Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Unburied Treasure
Lent calls us to a true discipline, an unburying of the true treasures of our heart so that our lives are ordered by what truly matters, by living as the children of God our Lord has made us.
Pr. Joseph G. Crippen, Ash Wednesday; texts: Psalm 51:1-17; Isaiah 58:1-12; Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21
Sisters and brothers, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen
Have you ever found yourself wondering about Ash Wednesday practices while listening to the Gospel for Ash Wednesday? Every year I find it an awkward moment when I, with a dark cross of ashes newly implanted upon my forehead, read “And whenever you fast, do not look dismal, like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces so as to show others that they are fasting. . . . But when you fast, put oil on your head and wash your face . . .” So says our Lord.
The Old Testament readings aren’t any less awkward. We’re given two choices by the lectionary, either a reading from Joel 2 or one from Isaiah 58, the one we heard tonight. Joel urges the people to “rend their hearts, not their garments.” (Tearing one’s robes was a sign of mourning and fasting and repentance.) And Isaiah sounds a lot like Jesus: “Is such the fast that I choose,” says the Lord, “a day to humble oneself? Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush, and to lie in sackcloth and ashes? Will you call this a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord?” And Isaiah goes on to say that the acceptable fast is to end injustice, to stop oppression, and to welcome and care for the homeless poor.
Meanwhile we’re all sitting here with ashes on our foreheads, and perhaps even pondering what we’ll give up for Lent, what fast we will undergo. It all feels, as I’ve said, a little awkward. I’ve often preached about the ashes we receive today, about their importance; I did so last year. But throughout my ministry I’ve never quite faced in my preaching the sense of this disconnect between our readings for the day and our practices of the day, and of Lent.
What’s going on in these readings is actually well worth our exploring. Joel, Isaiah, Jesus, and most of the prophets seemed to criticize worship practices, and life practices, that the faithful, religious people did. We could take that as simply what it seems, a criticism of the practices themselves. But if we look deeper, we see that the problem isn’t the practices. The problem seems to be that the practices have become the only thing, and there is nothing flowing from them into the people’s lives, nothing life-giving, restoring, or justice-making coming out of them.
And that’s a real problem for Jesus and the others. We’re a congregation with a rich liturgical life, and a congregation which finds meaning and strength from our shared rituals here. If anyone needs to understand what concerns our Lord Jesus and the prophets, it might be we who worship here.
We don’t have time to look at all our practices, so let’s simply think about what we do today, and what we do or don’t do in Lent.
Lent is a time throughout the history of its practice in the Church where people gave things up for the duration of the season. This grew out of a practice of legitimate and serious fasting. In the Orthodox Church today it still is a pretty serious practice of fasting from a number of foods and life practices.
Lent also was often a time of preparing catechumens – new believers – for baptism, and correspondingly it was a time for the whole Church to practice a time of discipline and austerity in preparation for the Paschal feast.
In modern times in the Western Church, especially among non-Catholics, the “giving up” is not necessarily a fast, but it’s an abstaining from something for a time. In our family, since we had children, we’ve given up fast food for Lent. Some years we’ve given up desserts. But Hannah’s birthday always is in Lent, so we had to make accommodations.
For Catholics, it was and is often more serious. I remember growing up how the schools would serve fish on Fridays, and how my Catholic friends took that very seriously. Of course, in times past having fish on Fridays was a year-round discipline. And today even McDonald’s has Filet-o-Fish specials on Fridays in Lent. Even marketers find this an attractive option!
So we receive ashes today, remembering our mortality, we confess our sins, and last Sunday we put away Alleluia from our worship until we sing it again at Easter. And some of us might consider the notion of giving something up for Lent. That’s about it.
And when I put it that way, I think I start to understand the concern Jesus and the prophets have. This seems pretty light, not challenging at all, and it isn’t at all clear to me that any of this actually has an impact on our lives, changes us, or makes a difference in the world.
In a powerful statement, Jesus says that the question we should consider has to do with our hearts, what we truly love and value, what we treasure.
“Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,” he says. In some ways all our practices I’ve described are outer observances. Jesus seems more interested in what happens inside, in the journey of faith we take in our hearts. Putting on ashes, giving up a food item for six weeks, these are things that we can do without having to think very hard at all. And certainly without changing in any significant way.
But Jesus invites us to a deeper observance.
The giving of alms quietly so the gift is given but no notice is taken of it by others.
Prayer that isn’t done so others can see it, but done for our connection with our Father in heaven.
And fasting that isn’t done in public, but in private. I remember a group at Gustavus held a fast for world hunger where people didn’t eat for a day and gave the money they’d have spent to world hunger. I did it, but I wouldn’t wear the sticker they handed out. It said, “Be nice to me, I’m fasting today.” It seemed ridiculous to advertise about it, to beg sympathy for a faith practice. Even more, it’s not what Jesus would have us do.
But when we consider Isaiah alongside Jesus’ admonitions, and consider the rest of Jesus’ teaching, what we’re invited to undertake is even deeper than private giving, prayer and fasting. For the prophets, worship and ritual without doing justice and working to restore God’s creation is worthless to God.
Listen again to Isaiah: “Is not this the fast I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin?” Doesn’t that remind you of Matthew 25, where Jesus says that to care for him is to care for the least of his brothers and sisters, feeding, giving drink, welcoming strangers, clothing the naked, visiting the sick and the prisoners?
So the problem the Triune God has with our worship and ritual isn’t with the worship and ritual themselves. The problem is if our worship of God doesn’t change how we then live. If what we do in Lent or at any time doesn’t profoundly shape our actions in the world, profoundly re-shape our hearts to be like the heart of God, profoundly shape our thinking and doing and being.
We sing David’s psalm of confession each Ash Wednesday. Presumably David didn’t say those words, “Create in me a clean heart,” just as words to say. Presumably he actually wanted to be given a clean heart, a renewed spirit, because his current heart and spirit were broken and sinful and not what God hoped to see and know.
So what we want to think about for our Lenten discipline is perhaps how it might truly be a Lenten discipline. How what we do from today until Easter might not only bring us closer to God’s grace but also begin to re-make us, disciple us.
In short, our Lenten discipline could conceivably unbury the treasure God has planted in our hearts and bring it to light so it guides our lives.
And fasting is the discipline that for centuries the Church has valued for its ability to turn us away from ourselves and toward God. But it’s only effective if we are fasting from things that our heart truly desires above God, things that draw us from God’s concern for the world, things that draw us to center on ourselves.
Food can do that, and the discipline of fasting for times from certain items, or even from all food, can be helpful reminders of our mortality, our need. When you hunger for something and consciously choose not to eat it, you force yourself to remember why you’re doing this.
But it might be helpful, in addition to possible food choices, to consider what fasting we might do that could help us even more in our discipline.
What attitudes or habits do we have and treasure that we know are not of God, that are self-centered or that lead us to forget the poor, forget to care for the vulnerable ones, or that lead us on paths away from love of God and love of neighbor? If you’re like me, thinking of changing such things for a lifetime is a daunting prospect. But what if we picked one, or two if we’re brave, and simply prayed that God help us commit to change this thing about us for the time of Lent? Six weeks, and no one needs to know except you and God. Six weeks, not a lifetime. But think of the change it could accomplish.
And what acts of justice and peace could we pick up just for this time, this season, that we currently do not do? Things which we put off, or don’t consider in the busy schedules of our lives, but that we might be able to try for six weeks. We could combine a giving up of food with an increase in giving to world hunger. We could give up time that we use for self-centered pursuits and use that time for being with or helping another.
There are endless possibilities, and again, if you’re like me, you’ve thought of some things you could be or do but just haven’t taken the time to start. Things that look very much like the “fast” Isaiah says God truly wants to see from us, and that Jesus preaches. Why wouldn’t we take these six weeks and pray that God help us in this one area, this one thing? Think of the change it could accomplish.
Of course, the six weeks will end, and we’ll celebrate Easter. But I suspect if we truly find some disciplines that actually discipline, we will be changed far beyond Easter day. We will find the Spirit has actually grown us more as disciples. We might even discover that we don’t want to stop doing what we began six weeks before, but even want to add other things.
Because if we unbury the real treasures of our heart and follow them, who knows what God will do with us.
That’s the real possibility of this Lenten journey, and really the only point in having a Lenten journey. That it becomes for us a life-changing walk with the Holy Spirit, and a transformation from a life focused on ourselves to a life lived in the rich and gracious love of God, and the transforming experience of loving our neighbor. A life that learns to model the self-giving love that led the Son of God to the cross, which looms ahead six weeks from now.
And that seems like a fast worth doing, with the help of God.
In the name of Jesus. Amen
The Olive Branch, 2/20/12
Accent on Worship
The First Sunday in Lent
Mark’s Gospel for the First Sunday in Lent begins with Jesus’ baptism. The focus of Mark’s account is not so much the baptism itself, but the transformative power of this event in Jesus’ life.
The church has often emphasized the cleansing aspect of Holy Baptism, that through the grace of God and the waters of Baptism your sins are washed away. But Jesus had no sin to wash away, so what was he seeking by allowing John to baptize him? Jesus had to walk his own faith journey in his life. It started with his baptism and everything else followed. In his baptism what he found was a clear confirmation from his heavenly Father. “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” We have been taught that this voice was meant for those who were present, but I believe that Jesus also needed to hear it. The Gospel writer connects this confirmation with Jesus’ willingness to be led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tested by Satan, in preparation for his mission to declare the good news.
Peter writes in the Second Lesson that Baptism is “an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.” Baptism is a beginning and a call for us to walk in the light and life of Jesus, to follow his example, and through his resurrection our appeals to God for a clean heart will be answered. The deep meaning of the Sacrament of Holy Baptism is a powerful confirmation from God that we are beloved. Like all Christian sacraments, Baptism is communal. Through it God first confirms God’s relationship with the baptized and by it the community of saints welcomes its new member. To grasp the deep meaning of Baptism is to know that we
are loved by God, to open our souls to God, to allow the Spirit to lead us into the wilderness, to be
transformed by the power of God’s love and grace, and to be willing to bring this love and grace into the world.
During this season of Lent let the waters of Baptism renew and refresh you every day as you live
your life and walk your faith journey in the resurrection of Jesus.
- Donna Pususta Neste
Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper (Tomorrow Evening!)
Tuesday, February 21 – 6:00 pm,
followed by the Burning of Palms for Palm Sunday.
Lent Procession Service
Sunday, February 26, 2012, 4:00 p.m.
Join Cantor David Cherwien and the Mount Olive Cantorei for another contemplative service of lessons and carols - for Lent! This service is offered as an opportunity to withdraw from the busyness of life to pray, sing, listen, smell- to fully enter into the season of Lent, a time to renew our baptism.
Sunday Readings
February 26, 2012 – First Sunday in Lent
Genesis 9:8-17 + Psalm 25:1-10
I Peter 3:18-22 + Mark 1:9-15
March 4, 2012 – Second Sunday in Lent
Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16 + Psalm 22:23-31
Romans 4:13-25 + Mark 8:31-38
Ash Wednesday, February 22
Holy Eucharist with
the Imposition of Ashes
Noon and 7:00 p.m.
The Bread of Life
The LORD gives “wine to gladden human hearts, oil to make the face shine, and bread to strengthen human hearts,” according to Psalm 104:15. Bread is the staff of life, and given by Jesus as part of the gift of the Eucharist. The one loaf symbolizes all the people of God gathered together and formed into one Body, fed by the bread which is itself the Body of Christ.
During Lent Mount Olive will be using real bread at the Eucharist to better connect to this powerful symbol and gift of Christ. We will try it for the period of Lent to explore whether this could be possible as our permanent way of sharing in the one bread and one cup of the Meal of our Lord. Several recipes will be tried as well, to best determine which works. Should we continue this into the future, members who are interested will be invited to bake bread for our weekly Eucharists as part of their way of serving.
If you have thoughts or comments on this, please don’t hesitate to contact Pastor Crippen, Vicar Doughty, Al Bipes (director of the Worship Committee), or any other members of the Worship Committee: Marcella Daehn, John Gidmark, Ro Griesse, Art Halbardier, Brian Jacobs, Kandi Jo Nelson, Paul Nixdorf, Tom Olsen, Dwight Penas, Rob Ruff, Cantor Cherwien.
Films of Faith in February
(and early March!)
Seen any good movies lately? It’s a good question, because film (like the other arts) can be a great way to be challenged, inspired, and guided to reflect on our lives of faith. And as with the other arts, one’s appreciation of a film can be enhanced by discussing it with others.
So on three of the four Sundays of February (including Super Bowl Sunday) and the first Sunday
of March, we will have the opportunity to gather at church at 3:00 pm to watch movies of substance and discuss them. The rest of the schedule is as follows:
Feb. 26: No film because of Lent Procession
Mar. 4: Into Temptation
We will watch the movie, munch (quietly, please) on popcorn, sip a little cider, and then, after the
movie, talk about what the movie showed and said and how it speaks to us as we try to live our lives of faith.
Taste of Chile
Mark your calendars for Sunday, March 4! The Missions Committee will host Taste of Chile to
celebrate Chilean food and culture and to learn about missions in Chile. If you are interested in making an authentic Chilean dish for the event (recipe provided), please contact Lisa Ruff at
jklmruff@msn.com or 651-636-4762.
“A Very Present Help”
Midweek Lent at Mount Olive
The forty days of Lent begin on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22, with Eucharist and the Imposition of Ashes at noon and 7:00 p.m. (Celebrate Shrove Tuesday at Mount Olive on Feb. 21 – see separate announcement.)
For the other Wednesday Lenten services this year we will focus on the presence of God in our lives, specifically the places where God’s healing grace is offered. We’ll be using as our starting point a section of Luther’s Smalcald Articles (from the Lutheran confessions) in which he describes the ways God’s grace and forgiveness are given us in concrete and knowable places.
The midweek schedule, beginning on Wednesday, Feb. 29, is Eucharist at 12:00 noon, followed by a soup lunch at 1:00 p.m. In the evening, there will be a soup supper at 6:00 p.m., and Evening Prayer at 7:00 p.m. The preaching at the noon Eucharist will be based on our theme, and the same meditation will be shared during the evening soup supper, with opportunity for further conversation at the meal.
Note: If you normally come to Evening Prayer in Lent but don’t come early for the supper, you’ll miss the conversation; consider coming early and concluding the evening with Evening Prayer.
Thursday evening Bible Study Begins March 1
A new opportunity for Bible study and conversation will begin at Mount Olive on Thursday, Mar. 1, from 6:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. “Prayer and God’s People” will be led by Pr. Crippen and will examine the relationship of prayer between God and God’s people in the Scriptures. We will look at people of the Bible and how they prayed, and ask several questions: Does their conversation with God tell us anything? Does it teach us anything about our prayer life? Can they model prayer for us, or show us ways we should avoid? The hope is that through this conversation we might find our own way in our daily lives of prayer.
The group will meet Thursdays at 6:00 p.m. in the East Assembly room, pending the size of the group. We will have a light supper each night, and participants will be asked to sign up and bring this each week. (The first week will be provided.) This will be a very light and simple meal – bread and cheese and other such things to put on the bread, perhaps some fruit, but not anything fancy. There will be five Thursdays before Holy Week, and we’ll take a break for Holy Week and finish the next two weeks after Easter. After this series is complete, Vicar Doughty will lead a series on the Psalms.
Vestry Update, February 13, 2012
The Vestry met on Monday, February 13 to cover a variety of new and old business. In upcoming
weeks, President Adam Krueger and Pastor Crippen will begin working on a model to use in the Visioning Process during spring and summer of 2012. Also on the horizon is the formation of an ad hoc committee to discuss and brainstorm the formation of the newly approved PR Committee. Al Bipes will be helping with this development while Adam Krueger will be assisting in the formation of the Aesthetics/Building Usage Committee.
In other committee happenings, Doug Parish, Bob Lee, Tim Lindholm, and Kat Campbell-Johnson have all agreed to serve on the Audit Committee. The Nominating Committee will consist of Pastor Crippen, Adam Krueger, Gretchen Campbell-Johnson, Lisa Nordeen and two other members yet to be invited.
With the upcoming Synod Assembly, the Vestry approved Al Bostelmann, Dianna Hellerman and
Jessinia Ruff as the representatives from Mount Olive. Please keep them and all of the Assembly in your prayers.
The Mount Olive Foundation has given their largest gift to the church to date with a total of
$21,553.83. These funds will be apportioned to Bach Tage, the Baptismal Font and Lectern restoration, the Conference on Liturgy, an Automatic External Defibrillator (AED), the Lutheran World Relief Fair Trade Project, Neighborhood Ministries, new office technology, and worship space projects as recommended by the Foundation. We all thank them and those who have contributed to the Foundation for their generous gift.
Pastor Crippen moved that the 21 new members and 2 new associate members be approved and
welcomed into the congregation by the Vestry. Watch for pictures in the Parish House display case in coming weeks.
There is much to anticipate in upcoming weeks at Mount Olive. On Shrove Tuesday the Youth Group will be serving a pancake dinner at 6pm. On March 4 the Taste of Chile event will be held. We will be working with EPES to present dishes from Chile. And on March 21 and May 20 a choir of children from Mount Olive will sing during the second liturgies. Ann Becker Peterson will be working with Cantor Cherwien and the Godly Play teachers to work with the children on their singing.
The next Vestry meeting will be March 12, 2012 at 7:00pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Lisa Nordeen
Matching Grant for Bethania Kids
Bethania Kids, one of Mount Olive's Mission partners, is celebrating its 25th Anniversary. Several
supporters are offering $50,000 of matching grants for donations received by Bethnia before March 1. The Missions committee at Mount Olive has authorized a special gift of $500 to Bethania. If individual members of Mount Olive would like to give a special donation to Bethania during the matching grant period, please send donations directly to Bethania because of the short time frame. The address for Bethania is: Bethania Kids, PO Box 2140, Winchester, VA 22604-1340.
Bread for the World Workshops and Offering of Letters
The 2012 Bread for the World workshop, "Cut Hunger, Not Hunger Programs" will be held at three different locations and dates. On Thursday, February 23, 9a.m. -noon, at Guardian Angels Catholic Church, 8260 4th Street N, Oakdale; on Saturday, February 25, 9a.m.-noon, at St. Stephen's Lutheran Church, 8400 France Ave. S., Bloomington; and on Wednesday, February 29, 7-9 p.m. at Bethel University, Eastlund Room in Community Life Center, 3900 Bethel Dr., Arden Hills.
This year, Bread for the World members and advocates need to raise our voices more than ever.
The deficit-reduction proposals Congress is considering could result in the most severe cuts to
programs for hungry and poor people in Bread's history.
Bread's 2012 Offering of Letters overall campaign will work to create a circle of protection around those most vulnerable by working to protect the funding of programs for hungry and poor people. The focus will be on four mini-campaigns: domestic nutrition assistance, poverty-focused foreign assistance, tax credits for low-income families, and international food aid.
Help Needed, Saturday March 3
On Saturday, March 3, from 2-5 p.m. at Mount Olive, the Missions Committee will prepare for the "Taste of Chile" (which is the next day). We need help chopping vegetables for a salad, filling
empanadas, and helping get a Chilean soup ready and doing some simple decorating. If you have just a couple of hours free that afternoon, your help would be greatly appreciated! You will have fun, help make the event a success, and even learn some new skills-- we will have an empanada-making demonstration! What better way to spend a late Saturday afternoon!
If you are interested, please let Paul Schadewald know that you will be stopping by to help on Saturday March 3 (612-237-8517), or by email, schadewald@macalester.edu.
Book Discussion Group
For the meeting on March 10, the Book Discussion Group will discuss A Passage to India, by E. M. Forster. For the April 14 meeting, they will read, The Birth of Venus, by Sarah Dunant.
The First Sunday in Lent
Mark’s Gospel for the First Sunday in Lent begins with Jesus’ baptism. The focus of Mark’s account is not so much the baptism itself, but the transformative power of this event in Jesus’ life.
The church has often emphasized the cleansing aspect of Holy Baptism, that through the grace of God and the waters of Baptism your sins are washed away. But Jesus had no sin to wash away, so what was he seeking by allowing John to baptize him? Jesus had to walk his own faith journey in his life. It started with his baptism and everything else followed. In his baptism what he found was a clear confirmation from his heavenly Father. “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” We have been taught that this voice was meant for those who were present, but I believe that Jesus also needed to hear it. The Gospel writer connects this confirmation with Jesus’ willingness to be led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tested by Satan, in preparation for his mission to declare the good news.
Peter writes in the Second Lesson that Baptism is “an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.” Baptism is a beginning and a call for us to walk in the light and life of Jesus, to follow his example, and through his resurrection our appeals to God for a clean heart will be answered. The deep meaning of the Sacrament of Holy Baptism is a powerful confirmation from God that we are beloved. Like all Christian sacraments, Baptism is communal. Through it God first confirms God’s relationship with the baptized and by it the community of saints welcomes its new member. To grasp the deep meaning of Baptism is to know that we
are loved by God, to open our souls to God, to allow the Spirit to lead us into the wilderness, to be
transformed by the power of God’s love and grace, and to be willing to bring this love and grace into the world.
During this season of Lent let the waters of Baptism renew and refresh you every day as you live
your life and walk your faith journey in the resurrection of Jesus.
- Donna Pususta Neste
Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper (Tomorrow Evening!)
Tuesday, February 21 – 6:00 pm,
followed by the Burning of Palms for Palm Sunday.
Lent Procession Service
Sunday, February 26, 2012, 4:00 p.m.
Join Cantor David Cherwien and the Mount Olive Cantorei for another contemplative service of lessons and carols - for Lent! This service is offered as an opportunity to withdraw from the busyness of life to pray, sing, listen, smell- to fully enter into the season of Lent, a time to renew our baptism.
Sunday Readings
February 26, 2012 – First Sunday in Lent
Genesis 9:8-17 + Psalm 25:1-10
I Peter 3:18-22 + Mark 1:9-15
March 4, 2012 – Second Sunday in Lent
Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16 + Psalm 22:23-31
Romans 4:13-25 + Mark 8:31-38
Ash Wednesday, February 22
Holy Eucharist with
the Imposition of Ashes
Noon and 7:00 p.m.
The Bread of Life
The LORD gives “wine to gladden human hearts, oil to make the face shine, and bread to strengthen human hearts,” according to Psalm 104:15. Bread is the staff of life, and given by Jesus as part of the gift of the Eucharist. The one loaf symbolizes all the people of God gathered together and formed into one Body, fed by the bread which is itself the Body of Christ.
During Lent Mount Olive will be using real bread at the Eucharist to better connect to this powerful symbol and gift of Christ. We will try it for the period of Lent to explore whether this could be possible as our permanent way of sharing in the one bread and one cup of the Meal of our Lord. Several recipes will be tried as well, to best determine which works. Should we continue this into the future, members who are interested will be invited to bake bread for our weekly Eucharists as part of their way of serving.
If you have thoughts or comments on this, please don’t hesitate to contact Pastor Crippen, Vicar Doughty, Al Bipes (director of the Worship Committee), or any other members of the Worship Committee: Marcella Daehn, John Gidmark, Ro Griesse, Art Halbardier, Brian Jacobs, Kandi Jo Nelson, Paul Nixdorf, Tom Olsen, Dwight Penas, Rob Ruff, Cantor Cherwien.
Films of Faith in February
(and early March!)
Seen any good movies lately? It’s a good question, because film (like the other arts) can be a great way to be challenged, inspired, and guided to reflect on our lives of faith. And as with the other arts, one’s appreciation of a film can be enhanced by discussing it with others.
So on three of the four Sundays of February (including Super Bowl Sunday) and the first Sunday
of March, we will have the opportunity to gather at church at 3:00 pm to watch movies of substance and discuss them. The rest of the schedule is as follows:
Feb. 26: No film because of Lent Procession
Mar. 4: Into Temptation
We will watch the movie, munch (quietly, please) on popcorn, sip a little cider, and then, after the
movie, talk about what the movie showed and said and how it speaks to us as we try to live our lives of faith.
Taste of Chile
Mark your calendars for Sunday, March 4! The Missions Committee will host Taste of Chile to
celebrate Chilean food and culture and to learn about missions in Chile. If you are interested in making an authentic Chilean dish for the event (recipe provided), please contact Lisa Ruff at
jklmruff@msn.com or 651-636-4762.
“A Very Present Help”
Midweek Lent at Mount Olive
The forty days of Lent begin on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22, with Eucharist and the Imposition of Ashes at noon and 7:00 p.m. (Celebrate Shrove Tuesday at Mount Olive on Feb. 21 – see separate announcement.)
For the other Wednesday Lenten services this year we will focus on the presence of God in our lives, specifically the places where God’s healing grace is offered. We’ll be using as our starting point a section of Luther’s Smalcald Articles (from the Lutheran confessions) in which he describes the ways God’s grace and forgiveness are given us in concrete and knowable places.
The midweek schedule, beginning on Wednesday, Feb. 29, is Eucharist at 12:00 noon, followed by a soup lunch at 1:00 p.m. In the evening, there will be a soup supper at 6:00 p.m., and Evening Prayer at 7:00 p.m. The preaching at the noon Eucharist will be based on our theme, and the same meditation will be shared during the evening soup supper, with opportunity for further conversation at the meal.
Note: If you normally come to Evening Prayer in Lent but don’t come early for the supper, you’ll miss the conversation; consider coming early and concluding the evening with Evening Prayer.
Thursday evening Bible Study Begins March 1
A new opportunity for Bible study and conversation will begin at Mount Olive on Thursday, Mar. 1, from 6:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. “Prayer and God’s People” will be led by Pr. Crippen and will examine the relationship of prayer between God and God’s people in the Scriptures. We will look at people of the Bible and how they prayed, and ask several questions: Does their conversation with God tell us anything? Does it teach us anything about our prayer life? Can they model prayer for us, or show us ways we should avoid? The hope is that through this conversation we might find our own way in our daily lives of prayer.
The group will meet Thursdays at 6:00 p.m. in the East Assembly room, pending the size of the group. We will have a light supper each night, and participants will be asked to sign up and bring this each week. (The first week will be provided.) This will be a very light and simple meal – bread and cheese and other such things to put on the bread, perhaps some fruit, but not anything fancy. There will be five Thursdays before Holy Week, and we’ll take a break for Holy Week and finish the next two weeks after Easter. After this series is complete, Vicar Doughty will lead a series on the Psalms.
Vestry Update, February 13, 2012
The Vestry met on Monday, February 13 to cover a variety of new and old business. In upcoming
weeks, President Adam Krueger and Pastor Crippen will begin working on a model to use in the Visioning Process during spring and summer of 2012. Also on the horizon is the formation of an ad hoc committee to discuss and brainstorm the formation of the newly approved PR Committee. Al Bipes will be helping with this development while Adam Krueger will be assisting in the formation of the Aesthetics/Building Usage Committee.
In other committee happenings, Doug Parish, Bob Lee, Tim Lindholm, and Kat Campbell-Johnson have all agreed to serve on the Audit Committee. The Nominating Committee will consist of Pastor Crippen, Adam Krueger, Gretchen Campbell-Johnson, Lisa Nordeen and two other members yet to be invited.
With the upcoming Synod Assembly, the Vestry approved Al Bostelmann, Dianna Hellerman and
Jessinia Ruff as the representatives from Mount Olive. Please keep them and all of the Assembly in your prayers.
The Mount Olive Foundation has given their largest gift to the church to date with a total of
$21,553.83. These funds will be apportioned to Bach Tage, the Baptismal Font and Lectern restoration, the Conference on Liturgy, an Automatic External Defibrillator (AED), the Lutheran World Relief Fair Trade Project, Neighborhood Ministries, new office technology, and worship space projects as recommended by the Foundation. We all thank them and those who have contributed to the Foundation for their generous gift.
Pastor Crippen moved that the 21 new members and 2 new associate members be approved and
welcomed into the congregation by the Vestry. Watch for pictures in the Parish House display case in coming weeks.
There is much to anticipate in upcoming weeks at Mount Olive. On Shrove Tuesday the Youth Group will be serving a pancake dinner at 6pm. On March 4 the Taste of Chile event will be held. We will be working with EPES to present dishes from Chile. And on March 21 and May 20 a choir of children from Mount Olive will sing during the second liturgies. Ann Becker Peterson will be working with Cantor Cherwien and the Godly Play teachers to work with the children on their singing.
The next Vestry meeting will be March 12, 2012 at 7:00pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Lisa Nordeen
Matching Grant for Bethania Kids
Bethania Kids, one of Mount Olive's Mission partners, is celebrating its 25th Anniversary. Several
supporters are offering $50,000 of matching grants for donations received by Bethnia before March 1. The Missions committee at Mount Olive has authorized a special gift of $500 to Bethania. If individual members of Mount Olive would like to give a special donation to Bethania during the matching grant period, please send donations directly to Bethania because of the short time frame. The address for Bethania is: Bethania Kids, PO Box 2140, Winchester, VA 22604-1340.
Bread for the World Workshops and Offering of Letters
The 2012 Bread for the World workshop, "Cut Hunger, Not Hunger Programs" will be held at three different locations and dates. On Thursday, February 23, 9a.m. -noon, at Guardian Angels Catholic Church, 8260 4th Street N, Oakdale; on Saturday, February 25, 9a.m.-noon, at St. Stephen's Lutheran Church, 8400 France Ave. S., Bloomington; and on Wednesday, February 29, 7-9 p.m. at Bethel University, Eastlund Room in Community Life Center, 3900 Bethel Dr., Arden Hills.
This year, Bread for the World members and advocates need to raise our voices more than ever.
The deficit-reduction proposals Congress is considering could result in the most severe cuts to
programs for hungry and poor people in Bread's history.
Bread's 2012 Offering of Letters overall campaign will work to create a circle of protection around those most vulnerable by working to protect the funding of programs for hungry and poor people. The focus will be on four mini-campaigns: domestic nutrition assistance, poverty-focused foreign assistance, tax credits for low-income families, and international food aid.
Help Needed, Saturday March 3
On Saturday, March 3, from 2-5 p.m. at Mount Olive, the Missions Committee will prepare for the "Taste of Chile" (which is the next day). We need help chopping vegetables for a salad, filling
empanadas, and helping get a Chilean soup ready and doing some simple decorating. If you have just a couple of hours free that afternoon, your help would be greatly appreciated! You will have fun, help make the event a success, and even learn some new skills-- we will have an empanada-making demonstration! What better way to spend a late Saturday afternoon!
If you are interested, please let Paul Schadewald know that you will be stopping by to help on Saturday March 3 (612-237-8517), or by email, schadewald@macalester.edu.
Book Discussion Group
For the meeting on March 10, the Book Discussion Group will discuss A Passage to India, by E. M. Forster. For the April 14 meeting, they will read, The Birth of Venus, by Sarah Dunant.
Sunday, February 19, 2012
Listen to Jesus
Jesus’ transfiguration shows us the glory of God in the body of Christ. We are part of this – both as disciples who are commanded to listen to Jesus, and as the baptized body of Christ, the Church. When God speaks to the disciples, “listen!” God is speaking to we who are becoming disciples. When God declares love for Christ’s body, God is also declaring love for you and I and the body of Christ, the Church. When have you listened to Jesus, and when have you heard God declare love for you? The light of God’s glory shines through Christ in transfiguration and on the cross; it shines through us, too.
Vicar Erik Doughty, the Transfiguration of Our Lord, year B; text: Mark 9:2-10
What a story we read today! Jesus goes up a mountain, two important people in the history of Israel appear and chat with him, the disciples babble in terror, the voice of God claims Jesus as God’s beloved son and then instructs, “Listen to him.” Then it all ends, they wander down the mountain. And, if I may add one verse, then the disciples obediently don’t mention it to anyone and they don’t even appear to discuss the fact that they just saw Moses and Elijah, but instead they start discussing among themselves, “So – what does ‘rising from the dead’ mean?”
We should note that this is AFTER the disciples have seen Jesus do one or two amazing things. Such as:
healing diseases
telling the powers of chaos – the wind and waves of a storm – to stop (and they did stop)
casting out demons
raising a little girl from the dead
giving the disciples themselves the authority to cast out demons
feeding five thousand and then again feeding four thousand
and so on.
Peter, for his part, has already confessed that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah. (Peter has had trouble thinking the Messiah is going to suffer and die, instead of maybe kicking out the Romans or whatever his expectations were.)
So it’s at this point that Jesus goes up the mountain, this mountain at the cusp of our Lenten season. Lent will end with Jesus on another mountain called Calvary or Golgotha, we know. On this mountain, with Peter, James, and John watching, Jesus’ clothes glisten like the light which goes into, through, and off an ice rink lit up at night in the park; like lightning, or glitter, or a disco ball, only more so. Whiter than white, “it-hurts-to-look-at-it” white. Whiter than my polyester alb will ever be in this world (which is not saying much, I know). Jesus’ clothes shine with the divine light of God, the shine that was on Moses’ face after he received the law; and possibly the shine of the chariots of fire that took Elijah into heaven. Visually we have God saying, TAKE NOTE: WHEN YOU SEE JESUS, YOU SEE GOD’S GLORY!
Then for good measure, in case the disciples didn’t figure it out, the Voice of God says THIS IS MY BELOVED SON; LISTEN TO HIM!
(That is the same sort of thing God said just to Jesus at his baptism, but now God’s making it known in public. We will hear the final version of this phrase during Holy Week, when the centurion who witnesses Jesus’ death says, “Truly this man was the Son of God.”)
So where we are at today in the life of Jesus and in the church year is a pivot point; a cusp between the spreading light of Epiphany and the dark-purple, ash-dusted penitential, introspective, catechetical season of Lent, which ends with the Christ-light, the glory of God, extinguished, the smoking wick on the rough cross, all on the mountain of Calvary nicknamed “the Skull.” That’s what Jesus sees ahead even as he walks up this mountain to show forth the Glory of God – that glory will show next in darkness and death, Christ dead for us, a glory which looks like defeat but in which death itself is defeated.
So, what of today’s text for us?
We can rejoice that we are present twice in this text: we see in ourselves the terrified, babbling disciples, for one thing. We are the people who say one day, “You, Lord, are the Christ,” then protest at the next opportunity that we don’t want Jesus to die. We are the people who have a fantastic experience of God’s presence and want to freeze that moment in time, to stay there in happy-terrified awe.
We are pretty reliably and predictably fools when in the presence of God. (My seminary classmate Michael, a pastor in Fort Collins, noted that he wished HE had a narrator who would follow him around and, whenever he said something foolish, would say, “He did not know what he was saying.”) One bit of good news there is that, when we do put our foot in our mouth or do something idiotic here at church– at least we know we’ve all been there. Even the disciples themselves had that experience. And we can forgive one another, and often we can laugh about it and move on.
As I said, there’s another place we are present in this text: in Christ. It matters that we, the Church, are baptized into the body of Christ. We are not fully human and fully divine, but we, in some mysterious way, lay claim to Christ’s body. We, in some faithful way, ARE Christ’s body: The body that gets transfigured. The body God declares love for. And yes, the body that is crucified, dies, and is raised. Somehow you and I participate in that by virtue of our baptism, and by virtue of Holy Communion.
Do I know how it all works? No. And I would be a fool to try to explain it! But it matters that the Church – you and I and all others baptized into Christ, over all the centuries – are the body of Christ.
This transfiguration of Christ – we’re affected. God loves you and me! God shines through us. And this is at the same time that the presence of God – and the command to listen to Jesus – makes us both want to stay forever AND to run away to where it seems more comfortable, more dim.
I invite you to consider what it means for God’s light to shine out from you. I invite you to consider what is the place you feel comfortably out of God’s light. I invite you to consider what you hear when God is speaking. When did God last declare God’s love for you? To what journey are you being called as we head toward that other mountain, Golgotha, over the next 40 days of Lent?
Let us listen to Jesus, who loves, who teaches still, who feeds thousands of thousands, who dies and rises from the dead for foolish disciples, for you and me; Jesus who, right after this liturgy ends, leads us down the mountain to serve and love all people, as he and we begin to walk toward Calvary’s cross.
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
Olive Branch, 2/14/12
Accent on Worship
A Clean Heart
“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.” King David, Psalm 51:10.
In most years, the month of February is a month of transition in the Church Year because in most years Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent are in this month. What this means is that our worship and the texts for our worship will undergo a great change during the next few weeks.
We began February in the season of Epiphany, still hearing the story of the light of Christ sent to the world, still carrying memories of our recent Christmas celebration. Epiphany’s green season closes, as it always does, with the awe-filled story of Jesus’ transfiguration and the revelation of his divine glory to three of the disciples, our worship next Sunday. During the season we were called by Scripture to mission, to spreading the Good News.
But this Sunday with the help of our children, we will put away our Alleluia banner until our Easter celebration, and we will turn our eyes toward Lent, and the journey of faith and life those six weeks bring us. With Lent we begin a forty day pilgrimage which is less focused our mission in the world and more focused on our own lives, faith, and hearts. And the hinge-pin of this shift is Ash Wednesday.
Ash Wednesday is a day when we hear God’s call to us to repent and seek forgiveness. Ash Wednesday is the day when we sing the song of King David as he asked forgiveness from God: “Create in me a clean heart, O God.” Our prayer to God, as we shift from celebrating God’s light in the world to looking at our own sin and our need for that light, is that God make us new inside, that God clean us inside and out.
In fact, that is why Ash Wednesday is such a good transition point to move us from Epiphany to Lent. Whether we are trying to live in our call as missionaries and witnesses of God’s love in the world, or are looking inward and seeing the sin of our hearts and lives and wanting God’s forgiveness, we need God to make our hearts clean. With our inmost being clean and looking to God, not only are our lives lived as the children of light we are, but we are able to witness to God’s grace as well.
Pray David’s prayer with me this month, as we make our great transition in worship and in focus. Ask God to clean your heart so you are the person God has called you to be both inwardly and outwardly. God grant us all clean hearts in Christ Jesus our Lord.
- Joseph
Lent Begins
Ash Wednesday
February 22
Holy Eucharist with the Imposition of Ashes
Noon and 7:00 p.m.
Sunday Readings
February 19, 2012 – Transfiguration of Our Lord
2 Kings 2:1-12 + Psalm 50:1-6
2 Corinthians 4:3-6 + Mark 9:2-9
February 26, 2012 – First Sunday in Lent
Genesis 9:8-17 + Psalm 25:1-10
I Peter 3:18-22 + Mark 1:9-15
This Sunday’s Adult Forum
February 19: Art Halbardier will lead a presentation on the development of the Nicene Creed.
Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper
Tuesday, February 21 – 6:00 pm
We Need Your Palms
It’s time to bring in any palm branches you have from last year’s Palm Sunday liturgy. These branches may be placed in the designated basket in the narthex. They will be burned on Shrove Tuesday, and their ashes used for the Imposition of Ashes on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22.
The Bread of Life
The LORD gives “wine to gladden human hearts, oil to make the face shine, and bread to strengthen human hearts,” according to Psalm 104:15. Bread is the staff of life, and given by Jesus as part of the gift of the Eucharist. The one loaf symbolizes all the people of God gathered together and formed into one Body, fed by the bread which is itself the Body of Christ.
During Lent Mount Olive will be using real bread at the Eucharist to better connect to this powerful symbol and gift of Christ. We will try it for the period of Lent to explore whether this could be possible as our permanent way of sharing in the one bread and one cup of the Meal of our Lord. Several recipes will be tried as well, to best determine which works. Should we continue this into the future, members who are interested will be invited to bake bread for our weekly Eucharists as part of their way of serving. If you have thoughts or comments on this, please don’t hesitate to contact Pastor Crippen, Vicar Doughty, Al Bipes (director of the Worship Committee), or any other members of the Worship Committee: Marcella Daehn, John Gidmark, Ro Griesse, Art Halbardier, Brian Jacobs, Kandi Jo Nelson, Paul Nixdorf, Tom Olsen, Dwight Penas, Rob Ruff, Cantor Cherwien.
Films of Faith in February(and early March!)
Seen any good movies lately? It’s a good question, because film (like the other arts) can be a great way to be challenged, inspired, and guided to reflect on our lives of faith. And as with the other arts, one’s appreciation of a film can be enhanced by discussing it with others.
So on three of the four Sundays of February (including Super Bowl Sunday) and the first Sunday of March, we will have the opportunity to gather at church at 3:00 pm to watch movies of substance and discuss them. The rest of the schedule is as follows:
Feb. 19: Joyeux Noelle
Feb. 26: (No film because of Lent Procession)
Mar. 4: Into Temptation
We will watch the movie, munch (quietly, please) on popcorn, sip a little cider, and then, after the movie, talk about what the movie showed and said and how it speaks to us as we try to live our lives of faith.
Taste of Chile
Mark your calendars for Sunday, March 4! The Missions Committee will host Taste of Chile to celebrate Chilean food and culture and to learn about missions in Chile. If you are interested in making an authentic Chilean dish for the event (recipe provided), please contact Lisa Ruff at jklmruff@msn.com or 651-636-4762.
Lent Procession Service
Sunday, February 26, 2012, 4:00 p.m.
Join Cantor David Cherwien and the Mount Olive Cantorei for another contemplative service of lessons and carols - for Lent! Designed especially for those who serve churches as leaders of such events, this is offered as an opportunity to withdraw from the busyness of life to pray, sing, listen, smell- to fully enter into the season of Lent, a time to renew our baptism.
“A Very Present Help”
Midweek Lent at Mount Olive
The forty days of Lent begin on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22, with Eucharist and the Imposition of Ashes at noon and 7:00 p.m. (Celebrate Shrove Tuesday at Mount Olive on Feb. 21 – see separate announcement.) For the other Wednesday Lenten services this year we will focus on the presence of God in our lives, specifically the places where God’s healing grace is offered. We’ll be using as our starting point a section of Luther’s Smalcald Articles (from the Lutheran confessions) in which he describes the ways God’s grace and forgiveness are given us in concrete and knowable places.
The midweek schedule, beginning on Wednesday, Feb. 29, is Eucharist at 12:00 noon, followed by a soup lunch at 1:00 p.m. In the evening, there will be a soup supper at 6:00 p.m., and Evening Prayer at 7:00 p.m. The preaching at the noon Eucharist will be based on our theme, and the same meditation will be shared during the evening soup supper, with opportunity for further conversation at the meal.
Note: If you normally come to Evening Prayer in Lent but don’t come early for the supper, you’ll miss the conversation; consider coming early and concluding the evening with Evening Prayer.
Thursday evening Bible Studybegins March 1
A new opportunity for Bible study and conversation will begin at Mount Olive on Thursday, Mar. 1, from 6:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. “Prayer and God’s People” will be led by Pr. Crippen and will examine the relationship of prayer between God and God’s people in the Scriptures. We will look at people of the Bible and how they prayed, and ask several questions: Does their conversation with God tell us anything? Does it teach us anything about our prayer life? Can they model prayer for us, or show us ways we should avoid? The hope is that through this conversation we might find our own way in our daily lives of prayer.
The group will meet Thursdays at 6:00 p.m. in the East Assembly room, pending the size of the group. We will have a light supper each night, and participants will be asked to sign up and bring this each week. (The first week will be provided.) This will be a very light and simple meal – bread and cheese and other such things to put on the bread, perhaps some fruit, but not anything fancy. There will be five Thursdays before Holy Week, and we’ll take a break for Holy Week and finish the next two weeks after Easter. After this series is complete, Vicar Doughty will lead a series on the Psalms.
Church Library News
How great to see the new members welcomed into Mount Olive membership on Sunday, and we would also like to welcome you to visit our two church libraries very soon. For those with toddlers, you may find it convenient to stop into the Courtyard Library to find what is available in the children's book browser bin, but our main library, the Louise Schroedel Memorial Library, is located at the very end of the north corridor, past the church staff offices. This library can also be reached via two walkways from the East Assembly room, in case that seems more convenient for you. We can assure you that the main library also has many wonderful books for adults and children, and an excellent reference section as well.
One of the current displays in the main library at the present time includes these books:
A Savior For All Seasons, by William P. Barker
Banishing Fear From Your Life (How to live at peace in a world of anxiety and tension), by Charles D, Baer
Godly Play (an imaginative approach to religious education), by Jerome W. Berryman Different Children, Different Needs (the art of adjustable parenting), by Charles F. Boyd
A Time for Fitness (a daily exercise guide for the Christian) by Fran Carlton
Creative Teaching in the Church, by Eleanor Shelton Morrison and Virgil E. Foster
How To Grow a Young Reader (a parent's guide to kids and books) by John and Kay Lindskoog
All God’s People Are Ministers, by Patricia N. Page
Christ’s Kids Create! (craft ideas for children 4-14 years), by Deborah Stroh
Prime Time: The Middle Years, by Carl T. Uehling
Three new books added to our Reference section include:
The New Interpreter’s Bible (a commentary in 12 volumes - Volume II and Volume VIII - filling out ten volumes we now have)
Augsburg Commentary on the New Testament – Mark. by Donald H. Juel
Many in our congregation already use the library resources with some frequency, but others have not availed themselves of the opportunity to dip into the rich treasure that awaits them inside the library doors. We encourage everyone to come into the library often -- browsers are always welcome!
As has been my custom, I end with a quotation that is worthy of sharing with you: Years ago, a man named Gilliman wrote a poem which ends: "You may have tangible wealth untold, caskets of jewels and coffers of gold. Richer than I, you could never be, for I had a Mother who read to me!" (from What's So Great About Books).
- Leanna Kloempken
Matching Grant for Bethania Kids
Bethania Kids, one of Mount Olive's Mission partners, is celebrating its 25th Anniversary. Several supporters are offering $50,000 of matching grants for donations received by Bethnia before March 1. The Missions committee at Mount Olive has authorized a special gift of $500 to Bethania. If individual members of Mount Olive would like to give a special donation to Bethania during the matching grant period, please send donations directly to Bethania because of the short time frame. The address for Bethania is: Bethania Kids, PO Box 2140, Winchester, VA 22604-1340.
Former Vicar in the News
The year 2017 marks the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. A religious, political, social and economic movement, it began when Martin Luther posted his ninety-five theses at the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. Through these theses, he proposed the theological discussion of the nature of God’s infinite grace and the forgiveness of sins. Wittenberg is often referred to as the cradle of the Reformation. In the German language it is known as the “city of Luther” or Lutherstadt-Wittenberg.
Unfortunately, 40 years of communism and oppression of Christians took its toll on the church in East Germany. Today, one in five people in Wittenberg claims to be Christian. Martin Luther, for some, is simply the statue of the man who stands on a pedestal in the city’s market square.
In preparation for the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, the German churches have invited Pastor Arden Haug (Mount Olive Vicar from 1991-1992) to accompany the Lutheran Church in Wittenberg. He will be working with The Lutheran World Federation in creating a welcoming place for Lutherans from around the world to renew their faith through visit, study and worship. He will also have oversight of the activities of the ELCA Wittenberg Center.
Part of Pastor Haug’s work will also be to introduce the city of Wittenberg and the work of Martin Luther to the ELCA. Resources will be available soon making it possible to glimpse the activities of a city reclaiming the heritage of the Lutheran tradition.
Minnesota FoodShare Cordially Invites You to Their Kick-Off Event
The Westminster Town Hall Forum, on Thursday, February 23, at 12 noon, will be the kick-off event for the 30th Minnesota FoodShare. Rick Steves, host to the popular travel show on Minnesota Public Television, will speak about hunger from a global and local perspective. Further details can be found on www.westminsterforum.org.
A Clean Heart
“Create in me a clean heart, O God, and put a new and right spirit within me.” King David, Psalm 51:10.
In most years, the month of February is a month of transition in the Church Year because in most years Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent are in this month. What this means is that our worship and the texts for our worship will undergo a great change during the next few weeks.
We began February in the season of Epiphany, still hearing the story of the light of Christ sent to the world, still carrying memories of our recent Christmas celebration. Epiphany’s green season closes, as it always does, with the awe-filled story of Jesus’ transfiguration and the revelation of his divine glory to three of the disciples, our worship next Sunday. During the season we were called by Scripture to mission, to spreading the Good News.
But this Sunday with the help of our children, we will put away our Alleluia banner until our Easter celebration, and we will turn our eyes toward Lent, and the journey of faith and life those six weeks bring us. With Lent we begin a forty day pilgrimage which is less focused our mission in the world and more focused on our own lives, faith, and hearts. And the hinge-pin of this shift is Ash Wednesday.
Ash Wednesday is a day when we hear God’s call to us to repent and seek forgiveness. Ash Wednesday is the day when we sing the song of King David as he asked forgiveness from God: “Create in me a clean heart, O God.” Our prayer to God, as we shift from celebrating God’s light in the world to looking at our own sin and our need for that light, is that God make us new inside, that God clean us inside and out.
In fact, that is why Ash Wednesday is such a good transition point to move us from Epiphany to Lent. Whether we are trying to live in our call as missionaries and witnesses of God’s love in the world, or are looking inward and seeing the sin of our hearts and lives and wanting God’s forgiveness, we need God to make our hearts clean. With our inmost being clean and looking to God, not only are our lives lived as the children of light we are, but we are able to witness to God’s grace as well.
Pray David’s prayer with me this month, as we make our great transition in worship and in focus. Ask God to clean your heart so you are the person God has called you to be both inwardly and outwardly. God grant us all clean hearts in Christ Jesus our Lord.
- Joseph
Lent Begins
Ash Wednesday
February 22
Holy Eucharist with the Imposition of Ashes
Noon and 7:00 p.m.
Sunday Readings
February 19, 2012 – Transfiguration of Our Lord
2 Kings 2:1-12 + Psalm 50:1-6
2 Corinthians 4:3-6 + Mark 9:2-9
February 26, 2012 – First Sunday in Lent
Genesis 9:8-17 + Psalm 25:1-10
I Peter 3:18-22 + Mark 1:9-15
This Sunday’s Adult Forum
February 19: Art Halbardier will lead a presentation on the development of the Nicene Creed.
Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper
Tuesday, February 21 – 6:00 pm
We Need Your Palms
It’s time to bring in any palm branches you have from last year’s Palm Sunday liturgy. These branches may be placed in the designated basket in the narthex. They will be burned on Shrove Tuesday, and their ashes used for the Imposition of Ashes on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22.
The Bread of Life
The LORD gives “wine to gladden human hearts, oil to make the face shine, and bread to strengthen human hearts,” according to Psalm 104:15. Bread is the staff of life, and given by Jesus as part of the gift of the Eucharist. The one loaf symbolizes all the people of God gathered together and formed into one Body, fed by the bread which is itself the Body of Christ.
During Lent Mount Olive will be using real bread at the Eucharist to better connect to this powerful symbol and gift of Christ. We will try it for the period of Lent to explore whether this could be possible as our permanent way of sharing in the one bread and one cup of the Meal of our Lord. Several recipes will be tried as well, to best determine which works. Should we continue this into the future, members who are interested will be invited to bake bread for our weekly Eucharists as part of their way of serving. If you have thoughts or comments on this, please don’t hesitate to contact Pastor Crippen, Vicar Doughty, Al Bipes (director of the Worship Committee), or any other members of the Worship Committee: Marcella Daehn, John Gidmark, Ro Griesse, Art Halbardier, Brian Jacobs, Kandi Jo Nelson, Paul Nixdorf, Tom Olsen, Dwight Penas, Rob Ruff, Cantor Cherwien.
Films of Faith in February(and early March!)
Seen any good movies lately? It’s a good question, because film (like the other arts) can be a great way to be challenged, inspired, and guided to reflect on our lives of faith. And as with the other arts, one’s appreciation of a film can be enhanced by discussing it with others.
So on three of the four Sundays of February (including Super Bowl Sunday) and the first Sunday of March, we will have the opportunity to gather at church at 3:00 pm to watch movies of substance and discuss them. The rest of the schedule is as follows:
Feb. 19: Joyeux Noelle
Feb. 26: (No film because of Lent Procession)
Mar. 4: Into Temptation
We will watch the movie, munch (quietly, please) on popcorn, sip a little cider, and then, after the movie, talk about what the movie showed and said and how it speaks to us as we try to live our lives of faith.
Taste of Chile
Mark your calendars for Sunday, March 4! The Missions Committee will host Taste of Chile to celebrate Chilean food and culture and to learn about missions in Chile. If you are interested in making an authentic Chilean dish for the event (recipe provided), please contact Lisa Ruff at jklmruff@msn.com or 651-636-4762.
Lent Procession Service
Sunday, February 26, 2012, 4:00 p.m.
Join Cantor David Cherwien and the Mount Olive Cantorei for another contemplative service of lessons and carols - for Lent! Designed especially for those who serve churches as leaders of such events, this is offered as an opportunity to withdraw from the busyness of life to pray, sing, listen, smell- to fully enter into the season of Lent, a time to renew our baptism.
“A Very Present Help”
Midweek Lent at Mount Olive
The forty days of Lent begin on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22, with Eucharist and the Imposition of Ashes at noon and 7:00 p.m. (Celebrate Shrove Tuesday at Mount Olive on Feb. 21 – see separate announcement.) For the other Wednesday Lenten services this year we will focus on the presence of God in our lives, specifically the places where God’s healing grace is offered. We’ll be using as our starting point a section of Luther’s Smalcald Articles (from the Lutheran confessions) in which he describes the ways God’s grace and forgiveness are given us in concrete and knowable places.
The midweek schedule, beginning on Wednesday, Feb. 29, is Eucharist at 12:00 noon, followed by a soup lunch at 1:00 p.m. In the evening, there will be a soup supper at 6:00 p.m., and Evening Prayer at 7:00 p.m. The preaching at the noon Eucharist will be based on our theme, and the same meditation will be shared during the evening soup supper, with opportunity for further conversation at the meal.
Note: If you normally come to Evening Prayer in Lent but don’t come early for the supper, you’ll miss the conversation; consider coming early and concluding the evening with Evening Prayer.
Thursday evening Bible Studybegins March 1
A new opportunity for Bible study and conversation will begin at Mount Olive on Thursday, Mar. 1, from 6:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. “Prayer and God’s People” will be led by Pr. Crippen and will examine the relationship of prayer between God and God’s people in the Scriptures. We will look at people of the Bible and how they prayed, and ask several questions: Does their conversation with God tell us anything? Does it teach us anything about our prayer life? Can they model prayer for us, or show us ways we should avoid? The hope is that through this conversation we might find our own way in our daily lives of prayer.
The group will meet Thursdays at 6:00 p.m. in the East Assembly room, pending the size of the group. We will have a light supper each night, and participants will be asked to sign up and bring this each week. (The first week will be provided.) This will be a very light and simple meal – bread and cheese and other such things to put on the bread, perhaps some fruit, but not anything fancy. There will be five Thursdays before Holy Week, and we’ll take a break for Holy Week and finish the next two weeks after Easter. After this series is complete, Vicar Doughty will lead a series on the Psalms.
Church Library News
How great to see the new members welcomed into Mount Olive membership on Sunday, and we would also like to welcome you to visit our two church libraries very soon. For those with toddlers, you may find it convenient to stop into the Courtyard Library to find what is available in the children's book browser bin, but our main library, the Louise Schroedel Memorial Library, is located at the very end of the north corridor, past the church staff offices. This library can also be reached via two walkways from the East Assembly room, in case that seems more convenient for you. We can assure you that the main library also has many wonderful books for adults and children, and an excellent reference section as well.
One of the current displays in the main library at the present time includes these books:
A Savior For All Seasons, by William P. Barker
Banishing Fear From Your Life (How to live at peace in a world of anxiety and tension), by Charles D, Baer
Godly Play (an imaginative approach to religious education), by Jerome W. Berryman Different Children, Different Needs (the art of adjustable parenting), by Charles F. Boyd
A Time for Fitness (a daily exercise guide for the Christian) by Fran Carlton
Creative Teaching in the Church, by Eleanor Shelton Morrison and Virgil E. Foster
How To Grow a Young Reader (a parent's guide to kids and books) by John and Kay Lindskoog
All God’s People Are Ministers, by Patricia N. Page
Christ’s Kids Create! (craft ideas for children 4-14 years), by Deborah Stroh
Prime Time: The Middle Years, by Carl T. Uehling
Three new books added to our Reference section include:
The New Interpreter’s Bible (a commentary in 12 volumes - Volume II and Volume VIII - filling out ten volumes we now have)
Augsburg Commentary on the New Testament – Mark. by Donald H. Juel
Many in our congregation already use the library resources with some frequency, but others have not availed themselves of the opportunity to dip into the rich treasure that awaits them inside the library doors. We encourage everyone to come into the library often -- browsers are always welcome!
As has been my custom, I end with a quotation that is worthy of sharing with you: Years ago, a man named Gilliman wrote a poem which ends: "You may have tangible wealth untold, caskets of jewels and coffers of gold. Richer than I, you could never be, for I had a Mother who read to me!" (from What's So Great About Books).
- Leanna Kloempken
Matching Grant for Bethania Kids
Bethania Kids, one of Mount Olive's Mission partners, is celebrating its 25th Anniversary. Several supporters are offering $50,000 of matching grants for donations received by Bethnia before March 1. The Missions committee at Mount Olive has authorized a special gift of $500 to Bethania. If individual members of Mount Olive would like to give a special donation to Bethania during the matching grant period, please send donations directly to Bethania because of the short time frame. The address for Bethania is: Bethania Kids, PO Box 2140, Winchester, VA 22604-1340.
Former Vicar in the News
The year 2017 marks the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. A religious, political, social and economic movement, it began when Martin Luther posted his ninety-five theses at the Castle Church in Wittenberg, Germany. Through these theses, he proposed the theological discussion of the nature of God’s infinite grace and the forgiveness of sins. Wittenberg is often referred to as the cradle of the Reformation. In the German language it is known as the “city of Luther” or Lutherstadt-Wittenberg.
Unfortunately, 40 years of communism and oppression of Christians took its toll on the church in East Germany. Today, one in five people in Wittenberg claims to be Christian. Martin Luther, for some, is simply the statue of the man who stands on a pedestal in the city’s market square.
In preparation for the 500th anniversary of the Reformation, the German churches have invited Pastor Arden Haug (Mount Olive Vicar from 1991-1992) to accompany the Lutheran Church in Wittenberg. He will be working with The Lutheran World Federation in creating a welcoming place for Lutherans from around the world to renew their faith through visit, study and worship. He will also have oversight of the activities of the ELCA Wittenberg Center.
Part of Pastor Haug’s work will also be to introduce the city of Wittenberg and the work of Martin Luther to the ELCA. Resources will be available soon making it possible to glimpse the activities of a city reclaiming the heritage of the Lutheran tradition.
Minnesota FoodShare Cordially Invites You to Their Kick-Off Event
The Westminster Town Hall Forum, on Thursday, February 23, at 12 noon, will be the kick-off event for the 30th Minnesota FoodShare. Rick Steves, host to the popular travel show on Minnesota Public Television, will speak about hunger from a global and local perspective. Further details can be found on www.westminsterforum.org.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Ins and Outs
In Jesus Christ, God makes all outsiders insiders, calling us through each other to become people who in turn see no boundaries, no obstructions, to others, rather who welcome with God’s arms. This is the healing, the grace, the salvation of God at its core.
Pr. Joseph G. Crippen, Sixth Sunday after Epiphany, year B; texts: 2 Kings 5:1-14; Psalm 30; Mark 1:40-45
Sisters and brothers, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen
There’s a nasty part of the broken human condition that seems to occur across cultures and societies, a flaw in how we live as social beings which is shared by rich and poor, young and old, east and west, and is lived and practiced by just about any kind of group of people we can imagine. Actually, it’s all about those groups: human beings like to classify, divide, distinguish, and clarify which people belong to which group, and by extension which group is better than which group. That we do this with everything we study is considered good science, ordering, naming, classifying, to better understand. But our constant need to evaluate some groups as better than others, especially when applied to how we live with others, leads to painful results. War, genocide, bullying, prejudice, oppression, religious hatred come immediately to mind.
Simply put, we like classifying groups and types of people because we want to be insiders, not outsiders. If we believe something politically, we’re the “right” kind of people, and those who disagree with us, of course, are not. If we have a certain status, we’re in and others aren’t. If we’re a certain race, or nationality, or gender, or faith, we cling to the idea that ours is best. Though some of us are so proud to be among those who are truly enlightened (as opposed to all those whom we know to be ignorant) that we take great pains not to speak our prejudices and our insider dreams aloud because we know how wrong it would sound, because we know we ought to be ashamed.
This is not how God created us to be. If God’s hope for humanity is that we love God completely and love our neighbors as ourselves, having insiders and outsiders clearly is not in God’s plan. Today’s Scripture points this out as well, but perhaps in a more subtle way.
Today we have two stories of lepers being healed by the power of God, which on their surface might seem simply more in our series of reflections on God’s healing we’ve had in these latter three weeks of the Epiphany season. But these two were lepers, which meant these two were also outcasts, relegated to the fringes of their respective societies. By any insider/outsider metrics, these two were clearly outsiders. Unfit to mingle even with the social groups to which they did formerly belong, Naaman and the unnamed leper of Jesus’ encounter were marginalized in the extreme (though in Naaman’s case, perhaps that remained in his future, as he still seems to be interacting with his people.)
I want to suggest that in fact all healing by God is best understood as bringing the outsider in, breaking down walls that divide, and creating a new community of God’s shaping. Leprosy will help us see it in one way, but this is the definition of the grace the Son of God brought to the world. Reiterated in multiple ways by the apostle Paul in his letters, and lived and breathed by the Son of God himself in his earthly ministry, to be given the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ is to be brought into life, where there are no groups, no us v. them, no insiders or outsiders. This is the life we are offered, the life the whole world is offered. And we see it clearly today.
Today healing is defined by God’s grace reaching the outcast.
It’s hard to read Naaman as an outcast because in the story he looks and acts like the great commander of the Syrian army that he is. He is beloved to his king, and seems to have a household who loves him, even the slaves. But his days at court are numbered. Leprosy’s not just a life-threatening disease to fear in these days. Its contagion means for Naaman that he will have to live apart from all he loves, outcast, unable to see and be seen. And his days as a valuable general are certainly over.
In that context, we can see why his king is willing to pay so much for him to be healed. And Naaman’s healing is a gift of life – he is restored to all he holds dear. He is brought back in.
Jesus’ leper is in a similar situation, but less so if we care about status. No one even thought to remark upon his name, this is no arrogant general demanding a certain way of healing. But he and Naaman have more in common than anyone else, for this leper’s life is lived on the outskirts of his village, away from everyone he loves, left to die in pain. Worse than the pain of leprosy must have been the social loss, the absence of loving, caring friends and family.
And he demands nothing, only offers Jesus a choice, “If you choose.” It’s a choice of faith, however: he believes Jesus can restore him not only to physical health but to his life, his community. And so the enemy general and the common Israelite Jew are restored by God’s healing to their lives and their loved ones.
And this is what Jesus does again and again, whether physically healing or simply welcoming and loving and caring: he bridges gaps, crosses boundaries, reaches out with God’s love and creates a new community.
His whole ministry focuses on outsiders coming in: Poor people with no status, despised tax collectors, those everyone knew to be “sinners,” people with disease (even those who weren’t literally outcast but for whom disease separated them from abundant life), those people on the fringes believed to be possessed by demons. Even Jesus’ Galilean disciples, who were considered ignorant, hillbilly rubes by the sophisticated Judeans of the cities to the south.
And Jesus’ ministry challenged the insiders more than anyone else he encountered: Both the social insiders like the elite and wealthy Sadducees, and the religious insiders like the pious and faithful Pharisees, who should have seen God’s Messiah in their midst, couldn’t get past Jesus’ inclusive vision of God’s kingdom. The tragedy is, they were welcome too, though without their status; and some, like Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea, heard that good news.
This, then, is our chief experience of healing and grace as well, that we who were far off have been brought near, we who were outsiders are welcome.
Think about the times you have not felt welcome, not a part of a group, an outsider. There are so many ways we exclude others, I have yet to meet someone who hasn’t had that experience of not belonging, of being outside.
Sometimes it’s at school when we’re growing up, from playgrounds at recess to middle school lunch rooms (which might be as clear a foretaste of what hell might be like as we get). Sometimes it’s at work or college as young adults, when it seems that we don’t have a place, where we’re longing to belong, to find a group. Sometimes it’s like our people today: things we suffer separate us from others. For millions around the world, it’s all those social ways, and then added to that are the constraints of poverty, of minority status, of different abilities, of oppression, of lack of education.
And sadly, even the Church of Christ is a place of exclusion, of insiders. Horrible things have been done to people by the very Body of Christ who was created and called to welcome them.
And to a certain extent, our sense of unworthiness can make us feel separate from God. Perhaps that was behind the leper saying “If you choose”: we aren’t sure, knowing what we know about ourselves, that even God truly ought to welcome us.
So the powerful good news that in Christ we are welcome, forgiven, loved, embraced, we belong – there is hardly anything we could hear that is better news. The experience of the Christian community offering the welcoming embrace of the loving, Triune God is a powerful one that has transformed billions. This is why we sing words like that of the psalmist today, “You have turned my wailing into dancing; you have put off my sackcloth and clothed me with joy!” This is certainly the way I experience grace more than any other way: both in knowing God still loves me and says I’m worthy, and in knowing that in this place others say and feel the same thing.
But like the Pharisees and Sadducees, here is where that nasty piece of human nature arises: once in, we want it to be ours alone. This is the horrible truth: we who are made welcome often refuse it to others: Those who come to us for love and grace but who are somehow not seen as worthy. Those who believe other than we, whom we then relegate to outside our attention (and presumably God’s as well). And those who struggle to live every day but about whom we can’t be bothered to care.
Our sense of not being worthy ourselves is somehow lost when we’re “in.” I know, for example, that I don’t mind waiting in a long line as long as there are lots of people behind me. And once welcomed into a group, it’s hard to remember those who don’t feel that welcome.
But on a day when we’re welcoming people into membership in our congregation, we’d best pay attention to this. One of the things which delights me about Mount Olive is that we say to people often that they are welcome to sojourn with us without joining as members – that this is and must be a place where all who need to come can come. We also delight, as today, when people choose to engage with us in this ministry more fully by joining our work as fellow members.
But the true community of Christ is far broader than this congregation, and we would do well to remember that. (Especially when we’re tempted to congratulate ourselves on how well we think of ourselves.)
Which brings us to an important character in Naaman’s story today. Or characters. His servants who speak the truth.
Naaman is fiercely proud, even if he’s now outcast – he won’t do what is simple because it’s beneath him. He’s still got enough insider to disparage the river of Israel, the Jordan, and the dismissive healing he’s offered. The prophet of the LORD doesn’t even deign to come outside and talk to him, for goodness’ sake. He sends his messenger, and tells him to get into the filthy Jordan to be clean.
His servants are lovely here. We can almost hear the gentle cough, the “With respect, my lord . . .” And they say that had he been asked to do something hard, he’d have done it. They know their lord, they know his spirit, his courage. And his pride. And their truth-telling changes the day. Naaman listens, bathes, and is healed.
This is what we need in our lives, this is what I urge you to pray for, and to cultivate in your lives: truth-tellers who speak to us in love and help us see what we won’t see.
Because the healing welcome of God for us is the same as for Naaman: we are welcomed freely and lovingly. But there might be things we need to let go of. God could have healed Naaman without the Jordan. But perhaps he needed to be healed of his pride and arrogance, too. And his ethnocentricity.
We are forgiven and blessed by God – and asked to let go of the things for which we needed forgiveness. We are welcomed in, and asked to let go of our need to foul that welcome by shutting the door behind us so that others also cannot be welcomed in. There are few things more disgusting than hearing a Christian who has been welcomed and loved and forgiven of all, denying the same to someone else.
And truth-tellers in our lives can help us with that. Those who know us and love us well enough to gently cough and say “With all due respect . . .” Those who can remind us when we’re falling into our old habits, or when we’re dishonoring our welcome by not welcoming others. Those who can call us to account, like Naaman, so we can let go and truly receive God’s grace and love.
Because it’s not hard to argue that if we aren’t welcoming of others, if we’re trying to keep all our sinful habits while claiming to be forgiven, if we’re denying God’s grace to others, we likely haven’t truly experienced or received it yet, and there’s something in us blocking it.
I have come to believe that this is a vital need in my life, and I cherish the people I trust who speak truth to me in love. Who can help me see myself as who I am, someone desperately in need of God’s grace. And can help me learn to let go of whatever is blocking me, making me not of Christ, so that the healing, welcoming grace of God in Christ can truly bring me in and change me.
It doesn’t take a great deal of thought to realize what’s next.
We who have received the welcoming grace, the healing welcome of our Lord Jesus Christ, are sent to be that welcome, that grace. We have no business treating Christ’s community as an insider’s club. And the easiest way for us to understand our mission in life is to look and try to see anyone, anyone, who might believe themselves to be outside. They won’t be hard to find.
Because God in Christ is reconciling the world to himself, Paul says. There are no more outsiders, no more insiders. Just the loving embrace of the grace of God known in the healing power of the risen Son of God.
And all are welcome, all are offered healing. Thanks be to God.
In the name of Jesus. Amen
Thursday, February 9, 2012
The Olive Branch, 2/6/12
Accent on Worship
We are coming to the end of Epiphany, and to our last Epiphany texts -- since next Sunday is the festival of the Transfiguration -- which are about washing and cleaning. On Transfiguration we’ll have a Sunday when Jesus shines with the purity of God’s bright light, and then we’ll move into Lent, remembering we are dust.
But for now we meet Naaman, the crabby pagan army general, grumpy that all God tells him to do, through the prophet Elisha, is wash in the muddy stream that is the Jordan river. Go look up some pictures of the Jordan; “Clean” is not necessarily what one would experience after washing in it!
Nevertheless, Naaman eventually does wash in the muddy Jordan, and the disease which had afflicted him is washed away by God. Namaan comes to believe in God through this washing, and immediately is moved to share his wealth in thanks.
In our reading from Mark, Jesus, having just slipped away from the crowds at Capernaum, encounters an already-faithful man who has a disease. In this case, Christ touches the man (interestingly for our Epiphany season, the word for “touch” is also the the word “ignite”) and says, “I will it: Be clean!” And it happens. The man, cleaned (and “lit up”, perhaps?) goes off, telling everyone what has happened-- he is clean, he is restored to community, and it happened when he encountered Jesus.
Not all of us have such dramatic stories as Naaman or the man healed by Jesus’ will and touch. But we are all washed in Baptism, and we are ignited by faith through the work of the Holy Spirit. In what way, this week, will we give thanks? In what way will we spread the Good News of what God has done for us and the whole world in Christ Jesus?
- Vicar Erik Doughty
The Bread of Life
The LORD gives “wine to gladden human hearts, oil to make the face shine, and bread to strengthen human hearts,” according to Psalm 104:15. Bread is the staff of life, and given by Jesus as part of the gift of the Eucharist. The one loaf symbolizes all the people of God gathered together and formed into one Body, fed by the bread which is itself the Body of Christ. During Lent Mount Olive will be using real bread at the Eucharist to better connect to this powerful symbol and gift of Christ. We will try it for the period of Lent to explore whether this could be possible as our permanent way of sharing in the one bread and one cup of the Meal of our Lord. Several recipes will be tried as well, to best determine which works. Should we continue this into the future, members who are interested will be invited to bake bread for our weekly Eucharists as part of their way of serving.
If you have thoughts or comments on this, please don’t hesitate to contact Pastor Crippen, Vicar Doughty, Al Bipes (director of the Worship Committee), or any other members of the Worship Committee: Marcella Daehn, John Gidmark, Ro Griesse, Art Halbardier, Brian Jacobs, Kandi Jo Nelson, Paul Nixdorf, Tom Olsen, Dwight Penas, Rob Ruff, Cantor Cherwien.
Book Discussion Group
For its meeting this Saturday, February 11, the Book Discussion Group will read Native Son, by Richard Wright, and for the March 10 session A Passage to India, by E. M. Forster.
Book Discussion meets on the second Saturday of each month at 10:00 a.m. at the church. All readers welcome!
Heart Healthy Food and Fun Event
Set aside this Sunday, February 12 for a not-to-be-missed dinner at Mount Olive, with “hearts” as its theme. Sponsored by the Neighborhood Ministries Committee, this fundraiser promises to be deliciously “heart healthy,” as well as fun. Hans Tisberger will provide games and prizes. Tickets for the event will are $12 for adults, $5 for children aged 5 to 12. Children under 5 are free, and will be available at the door. Join the fun and support the raising of funds to acquire additional needed kitchen equipment.
This Sunday’s Adult Forum
February 12: Dr. Terence Nichols of St. Thomas University will offer the second of a 2-part presentation, “What Christians Should Know About Isalm.”
Films of Faith in February
(and early March!)
Seen any good movies lately? It’s a good question, because film (like the other arts) can be a great way to be challenged, inspired, and guided to reflect on our lives of faith. And as with the other arts, one’s appreciation of a film can be enhanced by discussing it with others.
So on three of the four Sundays of February and the first Sunday of March, we will have the opportunity to gather at church at 3:00 pm to watch movies of substance and discuss them.
The schedule is as follows:
Feb. 12: Babette's Feast
Feb. 19: Joyeux Noelle
Feb. 26: No film because of Lent Procession
Mar. 4: Into Temptation
We will watch the movie, munch (quietly, please) on popcorn, sip a little cider, and then, after the movie, talk about what the movie showed and said and how it speaks to us as we try to live our lives of faith.
We Need Your Palms
It’s time to bring in any palm branches you have from last year’s Palm Sunday liturgy. These branches may be placed in the designated basket in the narthex. They will be burned on Shrove Tuesday, and their ashes used for the Imposition of Ashes on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22.
Knitters and Crocheters Wanted!
Yarnworkers, your talents are needed - again!
During Lent, we will collect donations of hand-knit or crocheted hats, scarves, mittens, and socks for donation to Our Saviour’s Community Services. These items will benefit those served in their homeless shelter and in their English Learning Center. All sizes are needed, and they request especially that our donations be designed for warmth – for a REAL Minnesota winter (unlike this year’s unusually mild Minnesota winter). If you like to knit or crochet and are able to make a winter thing or two to donate to this effort, simply bring your items to the church office before Easter. We already have a box filled and have started a second box!
For those who like to knit or crochet with others, plan to come to a knitting bee in the West Assembly Area this Sunday, February 12, from 1:30-3:30 (following the Neighborhood Ministries fundraiser luncheon), at church. We’ll put a pot of coffee or tea on and visit while we work. Those who wish to attend the Films of Faith event that day can knit for awhile after the luncheon while awaiting the movie.
If you have any questions about this project or if you are in need of supplies or patterns, please contact either Kate Sterner (katesterner@gmail.com) or Cha Posz (chaposz@gmail.com, or at the church office, M-F, 612-827-5919).
"Greetings" is Hot Off the Press
The winter issue of "Greetings from Mount Olive Neighborhood Ministries" will be distributed by the greeters after both liturgies on Sunday, February 12th. Extra copies will be available at the church.
Taste of Chile
Mark your calendars for Sunday, March 4! The Missions Committee will host Taste of Chile to celebrate Chilean food and culture and to learn about missions in Chile. If you are interested in making an authentic Chilean dish for the event (recipe provided), please contact Lisa Ruff at jklmruff@msn.com or 651-636-4762.
Attention Worship Assistants!
All of the server’s albs and hangers have now been labeled with numbers. Please choose an alb and write the alb number next to your name on the list which is posted on the bulletin board. Once the list is complete, a new roster with alb assignments will be posted.
We are coming to the end of Epiphany, and to our last Epiphany texts -- since next Sunday is the festival of the Transfiguration -- which are about washing and cleaning. On Transfiguration we’ll have a Sunday when Jesus shines with the purity of God’s bright light, and then we’ll move into Lent, remembering we are dust.
But for now we meet Naaman, the crabby pagan army general, grumpy that all God tells him to do, through the prophet Elisha, is wash in the muddy stream that is the Jordan river. Go look up some pictures of the Jordan; “Clean” is not necessarily what one would experience after washing in it!
Nevertheless, Naaman eventually does wash in the muddy Jordan, and the disease which had afflicted him is washed away by God. Namaan comes to believe in God through this washing, and immediately is moved to share his wealth in thanks.
In our reading from Mark, Jesus, having just slipped away from the crowds at Capernaum, encounters an already-faithful man who has a disease. In this case, Christ touches the man (interestingly for our Epiphany season, the word for “touch” is also the the word “ignite”) and says, “I will it: Be clean!” And it happens. The man, cleaned (and “lit up”, perhaps?) goes off, telling everyone what has happened-- he is clean, he is restored to community, and it happened when he encountered Jesus.
Not all of us have such dramatic stories as Naaman or the man healed by Jesus’ will and touch. But we are all washed in Baptism, and we are ignited by faith through the work of the Holy Spirit. In what way, this week, will we give thanks? In what way will we spread the Good News of what God has done for us and the whole world in Christ Jesus?
- Vicar Erik Doughty
The Bread of Life
The LORD gives “wine to gladden human hearts, oil to make the face shine, and bread to strengthen human hearts,” according to Psalm 104:15. Bread is the staff of life, and given by Jesus as part of the gift of the Eucharist. The one loaf symbolizes all the people of God gathered together and formed into one Body, fed by the bread which is itself the Body of Christ. During Lent Mount Olive will be using real bread at the Eucharist to better connect to this powerful symbol and gift of Christ. We will try it for the period of Lent to explore whether this could be possible as our permanent way of sharing in the one bread and one cup of the Meal of our Lord. Several recipes will be tried as well, to best determine which works. Should we continue this into the future, members who are interested will be invited to bake bread for our weekly Eucharists as part of their way of serving.
If you have thoughts or comments on this, please don’t hesitate to contact Pastor Crippen, Vicar Doughty, Al Bipes (director of the Worship Committee), or any other members of the Worship Committee: Marcella Daehn, John Gidmark, Ro Griesse, Art Halbardier, Brian Jacobs, Kandi Jo Nelson, Paul Nixdorf, Tom Olsen, Dwight Penas, Rob Ruff, Cantor Cherwien.
Book Discussion Group
For its meeting this Saturday, February 11, the Book Discussion Group will read Native Son, by Richard Wright, and for the March 10 session A Passage to India, by E. M. Forster.
Book Discussion meets on the second Saturday of each month at 10:00 a.m. at the church. All readers welcome!
Heart Healthy Food and Fun Event
Set aside this Sunday, February 12 for a not-to-be-missed dinner at Mount Olive, with “hearts” as its theme. Sponsored by the Neighborhood Ministries Committee, this fundraiser promises to be deliciously “heart healthy,” as well as fun. Hans Tisberger will provide games and prizes. Tickets for the event will are $12 for adults, $5 for children aged 5 to 12. Children under 5 are free, and will be available at the door. Join the fun and support the raising of funds to acquire additional needed kitchen equipment.
This Sunday’s Adult Forum
February 12: Dr. Terence Nichols of St. Thomas University will offer the second of a 2-part presentation, “What Christians Should Know About Isalm.”
Films of Faith in February
(and early March!)
Seen any good movies lately? It’s a good question, because film (like the other arts) can be a great way to be challenged, inspired, and guided to reflect on our lives of faith. And as with the other arts, one’s appreciation of a film can be enhanced by discussing it with others.
So on three of the four Sundays of February and the first Sunday of March, we will have the opportunity to gather at church at 3:00 pm to watch movies of substance and discuss them.
The schedule is as follows:
Feb. 12: Babette's Feast
Feb. 19: Joyeux Noelle
Feb. 26: No film because of Lent Procession
Mar. 4: Into Temptation
We will watch the movie, munch (quietly, please) on popcorn, sip a little cider, and then, after the movie, talk about what the movie showed and said and how it speaks to us as we try to live our lives of faith.
We Need Your Palms
It’s time to bring in any palm branches you have from last year’s Palm Sunday liturgy. These branches may be placed in the designated basket in the narthex. They will be burned on Shrove Tuesday, and their ashes used for the Imposition of Ashes on Ash Wednesday, Feb. 22.
Knitters and Crocheters Wanted!
Yarnworkers, your talents are needed - again!
During Lent, we will collect donations of hand-knit or crocheted hats, scarves, mittens, and socks for donation to Our Saviour’s Community Services. These items will benefit those served in their homeless shelter and in their English Learning Center. All sizes are needed, and they request especially that our donations be designed for warmth – for a REAL Minnesota winter (unlike this year’s unusually mild Minnesota winter). If you like to knit or crochet and are able to make a winter thing or two to donate to this effort, simply bring your items to the church office before Easter. We already have a box filled and have started a second box!
For those who like to knit or crochet with others, plan to come to a knitting bee in the West Assembly Area this Sunday, February 12, from 1:30-3:30 (following the Neighborhood Ministries fundraiser luncheon), at church. We’ll put a pot of coffee or tea on and visit while we work. Those who wish to attend the Films of Faith event that day can knit for awhile after the luncheon while awaiting the movie.
If you have any questions about this project or if you are in need of supplies or patterns, please contact either Kate Sterner (katesterner@gmail.com) or Cha Posz (chaposz@gmail.com, or at the church office, M-F, 612-827-5919).
"Greetings" is Hot Off the Press
The winter issue of "Greetings from Mount Olive Neighborhood Ministries" will be distributed by the greeters after both liturgies on Sunday, February 12th. Extra copies will be available at the church.
Taste of Chile
Mark your calendars for Sunday, March 4! The Missions Committee will host Taste of Chile to celebrate Chilean food and culture and to learn about missions in Chile. If you are interested in making an authentic Chilean dish for the event (recipe provided), please contact Lisa Ruff at jklmruff@msn.com or 651-636-4762.
Attention Worship Assistants!
All of the server’s albs and hangers have now been labeled with numbers. Please choose an alb and write the alb number next to your name on the list which is posted on the bulletin board. Once the list is complete, a new roster with alb assignments will be posted.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
What Are You Waiting For?
Today’s readings are filled with dramatic calls to turn to God, to follow the Son of God. For us, focusing on the drama of these calls might cause us to miss our everyday calls to serve God, to do justice, to bring in God’s kingdom.
Pr. Joseph G. Crippen, Fifth Sunday after Epiphany, year B; texts: Isaiah 40:21-31; Mark 1:29-39
Sisters and brothers, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen
Sometimes we don’t know what we really need, only what we really want. But there’s a big difference. Good parents know the distinction and don’t give their children everything they want. That would spoil them, and sometimes hurt them, as children often want things that aren’t good for them. A good parent is measured rather by their ability to meet their children’s needs, real needs, such as love, shelter, clothing, food.
I’ve found that in my life if I can distinguish between what I really need and what I only want, I can find peace and contentment a lot more easily.
Isaiah makes promises today, promises to those who “wait for the LORD.” Those who wait for the LORD will receive amazing things. Jesus’ ministry of healing looks a great deal like a fulfillment of such promises. But Jesus does healings in our reading today, and then disappears to another town when people start looking for him. So some who waited for him received healing, many did not. And surely this happened all the time.
But it makes me wonder: what are we waiting for from God? Are we waiting for something we really need, or something we really want? Do we know the difference? And if we do, are we satisfied with what we receive when God does answer us, does provide for us?
There’s an awful lot of waiting and searching going on surrounding Jesus as he begins his ministry, teaching, calling, and probably most importantly to the people, healing.
I find myself wondering about the people that were searching for Jesus. Most who sought him out were waiting for healing. As we join the story today, Jesus does a lot of healing in Capernaum, and then it was night. He went off to a lonely, quiet place, to pray. The next morning a big crowd is looking for him. They’d seen healings the day before and run home to get Aunt Betty who was paralyzed, or Cousin Larry who was blind – but Jesus was gone. The disciples seem to want him to go back to town, to the crowds – but Jesus says they have to go on, to the next village, so that he can “proclaim the message” there as well.
But what about the people waiting for him at Capernaum? Were they disappointed that he’d gone? They must have been. Had they missed their chance for healing? Why would he leave when there was more to do? Was he worth following, worth believing, if they or their loved ones didn’t receive healing like the others?
The people wanted more from Jesus in that town – but maybe it wasn’t the reason he came. I’ve talked about this before, that Jesus couldn’t walk past a sick person and not do anything, but that his mission was far more important than simply miracle-working. So today physical healings are clearly what the people want from Jesus, but they aren’t necessarily what they really need.
What is clear is that Jesus had and has more healing to offer than physical healing, much more. “The message” he says he needs to proclaim to the next town is what he began saying a few verses earlier in Mark’s Gospel: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”
Repent – turn to God – and believe in the good news, the good news that the time is fulfilled, God’s time is now, the time of waiting is over, and God’s kingdom has come near. As marvelous as it was for him to heal the sick and cast out demons, it’s rather this fulfillment he came to do. To fulfill God’s promises of life and bring God’s reign back to this earth. To call people to live in the rule and reign of God, to repent and love God and neighbor as we were made to do.
Those who were waiting for Jesus to heal their lameness, their blindness, their possessions – some received it, some did not. Just like us today. But all who wanted it, all, received the good news, the message that the God of the universe loves them and has come to be with them and give them life. All who wanted it, all, received the call to turn to God in love and to their neighbor in love and to find real life.
And that message was enough. In fact, for 2,000 years even if the physical difficulties are not removed, this promise, this good news, has been enough to satisfy and bring joy to believers. Because this presence of God is exactly what Isaiah promises – Jesus delivers on Isaiah’s promise.
Isaiah promises a powerful gift – power to the faint, strength to the powerless. But not necessarily healing, at least not physical healing. What seems to be promised here is simply what Isaiah says – strength to overcome difficulties, renewal of the spirit. “Those who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”
My sisters and brothers, this is what Jesus came to offer. Not removal of all difficulties, but strength to endure, and even to thrive and be joyful. That doesn’t mean we should never pray for healing, or for pains or suffering to be taken from us. God loves us and we’re to ask for what we want.
But we never want to mistake the fact that the immediate relief we want is not necessarily what we need. If we get that immediate relief, that particular healing we’ve prayed for, we can rejoice. But even then, we have not received what we ultimately need.
What we need is for God to destroy death, to make the reality that all of us face not be a reality anymore. That’s the healing we really need. That is exactly what God does. In effect, what God says to us in Jesus is this: “Whether or not I cure you physically or solve your difficulty or take away your suffering, do you see that it’s enough for you that I love you with a love beyond death, a love that will carry you through death into life, a love that makes your life worthwhile now and always?”
This is the promise of Isaiah. This is the reason Jesus went on to the next town – to continue to carry the message of God’s love and to call people to return to God and God’s love.
But there’s more, isn’t there? Jesus goes on to the next town because that message needs telling.
And now you and I are called to tell. So the question must be asked again: what are we waiting for? Not “what are we waiting for from God?” this time. No, “what are we waiting for?” The urgency of Jesus is this: the whole world needs to know this good news, that the time is fulfilled, that God’s rule has come to the world. And we who have received this healing are the ones called to carry the message. And if the world is to be saved, all are needed to live in love toward God and love toward neighbor.
Maybe Peter’s mother-in-law should be our model. It bothers some people that immediately after being healed by Jesus she gets up and serves them. I don’t know why it should surprise or bother anyone. It’s not like Jesus healed her and sat back and said “where’s dinner?” She’s just acting like lots of women I know and some I’ve been related to (like my grandmother), who would serve coffee and lunch no matter how they felt, and who would be distraught if they weren’t permitted to do it. I’m sure as soon as she felt better she said, “now go sit down and I’ll find some cookies and get the coffee pot going. And after that we’ll have some dinner.” Or words to that effect.
But more to the point, having been healed, she began to serve. And I think we would do well to emulate that giving. And that begs the question: What are you waiting for? Think about it:
You and I have been given gifts beyond telling, gifts unique to you, gifts unique to me, as well as gifts we all have received of wealth and possessions. We know the truth about God: that God loved the world so much that God became one of us, and died and rose to give us eternal life, life that begins now richly and fully, and will continue for eternity. And Jesus has said our only job is to use the gifts we have to tell others about it. To serve God by serving others with this good news.
If you and I don’t think about this every day and pray that God open our eyes to our mission field and get us into it, then I ask you again, What are we waiting for?
And this is where we stop for now, with questions.
What will you do with the healing you’ve received, the gifts you’ve been given, the Good News you hold in your heart? Have you found ministries that use your gifts, for the good of the Lord’s ministry here at Mount Olive, or in other places in your world and life? Or is that only for other people? Have you committed to growing your giving of money into a tithe, or more, since you are blessed with overwhelming wealth in a world filled with poverty and despair? Or is that only something others need to do? Have you shared God’s love with others in your actions, like Peter’s mother-in-law, or in your words, like Jesus? Or is that only someone else’s job?
Far too often we Christians live as if our faith is only for our own benefit, and we let others do the serving, the loving, the giving. But the ministry of Christ Jesus only works when the people of Christ Jesus work. When the death-defeating love which we have from God inspires us to love of God and neighbor in such a way that in our own ways we become part of God’s changing and healing of the world.
When God renews our strength and lifts us up on eagle’s wings, as God does every day, what will we do with that strength, that energy? That’s our question today.
Waiting for the Lord is a rich thing, which leads to life and joy and satisfaction of our deepest needs, even in the midst of affliction. But our Lord is also waiting for you, for me, to go and share this joy. God give us the courage and the will to do this.
In the name of Jesus. Amen
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
