Take Heart with Attitude and Action
It has been three years since I began here as your pastor.
As October ends, and I begin my fourth year with you, we celebrate the beginning of the new church year, and we welcome the new holiday season: Halloween, All Saints Day, Advent, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s Day. The holidays are the same as they ever were. And yet, for some of us, faced with loss or illness, or changes in our families, the holidays will feel different this year. They are the same, but different.
Three years together, and we have become a church family. Shari and I are part of this family. And I want you to know that I think about you all every day. I have your back. I’m right here, cheering you on. I celebrate with you. I worry about you. I pray for you. I visit with you. I talk with you on the phone and in emails. And I admire you all, for your courage, for your example, for what I continue to learn from you.
Struggling with loss, depression, illness, or chronic pain: these are some of life’s realities. Or maybe things just didn’t work out this year, life didn’t go quite the way you wanted it to go this year. Sometimes it’s difficult, just to get through another day. We are all in this together. But take heart! Our readings have some important words of encouragement for us today.
Our readings today point to attitude and action. In Mark 10, the blind beggar was sitting by the roadside. Who knows how long he had been sitting there. Maybe years. Just sitting there, getting more and more depressed, begging by the roadside. But he gets a glimpse of hope when Jesus walks by. Something wakes up in his soul! Jesus calls to him, and the people tell him, “Take heart, get up, he is calling you.”
The unhappy beggar throws off his cloak, jumps up, and runs to Jesus. He throws off his unhappiness and despair. He jumps up and runs to a new life. The man does something. He takes action. He breaks out of his gloomy pattern, his gloomy despair. And so, he is healed. This action is, in fact, his healing.
And in Psalm 34, we read one of my favorite sentences in the whole Bible. “Taste and see the goodness of the Lord.” Back in August, I told you about the summer squash seeds. Shari gave me a packet of yellow summer squash seeds to plant in our little backyard garden. So, I planted them, and we watched them grow. For the next few weeks, we ate summer squash. Shari cooked the squash from the garden, and each day, when I walked into the kitchen, she gave me a bite of squash to taste, right out of the skillet. It was delicious. Fresh summer squash right out of the garden, sautéed with onions and garlic and olive oil.
As I mentioned back in August, when you eat something good, you taste it right away. The taste is immediate. It belongs to you. No one else tastes it for you. No one else experiences it. You taste it for yourself, directly, immediately, you know it is good.
“Taste and see” is the direct experience of God’s goodness. We taste it, and we recognize God’s goodness, in the yellow squash, in a flower, in a sunset, in the rising moon, in a comet, in a seagull’s flight, in a song on the radio, in a red maple leaf: we recognize God’s gifts of goodness to us, and we find new life. This life is immediate and direct. It is right here and right now. Taste and see.
Again, I want to remind us all that this is a key to peace and happiness. Everyone wants peace and happiness. Don’t we all want to find peace and happiness? And the key here, the magic ingredient, so to speak, is this: It’s up to you.
Now, what am I talking about? “It’s up to you.” (And it’s up to me, too. I’m always preaching to myself, too.) This is a message about attitude and action. Attitude and action. To find peace and happiness, develop the right attitude and engage in the right action. I know life is hard. I know there are lots of bad things that happen along the way. Yes, we all have problems, and we’re going to have more problems. But how we think, and what we do, moment to moment, is the key. It makes all the difference. I have learned this for myself, and I know it’s true.
Each morning, when I wake up in the morning, I am simply amazed. I open my eyes, and I say to myself, “Wow. I woke up again. I’m not dead yet! I’m alive today! It’s a new day! I’m breathing. I can stand up. I can put my socks on. I can walk. I can drink coffee. Hallelujah!”
This is an attitude of gratefulness and joy. It’s an attitude of amazement. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, the miracle is that we are here at all. So, when one looks at life this way, when one looks at everything as a complete surprise, then one finds more and more things to be grateful about. You find what you’re looking for. If you look for what is wrong all the time, you will find it. What you focus on, is what you will see:
There’s a story about a monk in a Trappist monastery. Maybe I’ve told you this one already. It’s a monastery where there’s no talking. But once a year, each monk is called in for an interview with the Abbot. So, this new monk goes in for his first-year interview.
“How are things going?” asks the Abbot.
“The bed is hard,” says the monk.
“Thank you, that will be all,” says the Abbot.
A year goes by, and the monk comes in for his second-year interview.
“How are things going?” asks the Abbot.
“The food is cold,” says the monk.
“All right, thank you, that will be all,” says the Abbot.
Another year goes by, and the monk comes in for his third-year interview.
“How are things going?” asks the Abbot.
“The coffee is bitter. I’ve had enough. I’m leaving,” says the monk.
“That’s good,” says the Abbot. “You’ve done nothing but complain since you got here.”

This is what I mean when I say, “It’s up to you.” You find what you’re looking for. If you look for what’s wrong all the time, you will find it. But if you look for what is amazing, you will find it. Then, Life becomes a series of rejoicings. Halleluiah, I can walk downstairs to the kitchen. Halleluiah, the sun is shining today. Halleluiah, “Well I got me a fine wife, I got me a fiddle, when the sun’s coming up, I got cakes on the griddle. Life ain’t nothin but a funny, funny riddle, Thank God, I’m a country boy!”
John Denver was right.
In his songs, John Denver wrote about experiencing heaven on earth. “Almost heaven, West Virginia, Blue Ridge Mountains, Shenandoah River.” You know, that’s all he needed to say. “Blue Ridge Mountains, Shenandoah River.” It’s a picture of heaven. Country Roads, take me home, to the place I belong.”
John Denver wrote about simple goodness and about the things that really matter to people.
“Well, a simple kind of life never did me no harm, a raising me a family and workin on the farm. My days are all filled with an easy country charm. Thank God, I’m a country boy.”
He sang about goodness. And that is why his songs are still loved and sung by people from all walks of life. His songs make us think about what is good in life.

“Hey, it’s good to be back home again.
Sometimes this old farm feels like a long-lost friend
Hey, it’s good to be back home again.”

Taste and see the goodness, in supper on the stove, in nutmeg and butter, coffee and tea, garlic and oil, bread and potatoes.

“You fill up my senses, like a night in the forest, like the mountains in springtime, like a walk in the rain. Like a storm in the desert, like a sleepy blue ocean.”

This is goodness. And this is what the Psalmist sings about in Psalm 34.
“Taste and see, the goodness of the Lord.”
When we look for the goodness, we will find the goodness, we will see the goodness, and we will taste it. When we act with courage, when we stand up and throw off the cloak of our sorrow, we will be healed. As we celebrate the beginning of the new church year together, take heart. Let us continue to see the goodness, and to taste the goodness, and be healed. Amen? Amen.