Sunday Worship8, 9:30, & 11 am
Smack! The door slammed shut in front of me. I may have been a few feet from entering the classroom, but when the bell rang, the teacher shut the door – even if all the students were not in their seats. It was a daunting and embarrassing walk to my seat after the door was closed. With my shoulders slouched and my head down the teacher would shout, “90 percent of life is just showing-up!” Although this trademark saying was meant to teach a lesson about the importance of being on time, it turned out to be an important life lesson that I continue to carry with me.
When traumatic and life-changing events occur in our lives, and our heart aches, often all we need is someone to walk alongside us. As a Christian community, we are not meant to bear our burdens alone. Recently, Ava Fiebig and I attended a week-long training event focusing on Stephen Ministry. This is some of what we learned:
What is Stephen Ministry?
Stephen Ministry equips people to provide confidential, one-to-one Christian care to individuals in their congregation and community who are experiencing difficulties in their lives.
Who is a Stephen Minister?
A Stephen Minister is any caring congregation member who feels called to serve in this role. Once called, Stephen Ministers receive 50 hours of training in providing emotional and spiritual care. As our community continues to grow, the need for active listeners also continues to grow. Stephen Ministers care, listen, encourage, and pray for those in need.
Who would benefit from a Stephen Minister?
Almost anyone can benefit from having someone present to listen to what is on their heart. Grief, divorce, illness, job loss, loss of a home, military deployment, loneliness, and spiritual crisis, are a few examples of life struggles that a Stephen Minister can walk alongside you through.
This past week, I was reminded of the importance of presence and how simply showing-up is vital to our calling to help one another in difficult times. As you are enjoying the last days of summer, I urge all of you to take the opportunity to be present, especially with those around you who are struggling. If you feel called to share your skill for listening, please join me for an informational meeting about becoming a Stephen Minister at Lord of Life this Sunday, August 13, in the Fellowship Hall following 9:30 worship.
With Christ's Presence,
Lucas
What does church music look like to you? As Lutherans, we embrace a rich tapestry of styles and textures from traditional hymns to praise songs; from chants to global rhythms. We lift up the gifts of those who wish to offer them. Some days, that might look like piano, drums and singers. Other days we might hear guitar and violin. Every day, everyone assembled is invited to sing along to lift up our message and praise.
This year, as some of the threads of our musical brocade come out, what threads will we weave in to replace them? What musical gifts do you have to offer? Could you play your clarinet once in a while?
Do you play the cello and haven’t been sure if we might work it into worship? Please let me know the next time you see me or
I’d especially like to work on special music offerings, as we build up to our 500-year Reformation celebration in October.
The blazing summer sun, knee-high cotton socks, shouting rhymes for the sake of annoyance, these are the days I remember standing in far right field waiting for a baseball to roll passed a few defenders and into my glove. On a good day, I might have gotten to field the ball once or twice a game, that is, when I wasn’t distracted by picking dandelions in the outfield.
Finally, it was my turn to bat! Marching up to home-plate was where all the action was! Although I loved the rare feeling of hitting a homerun, my swing was never all that good. Instead, I was known on the team as the speedster, the one that could make it to first base in the blink of an eye. So, nearly every time I went up to bat, no matter the situation, I went for the bunt. Needless to say, Billy Hamilton is my favorite Redleg! Bunting was my gift. Most often, my team didn’t need me to bunt, but it gave me a sense of identity and purpose. In fact, using my gift of bunting, especially when the team didn’t need it, was when I thrived the most. It was incredibly freeing to bunt when the pressure of succeeding wasn’t on the line.
Much like any team, it is easy for any church to slip into a needs-based mindset for ministry. There are always vacancies that need to be filled and duties that need to be done. As we look toward restarting many of our ministries at Lord of Life for another meaningful year, we can become overly focused on what is needed. Certainly, the church needs volunteers, teachers, musicians, Ministry Area Coordinators (MACs), Stephen Ministers, communion assistants, council members, tutors, worship leaders, organizers, choir members, Family Promise hosts, gardeners, visionaries, cooks, acolytes, and ushers; but God invites us see things a bit differently. Rather than need, God calls us by our gifts.
The apostle Paul reminds us that “there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit” (1 Cor 12:4). This is the same Spirit that will sustain the church until the end of time. As opportunities to serve begin to increase, you are encouraged to live into your gifts; whether that is bunting, swinging for the fences, or strategically waiting for the right pitch. Now is the perfect time to get involved and dive-into wherever your gifts are calling you to serve.
When it was my turn up to bunt there was no anxiety or pressure to get on base. Bunting brought joy to the game. So too, you can rest assured that God will care for the church. God will provide the church with exactly what it needs. Our mission is to live into the gifts God has given us, to rally around those gifts, and to lift one another up because of the gifts we offer. Serving where we are led by the Spirit is what brings joy and abundant life. Whether you are up to bat, in the outfield, on the mound, in the dugout, or managing the equipment, you are an important part of the team. You play an invaluable role in the Body of Christ!
With a Serving Spirit,
Intern Lucas McSurley
“Mom, I think I have a problem with alcohol.” That was ten years ago. Those life-changing words confirmed why our family had been thrown into a condition of insanity and hopelessness. Our first-born child had become a victim of a disease over which we, as parents, had absolutely no control.
Our journey of faith and hope crystallized one October night at the Al-Anon meeting in the library at Lord of Life and our daughter’s miracle of sobriety began seven years ago at AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) in the fellowship hall. Al-Anon is a gathering where friends and families of problem drinkers find understanding and support. Alcoholics Anonymous is an international fellowship of men and women who want to do something about their drinking problem. This past Sunday, our daughter and her husband celebrated their first wedding anniversary! God is good! I shared that miracle with Pastor Lowell as I left church and it hung on his heart. He wondered if I’d share a bit of my journey of faith at LOL – “Why Lord of Life?”
I struggled with my faith through my teen years. Life and family circumstances sometimes made it difficult to trust that God loved me. I “walked away” from God and the church where I’d been baptized and confirmed in my teens after my dad took his own life due to depression aggravated by tinnitus. “How could the God my parents and I worshipped, trusted, and loved become so heartless?”
I subsequently played the devil’s advocate throughout much of my late teens and early twenties, arguing against God and his love. God stayed with me, despite my chosen estrangement from him.
You’ve heard the phrase before. This three-word admonition is shared as soothing balm following a tense or difficult moment, but often has the opposite effect. Rather than offering comfort, it stirs up irritation. When my car has run out of gas, when I have bounced a check, or missed an important appointment, please don’t demean me by suggesting that out of the trials of unpredictable or irresponsible living there may come a nugget of wisdom. “Live and learn” often lands on our ears as a reprimand of sorts with a silver lining.
But what if we hear it as something else? What if we embrace living and learning as a declaration of a vibrant Christian life? It isn’t an admonition, but a sustained promise of who and how we hope to be.
We live and learn when we pause to listen to the joys and sorrows of a child.
We live and learn when we look for the lonely and isolated.
We live and learn when we engage in Bible reading and study with others.
We live and learn when we meet one another in worship moments.
We live and learn when we serve our neighbors in need.
We live and learn when we wrestle with complicated issues of race and culture.
We live and learn when we respond with gratitude.
We can’t help but live and learn as people of faith. It is who we were created to be.
“Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. Keep these words that I am commanding you today in your heart. Recite them to your children and talk about them when you are at home and when you are away, when you lie down and when you rise. Bind them as a sign on your hand, fix them as an emblem on your forehead, and write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” Deuteronomy 6:4-9
From the earliest pages of Scripture, God’s people were instructed to put their faith into action, as a way of sharing God’s goodness with the world. “Listen, obey, talk, and write. At home and beyond, love God with your whole being.” Ours is not a stagnant faith, but one that is always growing as we live and learn the ways of Christ.
Lord of Life takes this command seriously by making life-long learning a priority. That’s right. Preschool kids, children, youth, teenagers, college students, newlyweds, mid-lifers, retired folks, and centenarians are all active learners at Lord of Life.
As you begin to fill your calendar with Fall activities, I encourage you to make room to continue living and learning in the faith. Consider stepping into a teaching role with Sunday School. Be a mentor with our teens. Plug into a Bible study. Pray for all in need. Commit to being generous with your finances. Step up to serving. Show up for worship. Jesus will meet you.
Living and learning in hope,
Pastor Lowell
For those of us who start our morning worshiping at St. Arbucks (that’s StarbucksTM, for those of you who don’t take your coffee as seriously as I do), coffee is our first step to facing the world each morning; it provides an opportunity to stop and think about the day ahead; it is a vehicle for conversation and fellowship. I could write a few chapters drawing parallels between coffee and our life as a worshiping community!
For now, I’d like to talk about fellowship and the opportunities we have at Lord of Life. So how does coffee affect our lives in fellowship with each other?
A few years ago, I spent Martin Luther King, Jr. Day with my family at The National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in downtown Cincinnati. It was our first visit to this monument and museum which “celebrates the heroes who created the secret network through which the enslaved could escape to freedom, the Underground Railroad... [and encourages] everyone to take part in the ongoing struggles for freedom.”
As we watched the films and heard the stories from both sides of the Ohio River, I was reminded that there were many secret codes associated with the Underground Railroad, including special words, distinct door knocks, laundry on the clothesline flapping in the wind, and lights in the windows, each signaling others that you were a safe place or a “friend of a friend.”
Jesus talks about our visibility as Christians being a signal of hope to others. We are salt and light. Salt bringing flavor to the world and light bringing vision and clarity in the darkness. He said, “You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden.”
More than twenty-five years ago, I visited Dachau concentration camp just outside of Munich. I have never experienced such an overwhelming barrage of sorrow and fear as I did that day. Arriving by car, I entered the camp through the same gate that some 200,000 prisoners did as the box car delivered them against their will. I was greeted by the same promise of freedom that they were, “Arbeit macht frei.” This iron sign notified them, that their freedom could be found in their efforts, proclaiming “Work makes you free.”
We know, of course, that work did not provide their freedom. If anything, the harder they worked, the closer they moved to the grave. For many in the camp, nothing provided freedom except death or, finally, if they survived the war, liberation from an outside force. They were labeled Jew, gypsy, homosexual, rebel, traitor, or other perceived threat and condemned to face daily peril or extermination. “Arbeit macht frei.” Nothing could be further from the truth.
Each time we look at the cross of Jesus, we are reminded that our work does not make us free. So, why do we continue to try to prove our worthiness by working our way to freedom? Daily, we strive to wriggle ourselves free of our shame and guilt. We wear ourselves out trying to escape the fears of our past. We work and work and work, trying to earn God’s love and favor. We expend our energies trying to please others, while fortifying our hearts and minds, disguising our fear and pride. We cower in dark corners hiding from the realities of weakness and sorrow.
Friday in German is Freitag – Free Day – the day of the week that marks the end of work and effort. It is that beginning of freedom. It is a period of relief and a cause for celebration. Each Spring, we gather on a Freitag, a Friday that we dare to call “Good,” and mark the beginning of our freedom in Christ. In the prisons of our own hearts and minds, God meets each of us and offers a word of relief. He says, “It is finished. Complete. I have accomplished the work.” The cross is a light of hope for us on a hill.
Jesus continues to come to us with liberation. Jesus comes with forgiveness and renewal. Into the dark places of our lives, the Light of God shines. The one crucified on a tree steps forward and meets us wherever we find ourselves and says, “You are free.”
Driving around Cincinnati on a dark night, you can still see many homes with lights in the windows, a signal of welcome and hope. By God’s power and promise, may our church and lives be such a place, a place of hospitality and welcome for all, and may we continue to shine light into the dark places.
Trying to shine,
Pastor Lowell