ Body, an assembly. If the church wants to paint the sanctuary, the pastor has input, but the decision is made by the leaders in the congregation. The pastor could think that the color that was chosen is ugly; but the pastor doesn’t have veto power over the color. When we painted our sanctuary, I let my opinion be known — it just so happened to jive with the opinion of our Voters’ Body. If it didn’t, and they chose to go with a color I wasn’t thrilled with, as their pastor, I would enthusiastically support their decision.

That is what a pastor does.

My opinion is my opinion. I support the decision of our congregation in all matters, even those that I may not be thrilled with, since I am the pastor. And I lend my support to their final decision because that is what a pastor does.

I am not Saint Matthew’s CEO. The Voters’ Body works in that fashion. We’ve been blessed to have a wonderful group of men and women who make hard decisions for our church. They take up the mounting challenges of running, staffing, and operating a non-proft organization centered on the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. And they do an incredible job. They are a blessing to His Church and to our little place in northern New Milford.

As Saint Matthew’s pastor, I preach Christ crucified. I speak of the love of God through Jesus, our Savior. I bring Christ’s body and blood to God’s children in need of forgiveness. I care for the sick, love the angry, and bring God’s peace to those who worry. I bring God to the hurting, to the sinful, to the pained. I admonish the sinful and call them to the repentance. In a short sentence, I serve God’s people.

That pastoral care service extends beyond our church walls into our community. I serve as Chaplain to the volunteer New Milford Fire Department. I serve on the New Milford Senior Advisory Committee representing Saint Matthew’s. I serve on the Board of Directors for New Concepts for Living, a wonderful community group that helps the disabled live normal lives. In a few months, I will begin service on the Board of Family Promise of Bergen County, formerly known as the Interreligious Fellowship for the Homeless.

I regularly visit the sick in our local hospitals, not just of Saint Matthew’s but of our community as a whole. I’ve sat with dying children and their heartbroken parents and siblings. I’ve baptized babies who were struggling to stay alive. I’ve buried people I never had the opportunity to know.

None of this makes me any better than anyone else. I am a sinner just like you. I haven’t lived “the perfect life.” But who has. There are  many things I’ve done wrong; but I repented and know that my God loved me beyond anything I can imagine and that by His grace and mercy, He forgave me.

I get attacked all the time for my beliefs, especially in my unwavering understanding of the exclusivity of faith alone in Jesus Christ that saves me from eternal damnation. But my faith keeps me strong. I am regularly smeared by those who hate me, especially by a tiny, tiny few in our New Milford community who have gone out of their way to knock me. They’ve called me a liar, a hypocrite, a killer, someone who is destroying New Milford, and some other assorted vulgarity that is not printable. They’ve spat at me, thrown rocks at me, and said some vile things against me. For instance, one person said that my mother, when pregnant with me, should have fallen down the stairs so that I could have died. The same person called the parsonage and left a terrible message calling me child molester since that is what all priests do.

Through the smears and attacks, my faith is still strong. My head is still up. My outlook never brighter. I continue to serve our Lord and Saint Matthew’s and His greater church because that is what He wants me to do. He wouldn’t have called me to serve unless He had a plan for me. He called me as a pastor to serve.

That is what I do.

I am not a CEO. I am a pastor serving a wonderful congregation in New Milford, New Jersey.

Electricity is still out for about 39,000 PSE&G residents, most of them  here in Bergen County. One could say that the outage number is rather high, but considering that yesterday the number stood at around 83,000, workers have made dramatic progress in trying to return life to normal. Boil water advisories are still in effect for many communities in our immediate region. While Dumont, our nearest neighbor to the east, has a water advisory up for it, New Milford does not. Schools, as you would guess, are still closed all over Bergen County, including here in New Milford.

I drove around yesterday with the intention of checking on homes of members of Saint Matthew’s, and was glad that of those I could reach, there appeared to be little to no damage. One family was very, very lucky as trees fell in their front and back yards, but the only damage they received was to their gutter. However, driving around in order to see these homes was hard — streets are still blocked by trees and fallen power lines. I have about seven or eight homes to visit or drive past this morning. Driving up north was a little hard yesterday; I hope this situation improves today.

My reason for the drive by is that I was unable to make contact with a number of congregants, so I figured I would just burn a little fossil fuel and drive past homes. It is still very shocking to see huge trees strung out across streets. Yesterday in my travels, I drove by Concord Street here in New Milford, but the road was blocked by a rather large oak. It is almost surreal to see these huge, beautiful trees just laying in the middle of the road.

Flooding here in New Milford has subsided and those who were effected are completing their clean up. However, in a number of our communities in Bergen, Passaic, and Morris Counties, flood waters are still rising and are expected to crest sometime today. Officials say that even after the waters begin to go down, this process will take some time.

Here at church, the fallen pine tree in our yard is scheduled to be chopped up today at 1pm. I will be back here at church to do what I can to help.

I was asked by a member about my family in New York — my brother is doing fine; my father’s house is without power; Con Edison expects to get power up and running in his neighborhood by Friday. Maybe.

Continue to pray for our neighbors as we all try and rebound from this incredible devastation.

It is quite ugly around New Jersey right now. This weekend’s storm left a lot of devastation throughout our region. Trees and power lines are down all over; PSE&G is saying that some residents will not get their power back until Wednesday or Thursday. United Water is telling a number of communities to boil their water before consuming – New Milford is not in that advisory area.

As one would expect after 4 inches of rain on top of major snow melt these past couple of weeks, parts of New Milford were yet again underwater as the Hackensack River overflowed its banks after the Oradell Reservoir exceeded its flood stage and it fed its overflow to the Hackensack. As residents of Columbia Street evacuated once again because of the waters, I couldn’t imagine what was going through their minds.  By the evening, the waters were receding. Everyone is happy that this weekend’s flooding was not as bad as 2007.

Power in our part of New Milford (the northern half) went out on Sunday morning around 6:30. With so many trees and power lines down, I did not expect anyone to show up for church. By the grace of God, 26 souls arrived for church in the dark. As I was preaching, I wondered what the church would be like if we had skylights.

Our volunteer fire fighters were at it all day. A couple of days before the storm, they prepared their rescue boat that I know they hoped would not be used. But it was needed.

With all the damage in New Milford, we were not as bad off as other areas. Parts of Wayne and Bound Brook are underwater this morning. Others are facing major repairs to their homes, businesses, and cars. And yes, two families in Teaneck are mourning the loss of loved ones after a tree crashed down on them as they were walking back from their synagogue.

Last evening, I drove around a bit to see the after effects of the storm and how clean up was going. Detours were prevalent, but traffic was moving. Workers from all stages of the clean up process were working hard as chainsaws roared everywhere I drove. As I drove back toward Saint Matthew’s, a PSE&G truck was working on the “troubled pole” near Main Street, the location of the transformer that always seems to blow in bad storms. You can see that the workers were diligently doing whatever they needed to do to get power up and running. By 7:40, power was back on.

By then, I was sitting in the bedroom of the house. Candles were flickering when I heard the most joyous sound — a power surge to the generator next door at the New Milford Fire Department. For 12 hours, that generator hummed. After six hours, the ceaseless whir of the generator got on my nerves. But that power surge was joy to my ears, and not just because I knew that power was restored and life in our little part of New Milford could return to some kind of normal.

I knew the generator would turn off.

More than a decade ago, I had an ugly issue with gallbladder stones. Several times over the course of a month in the springtime of 1996 I found myself bent over writhing in a stabbing pain just above my stomach. I had trouble gasping for breath during these attacks that, for the grace of God, only lasted a minute or two. Doctors said some tiny sand-like gravel was passing through my gallbladder and the only way to truly eliminate the pain would be to pop the little organ and live life without one.

Of course, I wasn’t interested in surgery, no matter how minor they considered it.

The doctor said that I could try and prevent future attacks by changing my diet. His suggestion was to become a vegan. He almost had me until he explained that I also had to give up coffee.

The surgery started looking good.

Instead, I thanked the doctor, paid my bill, and went back to work. Fellow co-workers suggested other remedies to prevent these types of attacks, including drinking more green tea. That one sounded good so I added it to my diet. From that point on, I had one additional gallbladder attack several years ago. Otherwise, no issues with stones, gravel, or sand floating through my gallbladder or liver.

However, late last night my kidney decided to get in on the stone act. Sitting at home around 11:20pm, I decided to go to bed. Putting my pad and pen down on the table in my bedroom, I stood up to prepare for sleepy time.

I took one step and felt a sharp pain stabbing me on my right side. Initially, I thought it was my appendix. Fearing that it was bursting, I painfully got dressed, slipped on two different loafers (thankfully, they were both black), and drove myself to the hospital. The pain was somewhat pulsating, ebbing several times on my six-mile journey. There was a moment while at a red light I thought the pain had eased up enough where I could go home and deal with the pain issue today, Tuesday. Ignoring the “go home” advice of my male ego, I continued on the drive to wellness. When I arrived at the hospital, I had one of those double-over-and-cry attacks.

After a few tests, the doctor said that I a couple of tiny sand-like stones in my right kidney. She said they looked tiny enough whereby I could just wait and pass them the natural way, which would be slightly painful. As she said those revelatory words, I buckled down again in pain and this time, the pain spread to my urinary tract. Suffice to say, it was ugly. Thankfully, the tiny sand-like particles exited my body.

The doctor suggested a reduction in calcium intake for a couple of days.

I’m a little worn out from not sleeping. I have a healthy list of office work to do before heading out to a town event at 2:30pm. Then, I’ll be back home.

Last evening here in New Milford, a 10-year old girl was killed in a high-speed crash. Moments before the accident, a thug (I’m not feeling very pastoral this morning) stole a car from a house in Bergenfield. The owner of the car left his keys in the car to run into his house, only to see the thief get into his car and drive off. Then the owner got into another of his cars and sped after the thug in his car.

It was during this high speed chase, the stolen car crashed into a sedan where a 10-year old girl sitting in the backseat was killed; a 14-year old family friend suffered severe internal injuries, along with a number of broken bones; and the dead girl’s mother and brother both suffered injuries, but none were life-threatening.

The thug is in the hospital – none of his injuries are life-threatening. But he will face felony murder charges and if the justice system is just, will lock this waste of humanity away for the rest of his miserable life.

As you can tell, I am quite upset.

See Fox5′s helicopter report from the scene last evening.

See Fox5′s report here.

See

The Thanksgiving Food Drive to support the New Milford Good Will Fund and food pantry will kick off here at Saint Matthew’s in the coming weeks. For more info – click here.

I know – I’ve been delinquent in writing lately. But I’ve been a little ill, a lot tired, and very busy. Hopefully, the first two on my list of excuses has eased a bit. And I mean a bit.

But this post is not about me.

This past weekend, our region was hit with the worst Nor’easter in 15 years. We had over 7 inches of rain that flooded streams and rivers…and where is that water supposed to go?

New Milford was hit with horrendous flooding, as were many communities here in Northern New Jersey. Lodi and Bound Brook got most of the news coverage – and deservedly so.

However, here in New Milford, we got hit hard, too. Hundreds of families were evacuated. If you know of the Prospect Street park near Saint Matthew’s, the water was so high, it was just below the rims on the basketball hoops, which stand upwards of 10 feet above the ground. This flood stretched straight through New Milford. The high school football field could have been used for water polo. Evacuations were done via motor boat. These were scenes that we only see on television newscasts, scenes rarely every seen in Northern New Jersey. But it was happening in our New Milford.

Our police chief said the flooding was worse than Hurricane Floyd a few years ago.

Standing at River Road, I could not believe my eyes as I looked south. Where there were once homes and a roadway, there was now just water, flowing as if there was nothing wrong. I could only think of the families whose homes were now underwater. I could only think of those families from throughout our community who were devastated.

Here at church, we were without lights for a good chunk of Monday. I don’t know when the lights came back on since I was out trying to see how people were doing. Not that I could do anything tangible.

But the people who did something should be commended. What more can we say about our police officers who worked to protect? What more can be said about our public works employees who tried everything to prepare our community for the coming rain and worked overtime to start the clean up process? And county emergency workers who jumped in to help the displaced and try to help them rebuild their lives.

However, there are volunteers in our midst who went out and spent the past couple of days serving and protecting. Our volunteer fire fighters were on calls all Sunday night, all Monday, and even this  Tuesday morning. They rescued people trapped in homes and helped others pump water out of their basements. I watched them late last night from the parsonage as they returned to the fire house here on Center Street. They looked tired.

And the first responders, also volunteers, were out all night and day as well. They helped rescue and treat the sick and the scared. They, too, looked like they could sleep for days.

It tells you something about a community where people give their free time to protect and serve. It tells you something about a community where people risk their lives to keep their community safe. And most especially, it tells you something about a community where a bunch of people act so selflessly to make sure that their neighbors are protected.

I can’t say anymore about these great men and women. While our New Milford is facing a long clean-up, we can only thank our Father in heaven for these volunteers, these police officers, and these boro workers who worked harder than hard to make this home of ours the best place to live in New Jersey.

I wanted to write some kind of update on what we on the New Milford Senior Advisory Board are discussing and working on. Considering that I am on the Board, I should be crafting some kind of report and posting here. Maybe I will write more about what is happening here in New Milford to help spread the word about the things happening in town. I don’t do a good enough job in our Parish Announcements telling the story of what is happening around town.

Yesterday was our Board’s regularly scheduled monthly meeting at the center on River Road. The Board’s meetings are held every month on the third Thursday at 1:30pm.

Outside of the entertainment committee report (that I missed because I had to leave for a hospital run), the meeting dealt primarily with 2 issues:

1. What is the policy of opening or closing the Senior Center?

2. Should outside businesses be allowed to come into the center and effectively promote themselves and their wares to the seniors?

More after the jump:

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Two New Milford middle-schoolers got kicked out of school this week after it was learned one of them brought a BB gun to school and the other hid it in his locker. Local police are taking this seriously and are not giving the kids slaps on their wrists.

“It appears that this was a stupid act that can’t be tolerated in the school,” (New Milford Police Chief Frank) Papapietro said. “They’re being charged to the fullest extent of the law, because that is the message we want to send out. You bring a gun to school, you’re going to pay a severe price.”

The Chief is right.

UPDATE: The school’s student handbook says the following about bringing weapons to school:

Students are prohibited by New Jersey State Law and New Milford School policy from bringing andy weapons into the school building. Weapons may include guns, knives, or any other object capable of inflicting bodily harm. Any student carrying or using a weapon will be immediately suspended from school. When there is probably cause to believe that an offense has been committed, the police will send an officer to the school to take custody of the weapon. It is understood and agreed that the New Milford Police department will make an arrest of any student believed to be in the unlawful possession of a firearm or other dangerous weapon. A formal complaint will be filed against a student in possession of a dangerous weapon and a recommendation from expulsion will be sent to the Superintendent.

This afternoon, the New Milford Volunteer Fire Department held their annual installation of new officers. David Stormer of Company 1 (the firehouse next to the church) is the 2007 Chief. I had the opportunity – as chaplain – to say the opening and closing prayer. And yes, as the firefighters here in New Milford are known for, they are throwing a party right now to celebrate. Yes, I am at home writing this post, but it is 72 degrees out and wearing a clerical shirt and sweater is just a little too much. But I am headed on back…