Faithful Moments

Thought for the Week-Open

Good Afternoon Girlfriends!

Settle in Girls...I got a little carried away.  Be sure to check the very bottom of the email for a special announcement.

Wow!  This week is just flying by! Several years ago there was a department store called Mervyn's.  They had the best TV commercials.  I remember one where this woman absolutely could not wait for the store to open...so much so, that she would wait for hours outside the store's doors with her face pressed close to the glass, her hands on either side of her face, and gently tap the glass saying: "Open.  Open.  Open."  Mervyn's was known for its great one-day sales.  Now, I told you that story, to tell you this one....  

This past Sunday was Easter (He IS Risen!), and my heart and mind have simply been reeling with the amount of people that were in church!  We must've run close to 3000 people through my church on Sunday.  In my service alone there was close to 1,400.  I sit on the front row, so I have prime placement to watch all of the people come up to the front of the church for Communion.  I was sitting there with my family, and watching the countless faces come up to the altar, receive the Lord's Supper, His forgiveness, His peace, and then depart back to their seats.  My heart was overwhelmed for each one of them.  The sanctuary was busting at the seams.  People were everywhere.  There was a sense of urgency, as though that day were the only day we would be open.  Pause.

There are two times a year that droves of folks will come into church.  The first: Christmas Eve.  The second: Easter Morning.  Today, I want to talk to you about both of those plus a little something extra.  Today's Thought has been about four months in the making, though I didn't piece everything together until this moment. (Thank you Pastor Noack for enlightening me)  I want you to come with me to a stable in the little town of Bethlehem.  The stable is small, and dank.  It does not smell sweet, it is not well lit.  There is no soft bed and no precious baby cradle.  There is however, a Baby and an open door.  God Almighty chose this humble place as the beginning of His Son's earthly appearance.  God, in all of His wisdom and power announced His Son's birth, not to the royalty of the day, but rather to a group of rag-tag shepherds.  "And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks by night.  An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.  But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid.  I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people.  Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord." Luke 2:8-11  Can you even imagine?  The shepherds were minding their own business, at night, when a host of angels appear in the night sky proclaiming the birth of the Messiah.  What did the shepherds do?  They hurried into town to see what the angels were talking about and knelt at the manger where the Christ Child lay.  Now, fast forward thirty-three years.  That Baby grew, until He was a full grown Man.  He did so many marvelous and miraculous things that there are not enough papers to write them down on.  The most miraculous thing He did, was lay His own life down for those same shepherds who came to Him when He was an infant, He laid His life down for you and for me.  "Then Pilate [the Roman Governor] took Jesus and had him flogged.  The soldiers twisted a crown of thorns and put it on his head...and they struck him in the face." John 19:1-2, 3  It gets worse before it gets better, stay with me, there will be some good news at the end.  Continue reading with me from the book of John.  "So the soldiers took charge of Jesus.  [Jesus] Carrying his own cross...they crucified him..." John 19:17-18  

Now, I could leave us here.  But how would that work for sharing the Gospel and the Good News of Christ?  Where's the openness of that?  It's totally true, Jesus was put on the cross.  He was crucified.  He did die.  He did NOT, however stay in the tomb.  Three days later, when the women went to the tomb to fully prepare Jesus' body for the proper burial, found when they arrived that the tomb was wide open!  He was gone!  The almighty and awesome power of God had raised Him from the dead!  I don't want to minimize the true miracle here: Jesus' death and resurrection saves us from our sins.  Without those two things we would be lost and condemned forever.  There are two quick Scriptures I want to draw your attention to: remember the shepherds?  They saw the Christ as an infant.  They witnessed His birth announcement in the form of a host of angels, yet after they'd seen Him, "the shepherds returned" (Luke 2:20) to their fields.  They went back to their daily lives.  And the women from the open tomb?  They ran from the garden, and met Jesus face to face, "'Do not be afraid.  Go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee; there they will see me." Matthew 28:10  See, the disciples were instructed to return to their lives as well.  Jesus would meet them back where it all started.  What does all of this have to do with Easter and Mervyn's?

For some, Easter and Christmas Eve services are like a one-day sale.  Some think that the deals available to them on that one day simply will not be around at any other time of the year.  Some feel that way about the church.  Sure, we put a great deal of effort into these special services, but the power of God is present every other day of the year.  My prayer for everyone who attended church on Easter morning was for the Holy Spirit to convict each of them in such a way as for them to feel the same urgency in their spirit to attend church next week, and the week after, and the week after.  Stand at the doors....we are OPEN.  Have a blessed week.

Side-note:

For those of you who don't know, tomorrow is my last day on staff here at Trinity.  It has been my honor and privilege to serve the women of this congregation.  No one panic!  Things here at the church are great.  I've been praying over this decision for many months.  My husband and I strongly feel that God is calling me into a new area of ministry through my writing and my speaking.  I will still send out my Thoughts for the Week--no worries there.  :)   Thank you for allowing me to be a part of so many lives.  These past several years have truly been a blessing to me.   

Thought for the Week-Powder

Good Morning Girlfriends!

I know I'm a bit early this week, but I wanted to get a jump on the week.  We are heading into Holy Week, and I've a couple of important things to say.  First, this week marks probably the most vital aspect of our entire faith.  Throughout the course of this week, we will walk through the institution of the Lord's Supper, we will walk step by step through the arrest, trial and crucifixion of our Savior, and finally rejoice on Easter morning with our Risen Lord!  But why?  Why do we celebrate (odd word choice) these events?  Hold that thought for a minute.  Settle in.  I want to tell you a story.

What do you know about powder?  There are several different types of powder.  There's the powder you put on your face, the sweet smelling kind you sprinkle on a baby's bum, and then there's the powder I want to talk to you about today.  Last Thursday I came home from work to a great big mess in my house.  You see, my husband decided to have both of the upstairs bathrooms gutted...at the same time.  The upside to this is that once it's done--it will be done all at once.  The downside, the mess is absolutely horrific.  The tile from those bathrooms had to be beaten apart, scraped up and basically pulverized in order to remove it from the floor.  Apparently when you lay tile, you are never supposed to change it out.  The kicker with this little scenario is the simple fact that I was unaware this was taking place.  Oh, we had talked about doing this...but the actual day and time had yet to be announced.  Therefore when I came home, I was greeted with a layer of powder-fine dust over everything in my house.  You see, I had not moved anything from the rooms directly adjoining to these two bathrooms.  So everything in those rooms were completely covered with about an inch thick layer of this very impressively clingy dust.  It absolutely permeated everything.  Made me think of something else...

As I mentioned, we are entering into Holy Week.  More than any other week in the year, this week we take a good long hard look at ourselves.  We have a "dust" problem with ourselves.  I'm not suggesting that y'all are hygiene deficient.  What I'm saying is we all have a sin problem.  And this sin covers each one of us so thoroughly, so completely that it permeates every part of our lives.  It blankets the outer layer of our person, and then it creeps into the very core of our being.  Let's see what the Book has to say about this.  Psalm 51:5 says: "Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me."  Ouch.  I remember when my babies were born.  It was hard to look at those sweet angels and think of them as being sinful, but they were.  If we keep moving to the right, we'll land in the book of Jeremiah.  In Jeremiah 17:9 tells us from the  New King James Version, "'The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it? I, the LORD, search the heart, I test the mind...'"  Are you beginning to see a pattern?  We have a sin problem that is covering us from the inside out.  This sin, is in every part of us.  It is even in places we cannot see.  I have one more place I want to show you.  We are going to jump all the way to very back of the New Testament; to the book of 1 John chapter 1 verse 8: "If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us."

No one is immune to this.  We cannot escape it.  It doesn't matter how well we drape ourselves.  We will always and forever be covered in a fine layer of sin.  What can we do?  I have an answer.  You see, when Jeff finally gets finished with his little remodeling project, and the dust finally settles--I won't be able to effectively rid my house of the dust.  There's simply too much of it.  I'm going to need help.  It's the same with us.  The sin that is on me and in me is simply too much.  I cannot rid myself of the sin--I never could.  You can't either.  We need help.  We need a Savior.  Jesus came to help us, Girls, He came to save us.  Without Him, we'd be lost forever.  This week as we make our way from the Garden of Gethsemane, the Cross of Calvary and finally the empty tomb on Easter morning...thank Him that your sins are gone forever.  There's not one place your sins can hide from Him.  Jesus is more effective that Swiffer, Mr. Clean and Merry Maids--combined!  It's over.  "It is finished." John 19:30 (emphasis added)  So, how's the powder that covers you?   Walk with me this week, let Jesus dust you off.  You'll enjoy the fresh new robes.  Have a blessed week! 

"'Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.'" Isaiah 1:18 

Join us this week for services!!

HOLY WEEK IS NEXT WEEK!!

April 21 (Thurs) 10:30 AM, 7:15 PM  Maundy Thursday

April 22 (Fri) 10:30 AM, 7:15 PM  Good Friday/Tenebrae*

April 24 (Sun) 6:00 AM        Easter Sunrise Service

        8:00 AM, 

        9:30 AM, 

       11:00 AM        Worship/Communion

*The Tenebrae service is an extremely somber service done in progressing darkness.  It is by far, my favorite service of the year!    

       

  

   

Thought for the Week-Gardening Angels

Good Morning Girlfriends!

I want to spend a little time today talking to you about angels.  Now, this is not going to be an in-depth, super deep study on angels.  For that type of spiritual discussion, I'm afraid I'll have to refer to you one of my pastors.  They are much more qualified than I am to teach those deep theological messages.  However, I do know a little bit about "Gardening Angels".  Let me explain.  Last week as we knelt down for nighttime prayers (sounds like we only pray once a week!) Elliott decided he would like to pray.  I've said for a number of years that he's going to grow up to be a pastor...anyway, as he made his way down the list of prayer requests that had been submitted by his brother and sister, he paused as he thought of his daddy.  Jeff has recently begun traveling again for work related purposes.  The children often pray for his safety.  On this particular night, Elliott was desperately trying to ask God to send His holy guardian angels to protect his daddy should he have to get back on the road.  The only problem with this precious request was the word guardian.  It simply would not come out of his mouth.  He stammered and stumbled and started the word over about four times before finally giving up and saying, "Please God send Your gardening angels to watch over Daddy if he has to go out West."  Girls, it was the most precious thing I've ever heard in my life! Of course I instantly began to think about angels...

Did you know we really do have guardian angels that watch over us?  Today is a special day.  We get to spend some time in both the Old and the New Testament.  I love the way our heavenly Father is constantly providing for us.  He knew this world would be a lot for us to handle.  He knew we would need some of His divine intervention in order to travel through this life.  Our children are thoroughly protected.  Come with me to the book of Matthew.  We find in Matthew 18:10 Jesus speaking.  He tells us, "'See that you do not look down on one of these little ones.  For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven.'" (emphasis added)  Isn't that wonderful?!  Jesus, Himself assures us that our children have angels watching over them.  I don't know about you, but I take great comfort in knowing that I'm not the only one tailing my kids!  But what about us?  No matter how big we get, we are still God's children.  He still looks after us.  He still protects us because let's face it, is there one person on the face of this earth who managed to stay out of trouble?  Come with me to the Old Testament.  I want us to drop in on a friend of mine who knew a little something about trouble.  Remember Job?  Read with me from Job 33:22-26 "'His soul draws near to the pit, and his life to the messengers of death.  Yet if there is an angel on his side as a mediator, one out of a thousand, to tell a man what is right for him, to be gracious to him and say, 'Spare him from going down to the pit, I have found a ransom for him'--then his flesh is renewed like a child's; it is restored as in the days of his youth.  He prays to God and finds favor with him, he sees God's face and shouts for joy; he is restored by God to his righteous state.'" (emphasis added) Doesn't that make you just want to smile?  God looks out for the little ones and He looks out for us as well.  

Angels are all around us.  I believe that.  Sometimes we can see them.  Sometimes we cannot.  Sometimes they come to us as holy and divine messengers of God, cloaked in human form.  Still other times, they come to us in the form of a friend, who passed in front of us with the right encouraging word at just the right time.  Elliott knew that he not only wanted God to send His gardening angels to watch over his daddy, but he needed those angels to watch over him.  What about you?  What are doing today that you may need a little bit of divine intervention?  Here's a thought: stop and ask God to surround you with His gardening angels.  They will tend to your spirit and refresh you for the task at hand.  After all, they've been in the presence of the Most High God!  Have a blessed weekend!

"Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?" Hebrews 1:14

HOLY WEEK IS NEXT WEEK!!

April 21 (Thurs) 10:30 AM, 7:15 PM  Maundy Thursday

April 22 (Fri) 10:30 AM, 7:15 PM  Good Friday/Tenebrae*

April 24 (Sun) 6:00 AM        Easter Sunrise Service

        8:00 AM, 

        9:30 AM, 

       11:00 AM        Worship/Communion

*The Tenebrae service is an extremely somber service done in progressing darkness.  It is by far, my favorite service of the year!    

       

 

Thought for the Week-Call of Duty

Good Morning Girlfriends!

I trust that everyone is having a good week.  My week has been busy...especially coming off of the weekend we had!  Settle in Girls, today we are going on (what I fear may be a lengthy) field trip.  In light of the subject matter, I have traded my usual pink, for a more subdued black.  So last weekend my church had its annual camping weekend at Lake Livingston State Park.  This a beautiful area with pine trees and bike trails and big ditches with fallen trees for the kids to play all over.  There were several families from the church that went, with most of us having three or more kiddos, which made for interesting head-counts.  Well, the kids had a blast with their own version of the Redneck Olympics with the ditch and the trees and the make-shift swing that my husband had constructed from an old piece of wood and a rope.  Right around lunch time on Saturday, as the adults were at the campsite some 150 yards from the play area of the kids, we hear the unmistakeable sounds of screaming.  These were not your average, run-of-the-mill screams of mild irritation.  These were the screams of utter panic and fear.  Fifteen kids were running at full speed back to the adults yelling that Ethan (my oldest) was badly hurt.  My heart stopped.  In fact, I can feel my face flushing as I'm typing this...days later.  He was trying to run with these kids back to camp, but he was crying, "My head!  My head is OPEN!"  He had been hit with the wooden swing, and was now bleeding copiously from the back of the head.  Now, head wounds of any size bleed like crazy.  Your head is full veins.  He had in fact, been knocked good enough that we knew a trip to the ER was needed, and fast.

As we walked to the truck, I tried to apply pressure to the back of his head to stop the bleeding.  My friend Lesli, a nurse and in that moment an angel, came running with a towel to do the job my bare hand could not.  She slid into the backseat of Jeff's truck and made the thirty mile trip into town with us.  Ethan remained awake and alert, but asked me, "Mom, am I going to bleed out?"  Granted, he took a good blow to the head, BUT I really didn't think he was in danger of bleeding out.  I had to smile.  It made me think of Someone else....

There is a popular video game on the market that I absolutely despise.  It's a war game, that is full of shoot-em-up, blow-em-up and destroy the bad guys type of game.  It is violent and graphic.  When one of your guys gets shot, a message flashes on the screen that says, "You're bleeding out.  You need health."  Then your fellow soldiers come and revive you.  It's a horrible game.  Obviously my son has played this game or he would know the terminology.  Terrific.  As many of you know, we are smack dab in the middle of Lent.  We are on our way to the Cross of Calvary, to the grave and then to the Empty Tomb.  But before we can go to any of those places, we first have to visit with the prophet Isaiah.  The book of Isaiah is buried deep in the Old Testament.  Yep.  The Old Testament will direct us to the greatest travesty of human justice, yet most beautiful display of God's grace ever shown to mankind.  Jesus Christ came to die for our sins, but first, He was the suffering Servant.  God revealed this message to the prophet Isaiah some seven hundred years before Jesus was born.  I'm going to show you a passage from Isaiah, then the fulfillment in the New Testament.  Stay with me, I promise the outcome will amaze you.

We know that Jesus was beaten by the Roman soldiers.  We read in Matthew 27:30, "They spit on him, and took the staff and struck him on the head again and again."  Isaiah saw this beating, and believe me Girls, this was a beating. Isaiah 52:14 "Just as there were many who were appalled at him--his appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any man and his form marred beyond human likeness--"  Can you imagine?  Jesus was flogged, as directed by Pilate. (see Mark 15:15)  Now the Jewish people put limits on the number of times a person could be whipped, however the Romans exercised no such restraint.  More often than not, victims of a flogging did not survive. We keep reading from Isaiah, in chapter 53:5 "...he was pierced for our transgressions..." and then we see as Jesus hung on the Cross from John 19:34, "...one of the soldiers pierced Jesus' side with a spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water."  I have one more parallel to show you.  This is the one that ties the whole thing together.  Ethan was worried about bleeding out, which he didn't, but Jesus actually did.  And this was all part of God's plan.  From Isaiah 53:12 "Therefore I will give him him a portion among the great, and he will divide the spoils with the strong, because he poured out his life unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors.  For he bore the sins of many, and made intercession for the transgressors." (emphasis added)  Jesus Himself tells the disciples during the Last Supper, "'This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many,'" Mark 14:34 (emphasis added) Jesus knew what was coming.  He knew that He would essentially "bleed out".  He knew He would carry His own Cross through the streets and endure the mocking (Is 53:3), He knew that He would be cut off from His heavenly Father for a time (Is 53:4) while He alone dealt with the full weight of the all the sins of all the people of the entire world (Is 53:10).  Jesus endured the beating, He endured the flogging, He allowed the Roman soldiers to nail His holy body to the Cross.  Why?  So that you and I would never have to go through those horrors.  Through the blood of Christ Jesus, our suffering Servant, our lives are secured.

You know, Ethan also asked me if he was going to die.  It sounds comical now, but in the moment and in his nine year old mind, that was a valid question.  I assured him, that no, he was not going to die.  I have to confess, I sound a lot more calm now, than I actually was last Saturday.  As his mother, seeing my son in pain and covered in blood, made me weak at the knee (to the point of spending the majority of the time at the hospital on the floor).  I knew he was in good hands.  The hospital staff was much more capable of putting staples into his head than I was.  This is where Lesli came into play.  She held everything together and made sure the job was done right, while Jeff and I were somewhat clueless.  I want to ask you, what are you dealing with today that is making you weak at the knee?  Do you need to hand something over to Someone whose hands are more capable and more skilled for that task than yours?  You know, Jesus' hands are strong and crazy talented when it comes to dealing with over-the-top problems.  Trust in Him today.  I did some heavy-duty praying on the drive to Livingston Memorial last weekend.  I knew that I couldn't handle what was coming alone, but through the intercession of Jesus, I could.  What will you trust Him for today?  I promise, He will not shy away from the Call of Duty.  Ethan is pretty pumped about the scar that will eventually form in the back of his head, but I tell you something: I'm pretty pumped about the wounds of Christ.  Through his wounds, I am healed....and so are you.  Have a blessed week!

"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life."  John 3:16 

Trinity Lutheran Church (Missouri Synod)

Lenten Worship Schedule

April 13  (Wed) 10:30 AM, 7:15 PM  Worship

HOLY WEEK

April 21 (Thurs) 10:30 AM, 7:15 PM  Maundy Thursday

April 22 (Fri) 10:30 AM, 7:15 PM  Good Friday/Tenebrae*

April 24 (Sun) 6:00 AM        Easter Sunrise Service

        8:00 AM, 

        9:30 AM, 

       11:00 AM        Worship/Communion

*The Tenebrae service is an extremely somber service done in progressing darkness.  It is by far, my favorite service of the year!