Because You Can

Because You Can by Rev. Josie Holler

In 1989 George H. Bush was President and Mikhail Gorbachev was the leader of the U.S.S.R. In the fall of that year, after graduating from college, I backpacked through Europe for several months. In October I had the opportunity to go to East Berlin. Driving into the city, seeing the buildings, cars, and all of the people, was surreal. I felt as if I was on a movie set, but the reality is that was everyday life for those oppressed Soviets.  Several weeks after I returned home the Iron Curtain fell. The wall dividing East and West Berlin was torn down and the mass exodus occurred, satisfying the long yearning desire for freedom. Not long after that the Communist regime ended giving hope and opportunity to the Russian people. Seeing the way the East Germans lived and endured all those years of oppression profoundly affected my view of the world and my own country. I made sure I attended church that first Sunday back. Not only that, I volunteered to do the children’s message on being thankful for our freedoms.

Sometimes we do not want to go to church on Sundays because we are grown up and our parents can’t make us go anymore. Sometimes we do not want to go to church because we do not feel like getting up, or getting dressed, or there is something else we would rather do. We live in a free country. No one can make us go to church.  However, have you ever considered the alternative? Like living in a country that tells you that you can not worship as you choose. If you do you risk going to jail, or possibly something worse. Before the Iron Curtain fell the East German people did not have the freedom to worship God. If they did it was at the risk of great peril. This had such an impact on my thinking in 1989, that the first thing I wanted to do was go to church, give thanks for the land I live in, and worship…because I could. This Sunday we have the opportunity to give thanks to God for the freedoms we all enjoy as Americans through a Patriotic worship service. Personally, I cannot think of a more fitting way to celebrate the Fourth of July.  I invite you to join in this special service, not because you have to, not because someone tells you to, but rather…because you can.

Peace, Josie