November 21th, 2024

Greetings to the Holy People of God,

I give thanks to God that we at Christ the King feed people with our meal packing event with Take Away Hunger, surrounded by worship as we celebration Christ the King Sunday and then come together for a meal of Thanksgiving.  I so appreciate that I get to celebrate Thanksgiving with you and then drive to family in Minnesota and share a meal with extended family and friends on Thursday.

I typically can’t wait only for the season of Thanksgiving for giving thanks.  I am sure you don’t either.  I have a little paper note book that I try to jot down 3 things or people that I am thankful for each day.  It helps me keep my bearings so that I don’t become bitter, discouraged or arrogant.  It helps me to notice things and people I might have overlooked.  And giving thanks to God is a great way to begin conversing with God.

In all things we give thanks to God even when we find ourselves struggling to find words of thanksgiving.  Some of the most intense moments of thankfulness come not at the times of plenty but when struggles are all around.  Think of the Pilgrims as they celebrated their first thanksgiving.  Half of their number dead, without a country and the winter ahead and they gave thanks to God.  Their gratitude was not for something but in God.  It was that same sense of gratitude that led Abraham Lincoln to formally establish the first Thanksgiving Day in the midst of national civil war, when the list of casualties seemed to have no end and the very nation struggled for survival.

The hymn, “Now Thank We All Our God” is another example of thanksgiving arising out of difficult times.  The hymn was written by Martin Rinkart, a Lutheran pastor in the town of Eilenburg in Saxony during the 30 Years War in Germany in the early 1600s.  The walled city of Eilenburg became a place of refuge from the fighting.  The city grew too crowded, food was scarce, bringing on a famine and a terrible plague.

In one year alone, Pastor Rinkart conducted funerals for 4,500 people, including his own wife. The war dragged on; the suffering continued and so did the creation of the hymn we still sing.

Now thank we all our God,
with hearts and hands and voices,
Who wondrous things hath done,
In whom the world rejoices

… and keep us all in grace,
and guide us when perplexed,
and free us from all ills,
in this world and the next.

When Bishop Current held her evening of gratitude here, she asked us to define gratitude and generosity and share with one another the people who taught us what these words mean.  Who are the people in your life that have taught you the meaning of these words?  Tell the
story of how God worked through these people.

I give thanks to God for you all and how God teaches me about gratitude and generosity through you. Happy Thanksgiving!

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

November 7th, 2024

Greetings to the Holy People of God,

The widows in my extended family are growing. My middle sister’s husband died in August of 2023 and my mother-in-law’s husband died in June and our oldest sister’s husband is in the care of hospice and will soon be a widow herself. And now this week, we will encounter two widows from our appointed bible lessons for this Sunday. Widows are on my mind.

Both widows in their own way are preparing for the last things.  The poor widow from Mark’s gospel is throwing two coins into the treasury giving out of her poverty, giving it all as Jesus tells us preparing us for his own giving of his life.  In I Kings 17:8-16, Elijah after his wadi dries up and the ravens no longer bring him food to eat, is directed by God to find the widow in Zarephath to feed him.  This widow is gathering sticks at the city gate so she can prepare the last meal for her son and herself.  A last meal that reminds us of the last supper that Jesus prepared for his disciples.  A simple meal that gives us a little taste of the feast to come.

It is in these last things, the sharing of their last things, rather than hanging onto them that God cultivates the landscape for us to let go, to open our hands, to open our hearts for God’s invitation to participate in what God is up to among us.

Oh, and this is the most difficult of places to be in not only for these widows but for us as well.  Can we really trust God when we are preparing our last meal or throwing it all in?

YES, yes we can! Not only have these widows and all the witnesses before us but also Jesus, God’s own Son, didn’t hold his life back but gave himself to life and to death to show us the way through life and death and the meeting of heaven and earth and all that God desires for us.

It is amazing what God does with our nothing, with our lack, with the last of what we have to offer, with our desperation, with what little we have to offer.

Why are widows so important in the biblical witness?  The ones who have lost their partner and have to figure out how to live in a world where they are so very vulnerable and yet they are witnesses to us
along with Ruth and Naomi.  They remind us that even when we feel like a part of us is missing, we are not alone.  God is faithful and present in our families, friends and neighbors.  God is with us and up to something and inviting us to participate.  Let’s open our hands to receive what God longs to give us and work through us.

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

October 31, 2024

Greetings to the Holy People of God,

Why do we vote on Tuesday?  It’s a tradition that reminds us of our history.  Before 1845, election days varied by state but then a law was passed to set a single election day for the election of the President of the United States and not long after it applied to congressional elections as well.  At that time the majority labor force consisted of farmers.  So early November was chosen because harvest was over but the weather was still mild. 

So why Tuesday?  Two days were out of the question.  Sundays and Wednesdays because most Americans were Christians and observed a day of rest and worship on Sunday. Wednesday was market day, when farmers sold their crops in town.  With horse and buggy, travel took time.  So Monday for travel and voting on Tuesday.

Election day is set for the first Tuesday after the first Monday to avoid election day from falling on November 1, All Saints Day as well as giving merchants time to settle their books from the previous month.

Tuesday was chosen out of the context of the time.  Now less than 2% of Americans farm and many people work on Tuesdays throughout the year, a new context is arising. (material sourced from Britannical.com)

Now we have many opportunities to vote besides Tuesday with satellite voting at libraries and mail in voting.  So even if you have already voted or will be voting on Tuesday, here is a prayer from ELCA Worship Resources.

Everlasting God,

source of all liberty, before whom every earthly ruler must bow and bend the knee, we lay our nation before you as we prepare for an election. Breathe upon us your Spirit of wisdom and discernment.

Grant all who seek public office the mind of Christ, who came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life for the freedom of the oppressed. Hold before us those who face uncertain futures, or who have no voice in our political process.

Uphold and safeguard poll workers and election officials in their work. Spare us from the crushing weight of cynicism. Give us grace to speak courageously, but with love, without which our words are noise and we are nothing.

Gather us together under the cross, where, in all of our difference, we can stand as one people, redeemed in Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. Amen.

Whatever day we vote on, we can give thanks to God for this opportunity to participate in the community of this nation with all neighbors near and far.

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

 Pastor Connie Spitzack

October 24th, 2024

Greetings to the Holy People of God,

A very happy and blessed Reformation!  We will celebrate Reformation this Sunday with the actual date being Thursday, October 31. If you have some red, wear it on Sunday to show your reformation and reforming spirit!  This is the day we remember the theological reforms of the 16th century that gave birth to Lutheranism and our continual need to reform.

We celebrate because we have a God that goes ahead of us to shape and prepare the way for us as well as reforming us in such gracious and merciful ways.  Thanks be to God.  We trust and receive God’s good work in his Son, Jesus who saves us and calls us into his embrace. 

Take time to think of the ways God has shaped you over the years or just this past year.  Reflect on how God could help to form and reform you now.  After blind Bartimaeus gets Jesus’ attention, Jesus asks him, “What do you want me to do for you?”  Bartimaeus knew exactly what he needed.  When Jesus asks that question of you, “What do you want me to do for you?”  How would you respond?

Last week, Jesus asked the same thing of James and John after they got his attention by asking Jesus to do for them whatever they asked.  They wanted to sit at the left and right of Jesus in his glory.  Bartimaeus wants to see again.  If Jesus were to ask you, what do you want me to do for you, how would you respond? Be honest.  In Mark’s gospel we are given the disciples desire for being close to Jesus’ glory and Bartimaeus’ desire to see again.  The whole human spectrum is covered.  Where is it you need to meet Jesus?

Wherever we meet Jesus, the road always takes us to the cross.  Bartimaeus throws off his cloak and James and John along with all the crowds gathered to journey up the dangerous road from Jericho to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover, the meal of freedom and what turns into Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem where a parade takes place where many more cloaks and branches are laid before Jesus and shouts of “Save us” ring throughout the people.  “Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!  Blessed is the coming kingdom of our ancestor David!” (Mark 11:9-10)

God meets us through his son, Jesus and takes us all the way through glory, through betrayal, through suffering, through death, through the promise of resurrected life and through the whole of our journey bringing us to God, to see God clearly.

Celebrating Reformation, the idea that we still need to look again and be shaped and formed by God’s creative hands so that we can see more of what God is up to as we see what God has been busy at in our history and in each day and for all our days.  May the joy and spirit of reformation live strong in each and every one of us!

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

October 20th, 2024

Greeting Holy People of God,

God’s work. Our hands.  We have looked at this for many weeks, lifting up and recognizing the many organizations and ministries that we partner with as a community of faith and also individually.  Thank you for sharing the ways you reach beyond our walls, following Jesus’ example whether that be as individuals or partnering with other groups.  Another way we enjoy God’s work through our hands is through organizations that reach around the world bringing God’s work of mercy and love through hands that partner with us.  ELCA World Hunger is one of those hands as well as Lutheran Disaster Relief.

“For 50 years we have joined together as Lutherans to address the root causes of hunger and poverty around the world through ELCA World Hunger. Part of our church’s long tradition of meeting human needs, ELCA World Hunger testifies to our hope for and commitment to God’s promise of a time when we will hunger and thirst no more. In 2024 we will commemorate the 50th anniversary of this ministry. We have made great strides, but once again we face a startling increase in global hunger. As we reflect on our last 50 years of ministry together, we know God calls us to respond to the needs of the world now more than ever. Will you join us?

 “ELCA World Hunger walks alongside communities in 64 countries — including the United States — to create unique solutions to specific challenges. With your help, our church can grow its support for our most vulnerable neighbors in a changing world.

“I can proudly say I am now able to run successful projects without fear of failure. My family lacks nothing, I have all that I once dreamt of having, and I am a proud mother.” —RUMBIDZAI TOMU, Zimbabwe

“With support from ELCA World Hunger, Rumbidzai received the tools and training she needed to begin raising poultry. Her family can now afford to eat three meals a day, and she has been able to send her four children to school.” (HW50 Brochure 2024)

Let us love not in word or speech but in deed and truth.  1 John 3:18

This past Tuesday, October 14, Bishop Current and ELCA Vice President, Imran Siddiqui hosted the World Food Day celebration looking back on the last 50 years and looking to the future together.  The video will be available to watch soon. I hope you will watch it.

At our synod assembly in May, retired pastor, member of Gloria Dei and former Assistant to the Bishop, Paul Ostrem, put forth a resolution on behalf of the 50th Anniversary of ELCA World Hunger.  As he spoke for this resolution, he encouraged each and everyone of us to give a gift of $50 (or more) in celebration of the ministry and work of ELCA World Hunger.  I am going to do that and I invite you to as well.  You may send your gift through the church or directly to ELCA World Hunger.

$50 for 50 Years of ELCA World Hunger!  

If we give $50, we can:

· Provide a community with five fruit-tree seedlings ($50).

· Help a farmer grow their garden with new tools, seeds and agricultural training ($50).

 If we give $50 x 2, we can:

· Serve 50 people at a variety of feeding ministries ($100).

If we give $50 x 10, we can:

· Provide a family with a cow, which produces nutritious, calcium-packed milk ($500).

· Empower four women to build a new business that will create a steady source of income and help their families escape poverty ($500).

If we give $50 x 50 we can:

·  Provide clean, safe water for as many as 500 families ($2,500).  

Let’s see what we can do in celebrating 50 years of ELCA World Hunger.

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack