PASTOR'S PODCAST

4TH OF JULY

July 4, 2024 • PASTOR DAVE KOPPEL

TRAGEDY

June 19, 2024 • Pastor D

Last Saturday night, there was a mass shooting in Round Rock. Those words don’t even belong in the same sentence. Mass shooting. Round Rock. It just sounds wrong.    This is not a big urban center. This is our home. This is where our kids go to school. This is where we go to the park, go swimming, and have festivals to celebrate our diversity and the beauty and wonder of our city. It’s where we go for the 4th of July fireworks…and, in days gone by, for the cardboard boat regatta.   Mass shooting. Round Rock. The words just don’t go together. Two dead. Fourteen hospitalized.    Mass shooting. The words are jarring.    We don’t know all the details. We don’t even know if the shooter was from Round Rock.    But now there is a tear in the fabric of our city. It will be mended because, well, this is Round Rock…but there will be a scar. 

SLIPPING GEARS

October 3, 2023

Not too long ago, I got my bicycle overhauled but something didn't feel right, and once in a while the chain came clean off! It wasn't until recently that I had it figured out; that I found the actual problem. Turns out one of the links was bent. So why do I tell you this? Well, it's like a lot of life. Often all it takes is one person to pull things off course, to keep things from working as smoothly as they might. So today let's stop and ask ourselves, “Am I a bent link in a chain?”

MY DUCK!

September 26, 2023

A mother and her toddler daughter went to visit a friend. When they arrived, the two mothers greeted each other with hugs, and they set the little girl down next to the little boy who had been playing with a toy duck. The little girl immediately grabbed the duck and said, “My duck!” As you can imagine, that didn't go over very well with the little boy. I won't go into the details of the duck being snatched back and forth or the ensuing tears that flowed, but I will say that the little girl kept repeating, “My duck! My duck!” We all want what we don't have. A part of us will always be crying out, “My duck!”

BRINGING TRASH AROUND

September 19, 2023

PULLING ON THE KITE STRING

September 5, 2023

Have you ever done something that seemed right at the moment, but when you had a moment to think about it, you realized that it might not have been the best course of action? How often do we act without thinking? How often do we make rapid, uninformed choices, and how often do we react instead of thinking things through? We all react to situations, sometimes without thinking or taking the long view.

JUMPING TO CONCLUSIONS

September 12, 2023

How often do we misinterpret what other people say? Or how often do we assume we have the whole picture when we only have a part? We all do that though. We all jump to conclusions; we think we have the whole story when we only have part of it…and then, in our minds, we fill in what we think the rest of the story might be.

TUNA NOODLE BRICK

July 25, 2023

Many years ago when I was a camp cook, I had a helper. After working together for a few weeks and watching him gain confidence, I decided to delegate some work. I told him that we would be feeding the 400 kids at the camp tuna noodle casserole. He assured me that he had it well in hand, but when I returned, each one was like a tuna noodle brick! Here's what I learned: first don't assume anything. Don't assume that somebody knows what you know unless you check with them beforehand. Second, communication is key. Unless we listen to each other, ask questions to clarify, or check to see if we have gotten it correct, we can't guarantee that actual communication has taken place.

I WOKE UP NOT IN JAIL!

July 18, 2023

Every week, I set aside time to have lunch with and pray with two colleagues. The other day we met, and one of the busboys came up to greet us — we've gotten to know him a little bit over the past year. When I asked him how we could pray for him that day, he said, “Just pray that God hears my thanksgiving and my praises. I don't want anything. I don't need anything. I just want to thank God.” He went on, “I thank God that I woke up today! I didn’t just wake up; I woke up, and I was not in jail!” Sometimes it's easy to forget all those things we take for granted, and we all have so much to be thankful for if we only stop and realize it.

INDEPENDENCE DAY

July 4, 2023

Today is one of my favorite days of the whole year. The 4th of July! Independence Day! It's a celebration. It's the birthday of our country. It's a time when we recall the stories of the patriots who took risks and were willing to lay their lives on the line for this incredible experiment called Democracy. It’s a great day to be thankful - for our nation, for those who came before us and led the way, for an incredible history, and most importantly, for an incredible God.

YOLO BYPASS

July 11, 2023

Recently, I had an opportunity to be in California with my family. On our way back to the San Francisco airport, I saw a sign that cracked me up. It said, “Yolo bypass.” The reason that the sign got my attention is the acronym Y.O.L.O. Yolo stands for “You only live once.” As people of the way, as followers of Christ, we have a Yolo bypass. We can bypass the idea that you only live once because we know that there's more than the life that we're living here on earth right now.

BASEBALL

June 27, 2023

SHOULD V. CAN

June 13, 2023

I recently went to a restaurant where they had us sign that read: “Do not touch blind! Please!" I don't know about you but when somebody tells me I can't do something, believe me, I want to do it! How about when somebody says you should do something? There is a real difference between the idea that you can do something and the idea that you should do something. What should you do as a Christian? We should be kind, loving and sharing. Yet that word “should” can often make it feel like a burden. What can you do as a Christian? We can be kind, loving and sharing. We can be forgiving. We can help each other. Do you feel the difference?

THE UMPIRE

June 20, 2023

A couple of Friday nights ago, I watched a ball game at Dell Diamond. For one pitch, it was a fastball, and the ball glanced off the bat straight into the umpire’s face mask. It threw the umpire back several feet and knocked him flat on his back. That umpire was down! The other umpires ran to his aid and cared for him before walking him off the field. I mention this not so much because the umpire got hit, but because the others ran to help him immediately. They were there for him. You never know what's going to hit you in life, whether it be a baseball to the head or something else, but you do know that you won't be going it alone.

40 YEARS OF DIRECTORIES

June 6, 2023

Have you ever forgotten someone’s name? I hate it when that happens. I saw someone at worship, and I knew that we had met, but I couldn’t remember their name. So, I thought, maybe they’ve been a member here for a while, so I started looking through four decades of photo directories. Looking through 40 years of directories, I noticed how individuals and families came and went over the years. People are in our lives for a season. Some for a long season, some for a short season, but they are all woven together into a beautiful tapestry.