Exciting transitions

Two of my churches, Holden and Dale, are a yoked parish in the midst of exciting changes. They just called a new pastor, who officially starts tomorrow. Yesterday they said goodbye to Interim Pastor Rell Spickerman, who has been here for about 15 months.

It has been a delight to work with Rell. He has over 40 years of ministry experience, much of it in the area of counseling, so his perspective has been unique among my pastors, and very helpful.

Rell and his wife, Louise, will head back to their home in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and he hopes to do one more stint as an interim pastor somewhere before retiring for real. ("Small world" moment: before coming to Holden and Dale, Rell was interim pastor of a church I attended during college, St. John in Cedar Falls.)

Pastor Heather Culuris will take the reins at Holden and Dale. I hope she knows what she's in for: Holden has had only eight pastors in its 155-year history, which averages out to almost 20 years each. Dale is just two years younger and has had 13 pastors. So this seems to be a long-term gig!

But Heather comes to us well-informed, since she and her husband, Chris, were Kenyon-area interns several years ago. Incidentally, Chris was just called as pastor of Trinity and Wanamingo Lutheran Churches in Wanamingo, so there's all kinds of excitement 'round these parts lately.

Though I don't work with Chris's congregations, we attend the same text study, so I'm thrilled to add both Heather and Chris to my already lengthy roster of great resources! The folks of Holden and Dale are excited to launch this new chapter of their history, and I'm happy to participate!

Coolest garage door ever

It's bright pink.





This is the home of one of my lovely WELCA ladies. Her house was certainly easier to find once I knew I was looking for a bright pink garage door. Check out some of the winter decorations she has displayed. This is a woman who knows how to be festive!





Incidentally, she's the same one who shared part of her hat collection at a Bible study a while back. She's just full of life and fun!

Weekly beauty: Snowy trees

I hate winter and I hate snow. But even I can begrudgingly admit that the right snow can be pretty. So here's your evidence. The first two pictures are from Nerstrand after our first snow in November. The second two are my parents' street in Iowa, from my trip home after Christmas.

Another battle scar

Clearly I am not responsible enough to own an alb (liturgical robe) as nice or as sentimental as the one I have. First there was the unfortunate wine incident, then a few weeks ago this:





I had finished worship at Grace and was heading to Vang. I must have been moving too fast, because I caught the sleeve on a handrail on the stairs and it tore. Fortunately, I do have some basic sewing skills, and I'm quite happy with the repair:








Just a tiny pucker, not so bad. And by the time I finish internship, my alb will be quite broken-in and full of character!

January 9 sermon

Text: Matthew 3:13-17
Preached January 9 at Gol and Hegre


Grace and peace to you from God, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Over these weeks of Christmas and Epiphany, we’ve been celebrating the Incarnation of Christ—the outrageous scandal of the true God becoming truly human in the person of Jesus. And here we go again. We have Jesus joining with humanity, sharing in the real, physical experience of baptism.

Can you picture the setting of this story Matthew tells us? Can you see the gathered crowds? The sun gleaming on the surface of the Jordan River? The mess of sand and mud that forms its banks? Can you see Jesus and John, standing in the muck having a hushed conversation?

“Why should I baptize you?” John asks. “Shouldn’t you be baptizing me instead?” It’s a logical question. John knew his call—he was to prepare the way for the Messiah. Surely he shouldn’t be baptizing the one whose sandals he wasn’t even worthy to untie!

But, for whatever reason, Jesus knew it was God’s will that he be baptized, even though he was free of sin and had no need of forgiveness. So Jesus submitted to the experience, standing in solidarity with a humanity that toils under the weight of sin, with a humanity that is sorely in need of forgiveness. Jesus joined us in our humanity, and he began his public ministry by being baptized.

And there was more to experience: Just as Jesus emerged from the water, splashing toward the edge of the river, mud squishing between his toes, the heavens opened. Can you see the fluffy clouds parting, the bright blue sky separating as if by a zipper? Can you see the Spirit of God descending in visible form, fluttering toward Jesus? Can you hear the thundering voice of God declaring Jesus his own beloved Son? Or maybe it was more of a soft, smiling voice, gentle and full of love?

Whatever it sounded like, God’s presence was made clear by both word and sign. The crowd heard the words of God and they saw the Spirit descending. We are embodied people, and God speaks to us in embodied ways.
God speaks to us through the scriptures, to be sure, but he doesn’t stop there. God sends us preachers. And I don’t just mean pastors or interns or other professionally churchy types. I mean all the people who proclaim and live out the good news of God’s love in Christ. All the people who remind us over and over, in ways we can both hear and see, that Christ came for us.

And God takes yet another step in speaking to us through the sacraments. In the water of Hoy Baptism, and in the bread and wine of Holy Communion, God’s grace is made visible and tangible—word is joined with sign so we can not only hear and see, but also touch, taste, and even smell, the promises of God for us.

At Jesus’ baptism, God opened the heavens, spoke a word, and made the Spirit visible to the crowds. God’s voice breaks into our world in a variety of ways, and when God’s voice breaks into your life, watch out! Big things will happen.

We can look back just over the last few weeks and recall big things happening in the lives of God’s people. God’s voice broke into Mary’s life and she became the mother of our Lord. God’s voice broke into Joseph’s life and he, too, was swept up in God’s plan. God’s voice broke into the lives of the shepherds and wise men, and they all left what they were doing to go find the Messiah.

This is what God’s voice does: it calls us to Christ. God spoke to Jesus at his baptism: “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” God’s voice gives us our identity, and it reorients us toward God’s mission.

God proclaimed Jesus his beloved Son. And so are we proclaimed beloved sons and daughters of God in our baptism, when we hear the words, “Child of God, you have been sealed by the Holy Spirit and marked with the cross of Christ forever.”

Child of God. How often do you think of yourself in this way? If someone were to ask you to describe yourself, would “beloved child of God” be near the top of your list?

There are countless ways we can draw our identities from sources other than God. Personally, I have a hard time not putting too much weight on other people’s opinions of me. The intern committee and pastors have been evaluating me lately, and their feedback is very important to me. Now, on one hand, that’s good and healthy. I’ll grow and improve in my vocation based on what they have to say.

On the other hand, sometimes I lose perspective and forget my true identity. Regardless of what anyone thinks of me, I am, ultimately, a beloved child of God. No one else’s negative opinions can diminish us in the eyes of God, nor can anyone else’s positive opinions elevate us in God’s eyes.

No one else’s view of us changes who we are. But God’s view does change who we are. When God looks upon us with favor for the sake of Christ, we are created anew. When God poured out his forgiveness and salvation on us in the waters of baptism, we were drowned to sin and raised to new life. And even though we are still sinful, that sin no longer defines us. It doesn’t have the last word now that God has declared us his beloved children.

Think of the names you’ve been called in the past. Think of the long-term labels you just couldn’t shake: egghead or fatso or stupid or klutz. Think of the one-time insults that have haunted you long after they were uttered.

I’m here to tell you: none of those is your real name. Your identity came from God on the day of your baptism, when you were named “beloved child of God.”

Of course, God is much bigger than any one of us, and other people are also beloved children of God, created in God’s image.

Can you imagine each person in this congregation as beloved of God? Can you imagine all people everywhere as beloved of God? Women and men, Republicans and Democrats, gay and straight, citizens and immigrants, old and young, rich and poor, educated and uneducated, people of every race and nationality, people of every size and shape, people who are homeless or addicted or mentally ill, people who are insecure or self-righteous or just plain mean?

In our polarizing and vitriolic political discourse, we have lost sight of the fact that those who disagree with us are also beloved children of God, and we have fostered a climate where tragedies like yesterday’s shooting in Arizona can occur. How might it be different if we remembered that we are all beloved children of God?

This is the “reorienting” part of God’s voice breaking into our lives. It turns us away from our own agendas and toward the mission of God, which serves the neighbor rather than the self.

When we are baptized, we are baptized into servanthood. This is not just an individual life plan. This is God drawing us into his mission, which is much larger than any one of us.

God’s love is intensely personal, landing on each one of us as the Spirit alighted on Jesus at his baptism. But God’s love is also wild and untamed, always on the move, always unexpected. Just look at the stable, the cross, the empty tomb!

One writer (Daniel D.Chambers) shared a story:

One evening a New Testament professor from Princeton Seminary visited a high school youth group. After the professor finished speaking about the significance of Christ’s baptism as a revelation of God’s presence in Jesus, a high-schooler said without looking up, “That ain’t what it means.”

Glad that the student had been listening enough to disagree, the professor asked, “What do you think it means?”
“The story says that the heavens were opened, right?”
“Right.”
“The heavens were opened and the Spirit of God came down, right?”
“That’s right.”
The boy finally looked up and leaned forward, saying, “It means that God is on the loose in the world. And it is dangerous.”

After his baptism, Jesus went into the wilderness, and it was dangerous. Jesus taught in the temples, and it was dangerous. Jesus healed on the Sabbath, and it was dangerous. Jesus confronted the authorities…and it was dangerous.

God’s call to service is dangerous. It was dangerous for Jesus, whose baptism was the first step toward his cross. It is dangerous for us. God’s work might lead us into unknown territory.

God calls us to serve the neighbor, whatever that might mean. The neighbor might cross our path unexpectedly, and they might not look like us. God calls us to live faithfully in an aggressively secular and consumerist culture. God calls us to share the good news of his love in Christ to a world that desperately needs it but doesn’t want to hear it.

But God never calls us without also equipping us. The Spirit descended upon Jesus at his baptism. And the Spirit also descends upon us and dwells within us, strengthening and empowering us for the work which God sets before us.

You are a beloved child of God, baptized into the love of Christ, sharing in the life of Christ, and called to the service of Christ. This is your identity and your mission, in the face of any challenges you may encounter. And, as the prophet Isaiah told us in our first reading, God upholds and delights in his servant.

Let me remind you one last time of your identity by sharing just a couple pages of this beautiful book about baptism, written by Walter Wangerin and illustrated by Gerardo Suzán. It’s called Water Come Down!

I am the water that fell on you
Three times with the Word that made you new
While everyone smiled and smiled.

Upon your forehead, the cross of Christ;
And in your hand, the light of his light!
O child of earth and skies:
Burning as bright as the angels at night,
You are God’s love and God’s loveliest sight
On the day you were baptized.

All of us now, on earth and in heaven,
One mouth,
Ten mouths,
Ten million and seven,
Greet you, friend. We’re glad you came—
So glad we stand and applaud.

And we call you by your brand-new name;
Beautiful, beautiful child of flame,
You are the Child of God.

Amen.

Lefse: A photo essay

For the unaware among us, lefse is a Norwegian potato pancake or flatbread. In areas that aren't so heavily Scandinavian, it's not common. (I once did a little happy-dance when a coworker found some at the New Pioneer Co-op in Iowa City.) We had to go to Decorah to get the supplies to make it (griddle, stick, rolling pin).

Here in Minnesota, it's ubiquitous. In my area, we have it at every church dinner, you can buy it in most of the grocery stores, and the supplies are available in pretty much any local hardware store. Which is awesome.

When I was visiting my parents after Christmas, I got to help my dad make his last batch of lefse for this year.

When I was in sixth or seventh grade, we went to my great-grandmother's house and had her make a batch so we could record her process (audio only; no video, unfortunately). As you can imagine, that tape has been a treasure for our family since Grandma Hovey died.

So my dad had a good teacher, and has become a master lefse-maker in his own right. He rolls it so thin that you can almost see through it, and it's delicious. But it's quite a process....


Here we go, with the official apron in place. He had already cooked and riced the potatoes the day before and mixed them with a few other ingredients to make the dough. It works better when you refrigerate the dough overnight.




Mixing a section of dough with flour.




It then gets rolled into these balls. People like my great-grandma just grab a hunk of dough and call it a day, but my dad, always one for precision, carefully measures so that each one is just a hair over a third of a cup. There is a genetic reason for some of my own slight OCD-like tendencies. Just sayin'.




Each ball of dough gets rolled out with the special grooved rolling pin.




The resulting round of lefse is transferred with the special lefse stick to the special lefse griddle. It gets crazy hot, necessitating protection of the tabletop with the specially engineered triple-cardboard forcefield. Can you tell how "special" this all is? You turn the stick in your hand to unroll the folded lefse.




One round cooking while another gets rolled.




The special lefse stick in action, carrying a finished piece to...




...the damp dishtowels that keep the cooling lefse soft. One towel underneath and one on top, which we kept spraying throughout the process to keep them damp.




And voila. The magic of lefse, ready for butter and brown sugar. It's delightful, and it's a fun family tradition.

Weekly beauty: Epiphany

Fridays are "weekly beauty" day, but I'm getting this one in under the wire while it's actually still Epiphany. This festival commemorates the visit of the magi to Jesus, and is also associated with the wedding at Cana and Jesus' baptism by John (both of which point to the beginning of Jesus' public ministry).

This year I celebrated with Evening Prayer at First Lutheran. Last year my friend Rachel and I were herding our preschool "sheep" during the Sunday school Epiphany pageant (which replaces a Christmas pageant) at the Lutheran Church of the Resurrection. They missed their big entrance and arrival at the manger because they all needed a bathroom break, so they straggled in during the next song. So it goes.

So, for your weekly beauty: a beautiful icon of the magi and a medley of "God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen" and "We Three Kings" by the Barenaked Ladies and Sarah McLachlan, which I have probably listened to 3,196 times over the last several weeks.

My growing niece

Dayla Elizabeth is now five weeks old, though still about four weeks shy of her original due date. But she is doing marvelously well! She's grown from just under three pounds to over four pounds; probably close to four and a half by now.

She's been spunky from the get-go, squirming around like a champ and being a trooper. They say she may be home within a week or so! Look how beautiful she is! This first picture, where she seems to be smiling up at my brother, just melts my heart!

Details at Holden and Dale

I led worship at Holden and Dale Lutheran Churches this weekend, which was delightful, as always. Just thought I'd share a few fun details that weren't among my previous pictures of these places.


A view of Holden as I approached from the east. I mentioned before that they call it the "cathedral in a cornfield," and now you can see why.




This might be my new favorite stained glass window. (At least until next week, when I'm sure another will catch my eye somewhere else and it'll be my new favorite until the cycle starts over.) Anyway, it's over the altar at Holden but I hadn't really paid close attention to the subject matter before. It's the women and the angel at the empty tomb. Love it!




It's still Christmas until Epiphany on Thursday. Here's the tree at Holden. The bottom branches are about waist-level on me, and my head hit around the second or third tier from the bottom. Very large tree. I wish I had been around as they wrestled it into the sanctuary.




The new doors at Dale. The etching was inspired by one of Dale's stained glass windows.




The cute little archway by which one enters the Dale sanctuary from the narthex. This building has lots of fun nooks and crannies and interesting bits of character like this.

New year, new you?

My January column for the churches' newsletters.


Once again, we find ourselves at the start of a new year. The airwaves and internet are saturated with features about New Year’s resolutions, with hundreds of “experts” telling you how to fix anything you don’t like about yourself.

How might our experience of the New Year be different if we change our focus? What if, instead of concentrating too narrowly on our perceived flaws, we spend this year exploring our baptismal identity and how it plays out in our lives?

Martin Luther said “a Christian life is nothing else than a daily baptism, begun once and continuing ever after” (Large Catechism). So the impulse to improve upon our weaknesses is not totally misguided, but the emphasis in the Christian life is very different.

New Year’s resolutions tend to be about fitting into an identity prescribed by the culture around us. They are often driven by shame—we start out feeling somehow inadequate, and we end up feeling like even more of a failure when we don’t meet the unrealistic expectations we set.

Our baptismal identity, in contrast, is a gift from God, rooted in love and charged with great power. We are a new creation in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17)! And we are sealed by the Holy Spirit, whose fruit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). But this fruit is not produced through the guidance of self-help gurus, for it is not work we can do ourselves!

Now, I’m certainly not suggesting we become complacent. Indeed, the Spirit works through our lives of discipleship. Through regular worship, through the Lord’s Supper, through scripture and study and fellowship with other Christians, the Holy Spirit continually shapes us into closer conformity with the Christ whose image we bear. This work is about joy! It is about love of God and love of neighbor! It is not about shame.

What does it mean that you are baptized? How does your identity as a child of God define you? How does it counter the pressure of culturally-defined perfection or unhealthy expectations?

This year, I wish you the peace and assurance of knowing you are a beloved child of God, defined by the Christ who has claimed you, and in whom the Spirit is always at work!