My elementary school gym class met outside on a fall day to begin a weeks-long session on soccer. The teacher blew her whistle and called everyone to attention, telling us to line up on the edge of the field. Two “captains” (read popular kids) were chosen by the teacher and then they began to pick teams.

We all know the anxiety of this moment. Maybe it wasn’t on the soccer field for you, but you know the unease of wondering if and when you’ll be picked. Will your name be called early in the team selection or will the line of players dwindle with you standing there until the brutal end? And if it isn’t you, then it will be someone else.

We all want to be chosen. We want to be included. We yearn to be part of something bigger and hope to share our gifts and skills as a way of contributing to the team.

God spends a lot of time choosing. Early in the pages of Scripture, God chose the Hebrew people and set them apart as holy. God went on to select locations where people would encounter God and named commandments which would enable deeper collaborations and relationships between God and humanity.

When Jesus’ ministry fired up, God chose a batch of diverse and unqualified disciples to learn his ways, held up women and children as examples of faith, and sought to align himself with the sick, the outcast, the refugee, and the sinner. He named cheaters and criminals, screw-ups and deserters as holy, chosen, and beloved.

Jesus declared that the blessing and favor of God was evident in those who were poor in spirit, mourning, humble, hungering and thirsting for righteousness, merciful, and making peace. The last, they will be the first. The ones who appear to be least, will be the greatest.

God’s choosing and invitation spills into our lives, too. 1 Peter 2:9 proclaims, “You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” You have been chosen in love to love. God has chosen you, loved you, and empowered you, so that the fruit of the Spirit – love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control – would spill out into the world.

As I write, our 2020 presidential election has yet to be decided. Sometime in the coming days, some will be chosen and others will not. Headlines will declare “winners” and “losers.” Our election cycle may be over for this fall, but every day is an opportunity for us to choose.

Who will you choose? How will you serve? What will fill your time? I pray that you and I stand with Joshua and declare, “as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” (Joshua 24:15).

We’re in this together,

Pastor Lowell

During a normal fall, by mid-October I would be near my wit’s end getting several ensembles prepared for one of our biggest feast days of the year. Reformation is one of the days I can always get a lot of people involved – handbell ringers, instrumentalists, adult singers, children, etc., and I don’t have to compete with holiday or spring break travel plans like I normally would for Christmas or Easter. And I love the opportunity to show off the massive amount of talent we have at Lord of Life!

Of course this fall, I haven’t been able to rehearse with any ensembles at all, and I wanted to find other ways to help make worship special. At the beginning of the COVID pandemic, I taught myself to sew so I could make myself some masks to wear. Since I had a new skill to work with, I thought I’d try my hand at making some new worship adornments for worship.

Every Sunday, one of the things our volunteers do to set up for communion is to make sure that the paraments – the fabric decorations that hang in front of the altar and lectern – match the Sunday and Season we are celebrating. During the long summer months, they are green. During Advent, they are blue, during Lent, they are purple. On Christ the King Sunday, Christmas, Easter and the following Sundays of Easter, they are White. There are a handful of Sundays and feast days throughout the church year in which the appropriate color is red. These include Palm Sunday, Pentecost, Saint days, and, for Lutherans, Reformation Sunday.

Red is the color we associate with the fire of Pentecost and the blood of Martyrs. As I thought about what that meant for a parament we would use throughout the year, I wanted to create an area focused on God – the white circle. You could think of it as a meditation or a contemplation point, and I tried to draw the eye into it with the spirals of rope. The inner white circle is surrounded by several interlocking circles of God’s incarnation in the world – the fire of the Holy Spirit and the blood of Christ. The resulting pattern is busy and complicated, just like the world, but I still wanted to add more.

As I thought of ways to add to the design and stay true to my theme, I thought of some of the artistic talent we have at Lord of Life – glass artist Rick Ponton and ceramic artist Maria Hupp. Both made beads in their respective mediums, which I thought beautifully represented the way we continue to be stewards of God’s creation and reform the world.

As our Share the Light campaign continues to reform our space, there will be more opportunities to bring our talents together to make our worship more meaningful. If you have talents you’d like to share, we’d love to know about them!

Yours in Christ,

John Johns, Music Director

I have a liking for mid-century modern furniture, yet, I don’t have the pocketbook for it. Instead, I own a couch that is older than me, and may even be older than my parents. It’s blue, dirt is one with the couch, and the seats are sunken in towards the middle. My boyfriend complains that it is too low and that I should get rid of it, but I refuse because I love the couch. In a seminary class, I was tasked with describing my ideal world where I find peace. It featured me, the boyfriend, my dog, and my couch. Yet all those things are either finite or temporary.

Just like the day in which I will have to get rid of my couch, finite is bad, as is getting to the bottom of a pint of ice cream and realizing that the pint does not have an infinite end. Yet, temporariness can be good. When temporary is awesome, it is the end of a workweek. We can go throughout our day or week pointing at the end of something and contemplate how its lack of permanence affects us. Temporariness is always around us, though we commonly do not take notice of the importance of temporary. 

The world has meaning because the world is finite. And we are accustomed to things having an end. Celebratory moments are dear to us because they do not last forever. Buying cotton candy (my sweet tooth again) is special because it is a once in a while purchase. 

Of course, the existence of my couch, eating cotton candy, and ice cream are small examples of finite moments, but the same lesson transfers over to irreplaceable moments and people in our lives. For all of us, we have or will experience the harsh reality of being in a world of non-permanency, whenever we lose someone we love, or go through dramatic and undesirable changes in our lives. But because we dwell in the reality of a world full of temporary, we cannot help but treasure what we have in our orbit. 

Scripture reminds us of being in a world of temporary with these words, “This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it,” Psalm 118:24. Though the rising of the sun seems destined, it is not guaranteed. Rather, it is a blessing from God. Take stock of what is temporary around you. You may be surprised by the reality that has not been given much thought. You may feel the need to reprioritize. Ice cream and cotton candy will taste sweeter, hugs will last longer, and the end of a work-week may actually be workless for once and awhile.

God's peace,

Pastor Alec Brock (he/him/his)

Are you a “maybe someday” person? Do you have a “maybe someday” list?

Maybe someday I’ll get new brakes for the car.

Maybe someday I’ll finish that degree.

Maybe someday I’ll go to the doctor and ask about that lump.

Maybe someday I’ll reach out to make amends.

Maybe someday I’ll take a cruise.

I’m not entirely a “maybe someday” type of a person, but there are plenty of scenarios that I push down the road to a time when there will be more hours in a day, more money in the bank, and more energy in my heart to begin or accomplish a certain something. Maybe someday.

Several friends – including some of you – have been an inspiration when you tackle stuff immediately. You schedule the brake job, finish the degree, talk to your doctor, explore the forgiveness option, and book the cruise. You move through life with a Larry the Cable Guy attitude, “Let’s get ‘er done!”

Even more than that, some of you are “early adopters.” You embrace new technology, invest in new ideas and patterns, and jump at the chance to try something new. Others wait it out, but early adopters live into the future now.

Lord of Life is an early adopter kind of a community. Long before “contemporary worship” was being discussed in Lutheran circles, Lord of Life used a variety of instruments and styles in worship. From our beginning, we’ve opened our building to outside groups and created time and space for community organizations to assemble. We have a long history of engaging issues of addiction and mental health as linked to our spirituality. Rather than circle in ourselves, Lord of Life has invested dollars and hands in our local, regional, and global ministry partners, extending the living, sharing, and celebrating of our Christian faith to all people.

This year has forced us to be early adopters in new areas, too. Over the last seven months, our exceptional staff has figured out how to make worship and ministry connections happen beyond our building. Online worship, virtual meetings and Bible studies, along with an alternative model of Vacation Bible School (VBS) were “maybe someday” ministry elements which were thrust to the forefront with COVID precautions and restrictions. All of these new virtual tasks and many more have been added to the already full plates of our ministry team.

As we look to the coming year, one of the areas of focus for growing our mission spending plan for 2021 includes “The Future Of Ministry Excellence.” This not only includes first fruits giving to our ministry partners and a cost of living raise for the Lord of Life staff who work tirelessly to help us live out our mission, but also a new part-time Digital Ministry Coordinator to help Lord of Life sustain high quality online worship and faith formation experiences. This person will also supplement and enhance our in-person experiences.

As we have seen during the pandemic, the way we worship has changed. Thank you for adapting and continuing to support our ministries. Your generosity has allowed us to remain connected while socially-distant and has also expanded our digital ministry footprint, reaching people for whom “Maybe someday I’ll reconnect with church” has become a reality!

Thank you for following Jesus – the first early adopter of all things that truly matter – love, forgiveness, joy, and hope. We love, because he first loved us.

Someday is today!

Pastor Lowell

We had our first preschool chapel a few weeks ago in the outdoor worship space. Over two days, our seventy-five little ones gathered beneath the canopy of changing leaves and the autumn sky to talk about God’s amazing creation. We read through each day of the Creation story, finishing with a resounding, “And God saw that it was good!”

If you’ve ever been present for the children’s message, you know that the leader needs to be ready to respond to anything at a moment’s notice. A few years ago, as I was explaining the beauty and mystery of that Easter morning, a child piped up and declared, “Jesus is a zombie! He was dead, but is alive forever!” She couldn’t help but share her epiphany with the assembled community.

Little ones aren’t the only ones to have enthusiastic “A Ha!” moments. Lifelong learning is part of our Christian faith. We not only read Scripture and listen to sermons to gain new insight, but we also invest in new hymns and worship songs, dig deep into difficult conversations, expand our generosity to meet a need, explore new ways to serve, and stretch our hearts, souls, and minds in hopes of growing in faith.

We experience clarity in moments of prayer or meditation. A book, film, music, or conversation can illuminate a reality we hadn’t noticed before. Sometimes, we can’t help but blurt out our discovery to the world! We trust that God is not done working and growing in us.

Robin J. Steinke, President of Luther Seminary, declares, “[We] cling to the same hope that energized the first reformers half a millennium ago: God is at work, forming faith by the power of the Holy Spirit, and transforming the world through the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is the hope that fuels our efforts in faithful innovation.” 

This is a time of dreaming and living into a future filled with hope. All of us have recognized during this COVID season how our ministry needs to adapt to our new reality. As we build for the future of ministry at Lord of Life, formation in Christian faith and continuing growth as disciples will be essential. We need help and guidance as we continue to learn and grow as a people in this place.

We are making plans for the addition of a Director of Faith Formation in the new year. We are fortunate that our church is committed to growing and learning! Engaging a new ministry leader in this role will provide our congregation with a powerful focal point. They will work with individuals to discern their gifts and passions, and work with staff and other ministry leadership to identify ways to enrich our already vibrant learning and serving moments – allowing them to connect people with opportunities to encounter the promises of God and wrestle with issues of faith. The synergy created by having a staff member dedicated to individual discernment, and equipping and empowering leaders, will allow us to expand our spectrum of ministry.

As our world changes, so do the ways that God invites us to love and serve one another. God’s faithfulness to us and our enduring, creative response as a community of faith, allows us this time of dreaming and living into a future filled with hope. God told the prophet Jeremiah, “I know the plans I have for you. They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope.” Jeremiah 29:11 (NLT). Those same promises spill into our lives, fueling us for ministry.

God is good!

Pastor Lowell

I recently went to Duke Divinity School in North Carolina for some continuing education. Well, I didn’t really go to Duke, but joined in a virtual conversation for their annual Fall Pastor’s Convocation series offered for pastors across the country.

The Dean of Duke Divinity, L. Gregory Jones, addressing the webinar, explored “Navigating the Future in the Midst of a Heavy Fog.” Jones contends that we are currently experiencing four overlapping pandemics: COVID, racial injustice and systemic racism, economic disruption, and a mental health crisis. Any of these on their own have the ability to trigger massive anxiety and disruption, but the compounding realities at the intersection of these issues creates a deep unease within ourselves, our families, our churches, communities, and the world. Jones compared the looming chaos and unpredictability to a heavy fog.

I don’t know how you drive in heavy fog, but I’m overly cautious. Even on the roads of Butler County, which might be familiar to me and well-traveled in my daily life, I move forward with hyper-attentiveness and restraint, trying to anticipate what might emerge from the mist. What’s ahead? When do I need to slow down or turn? Each of these are difficult to comprehend when not able to look ahead with clarity.

Throughout the biblical narratives, people often met God in cloudy and foggy moments. A fog was lifted from eyes and hearts. God spoke from the cloud and the Spirit descended. Jesus was shrouded in haze on the mountaintop during the Transfiguration and the Israelites were led by a pillar of cloud and fire through the wilderness wanderings.

We don’t know what the coming months hold, but we trust that God will meet us in the fog of our lives and bring transparency. The One who has been faithful throughout all of history, will continue to guide us. As we move through the clouds of this season, we are planning with clarity for the future.

Looking at our 2021 Mission Spending Plan, you will notice that we have some new additions. Our congregational and community needs continue to grow, so we are proposing new staffing positions to help us grow in faith, first, adding a Director of Faith Formation. This person will devote attention and energy to engaging and equipping people of all ages with tools and opportunities for deepening their discipleship, by inviting them into transformational learning and serving moments.

We also hope to round out our digital strategy by hiring a part-time Digital Ministry Coordinator to help Lord of Life sustain high quality online worship and faith formation experiences, while also supplementing and enhancing our in-person experiences. As we have seen during the pandemic, the way we worship has changed and has allowed us to remain connected while socially-distant and reach people that previously were not attending in-person worship.

What a gift it is to not be in the fog alone. God promises to be with us and, to sweeten the deal even more, God gives us traveling companions who encourage us and walk boldly into the future with us.

Navigating together,

Pastor Lowell