AUGUST 1ST, 2024

Greeting Holy People of God,

I hope you are as excited as I am to hear our youth share their experience and pictures of the youth gathering on Sunday.  I wrote them an email reminding them that you were praying for them and I encouraged them to enter into conversation with God as they prepared what they would share with you about God’s good news through Jesus that they experienced at the gathering.

I reminded them that there was a lot of preparation with the youth gathering and encouraged them to prepare as well.  Then I came across this article from Tim Brown, the Director of Congregational Stewardship Support for the ELCA.  Here is his article.

Living That July Life

Images from the ELCA Youth Gathering are flooding social media these days, and hopefully pictures of youth engaged in service, prayer and learning are popping up on the phones and iPads of parents, grandparents and guardians.

These images, along with those of blooming gardens, long-awaited vacations and other mission trips, paint a picture of “that July life” that seems exciting and somewhat easy.

It certainly is exciting. But it’s not easy.

The key, of course, to a July life that looks easy is early planning. Dotting out the details slowly but steadily throughout the months leading up to July takes some foresight and vision. Though last-minute individual vacations can be adventurous, things like mission trips, the ELCA Youth Gathering and even larger family excursions require thought-maps, action plans and execution strategies.

I hear from many congregational leaders that they’d love to focus all their community’s energy on living out the gospel, loving neighbors, and worshiping with intention and vigor. As well they should! This is the calling, right? We all want our communities and congregations to live “that July life,” singing God’s new world into being one memory, one picture-perfect moment, one life changed at a time.

But remember, “that July life” takes some planning, work and scaffolding. It takes well-stewarded resources and relationships built slowly, steadily and toward one cross-centered goal.  (Here he offers a list of steward tools) None are quick fixes, but utilizing these tools, putting into practice these stewardship concepts slowly, steadily, with intention … well, it can certainly make a huge difference when the time comes to live out your community’s God-given mission.

It's not always easy, but it doesn’t have to be overwhelming either. Slowly, surely, start small and dream big with what God is calling you to do. Start even now in the midst of easy July life. Those vacations, the Gathering, those mission trips — they all started early.

Living that July life can be sweet, meaningful and world-changing. It’s not always easy — it takes careful, thoughtful planning. But it’s worth it, by God.

Tim Brown is right. We will see that in our National Night Out Event and blood drive on Tuesday, August 6.  My hand therapist, Brad, agrees. He seemed surprised when I reported back that I did my therapy exercises 5 times a day, every day as he instructed me to do.  It showed, as I increased the range of motion in my wrist.  I was rewarded with once-a-week therapy rather than twice a week.  I can’t play pickleball yet but I could play ping pong.  Anyone up for a match?  There is something about hitting a ball that is good therapy for me.

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

July 25th, 2024

GREETINGS HOLY PEOPLE

OF GOD,

It’s been a whirlwind of a summer.  Confirmation camp, family vacation to northern Minnesota, 4th of July, broken arm, surgery, no pickleball, VBS, pool party, youth gathering in New Orleans, July food drive, Free Lunch and summer lunch bunch and now getting ready for the installation of new flooring and hosting National Neighborhood Night Out with our some of our neighbors providing Sudanese Mediterranean foods and our first time ever blood drive that same afternoon.  Thank you to all who have signed up and spread the word.  We have reached 30 on our sign up for the blood drive.  Wow.  It’s totally amazing.  And this is just in my small circle of influence. 

On the national stage there is also a whirlwind of activity.  We have a failed assignation of former president Trump, the withdrawal of President Biden from the upcoming election, President Biden with covid as do many returning from the youth gathering including Bishop Current, my husband and his youth group.  As of this writing I have tested negative and will test again on Saturday.  I will send out a church wide email on Saturday or you may call me directly at 319-631-8858 but if you are in a high-risk category you may choose to watch worship via Facebook or YouTube or you may come and choose to wear a mask.  I trust that you will make an appropriate decision for yourself and our community.

It is a whirlwind.  I get overwhelmed just listing it all.  Life gets a bit overwhelming from time to time.  During the youth gathering there was a time I was so overwhelmed with planning, I just had to sit with our leaders and map out our plans for the coming days.  I wrote things down, tried to listen to all our leaders and not make snap decisions and kept listening to everyone including God. 

Amid the whirlwind of activities and events, it is good for us to sit still and listen to God.  For me, I set a timer for 20 minutes and clear my mind focusing my attention on God. When my thoughts ran astray, and they do, I come back to God’s name.  Try it.  But if that doesn’t work, try music or a hymn or try focusing on scripture or journaling or walking or go to a high place, a place where you are reminded of God’s presence.  The sanctuary is available to you.  With everything circling around us, it is essential that we have a good ear for the Holy Spirit’s whisperings and guidance.  Take a deep breath and imagine God’s presence filling you with each inhale and as you exhale entrust yourself into God’s good hands.  You are not alone.  God wants to help you and walk with you.  God wants to show you the way.  God loves you.  We are not alone.  We have each other and most importantly God has us and is always ahead of us no matter where we go.

We are a people who keep turning to God. We remember God’s faithfulness.  God provides a way, and it is often a very interesting and challenging way.  A way that asks us to die to ourselves so that God breathed life can emerge and take root and grow.  A way that is more than we can imagine. A way that is better because we walk with God.

Whatever whirled wind is surrounding you, stop and rest with God for a time and trust God to help you get your bearings amid all that is taking place in our lives, personally, collectively and in the worldwide arena.  We are not alone.  God is with us and we have each other.

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

July 11th, 2024

GREETINGS HOLY PEOPLE OF GOD,

Thank you for your prayers and many kindnesses as my family grieves the death of my father-in-law, Phil Youngquist and as I navigate a broken arm from a fall while playing pickleball with surgery on Thursday. 

I often wonder what God is going to be working through as us and then before my eyes glimpses appear. I get to be in a place of brokenness, literally and God’s glory shines through this community of faith, my family, and the medical community. I am grateful to God. 

God’s word comes alive as I experience the sufficiency of God’s grace. For God’s power comes to its fullness in weakness (2 Cor. 12:8-10).  I am grateful for all the help that tumbled forth.

I am grateful for Richard Tiegs helping to distribute the communion bread and Kevin Edens with his quick wit makes me laugh and I get to sing the communion hymn. I am grateful for Amita Nelson and Emily Rothfuss who were my faithful and trustworthy VBS classroom helpers and my good neighbors. They helped demonstrate game play, got more bibles, hung pictures on the wall and came up with creative solutions when things fell off the wall. I am grateful for Pastor Judd Larson who filled in for me on Thursday. 

I am grateful to Kevin Heckman for the embellishment of my “fall” story becoming a great slam into the kitchen and winning point rather than just a clumsy fall. I am grateful to Lisa Gray who shared not only her own splint experiences but also shared wonderful devices and advice. I am grateful for Peter Calhoun repairing my computer that also took a fall. 

I am grateful for former Bishop April Ulring Larson who will graciously help me with the load this Sunday as she preaches God’s good news in Jesus Christ. I am grateful for our youth who will be going to the Created to Be Youth Gathering and will be commissioned this Sunday: Rachel Calhoun, Natalia Flack, Jena Frank, Cooper Gray, Elsa Gray, Neil Houston, Zach Howard, Leslie Kimura, Amita Nelson, Bekah Ode, and Jana Sevenbergen, along with our adult leaders— Pastor Connie, Joel Flack, Amy Frank, Andrea Flack, and Seth Ode. 

I am grateful for all who participated in our VBS this week. They are all so amazing and smart. Come to worship and hear about our neighbors. Our kids will sing, collect noisy offerings and we get the opportunity to be neighbors to each other and around the world. Remember to bring food for our food drive.

I am grateful for the larger church and how through the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and Lutheran World Hunger we can help our neighbors in need around the world. In Malawi, women feed kids just like we help with the Lunch Bunch, Free Lunch and our July Food Drive. In Colombia, our neighbors help young people through programs like Project Your Future.  Ask our kids what Maria learned to do. In Rwanda, some of Angelique’s fears for her son, Frank were helped thru neighbors providing scholarships.

ELCA World Hunger is celebrating 50 years and we have joined their celebration through our VBS. Our youth will learn more about ELCA World Hunger at the gathering and they will be asked to bring ideas home for us to try. There are so many ways to help our neighbors and I am so grateful that you are my neighbors. I wonder what God will work through us. To God be the glory! The sufficiency of God’s grace is so amazingly abundant!

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

June 27th, 2024

GREETINGS HOLY PEOPLE OF GOD,

It is Lamentation after all, a book named for lamenting, and we will hear on Sunday a reading that does not at all sound like lamenting from Lamentations 3:22-33.  When I first read it, I thought of the hymn, Great is your Faithfulness.  We get ten verses of hope spilling forth.

So open your Bibles and read the 21 verses that come before Lamentation 3:22-33.  Verse 21 says, “But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope:” What calls forth hope to your mind?  Read the 21 verses and ask yourself what words of hope would pour out of your mouth.  Or write up your own 21 verses of lament and see what you call to mind and the measure of your hope.

What is our go to theology of suffering?  Does God punish? Where is God in the suffering of our world?  Where is God in our dark night of the soul when hope is illusive and cannot be found? Pat and easy answers tend not to quench the depth of our wondering about God and suffering. 

We keep turning to God and each other.  We keep turning to God’s word and worship.  We keep living trusting God’s faithfulness.  This is the relationship we live in.  The relationship we have with God is complex for we are “fearfully and wonderfully made” by God. We will struggle.  We will question and doubt.  We will wonder and ponder.  We will lament the happenings of our lives, our relationships, our community, our nation and government.  And we will grow along with our biblical witness who after 21 verses of lament can also pull to mind great hope in God’s enduring faithfulness.

Bold Inquisitive Belief Loving Expansively,

Pastor Connie Spitzack

June 20th, 2024

YOUTH GATHERING UPDATE

We are close to completing our getting ready materials as we have focused on BRAVE, AUTHENTIC, FREE and now – DISRUPTIVE.

We were introduced to Ruby Bridges and her family who fought for civil rights in New Orleans.  We explored moving from being mad, sad and overwhelmed by what goes on in this world to understanding that justice work is part of our baptismal call, following the example of Jesus. Prayer and action are a part of who we are created to be.

New Orleans has a history of disrupters. The city builds community through diversity. Through people such as Ruby Bridges, its history challenges us to reject the things that separate us. On Nov. 19, 1960, at age 6, Bridges became a civil rights leader by taking the first step toward desegregating William Frantz Elementary School.

The image above records the historic moment when she was escorted to school by federal marshals. The significant difference in height and stature between Bridges and her escorts captured the absurdity of the European-descent parents who withdrew their students from school and left Bridges all alone on that first day, six years after desegregation had been mandated in the Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education.

Her parents answered a call by the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) to challenge school segregation. This cost them — her grandparents were forced off the land they tilled as sharecroppers, and her father was fired from his job. But they stayed the course, and Ruby Bridges continues to call New Orleans home.

Gathering Connections

Like the church, the Gathering should be a place where we can practice living in a community that is growing, forgiving and infused with God’s grace. Far too often our communities choose comfort as their primary goal, thinking, “If we just keep everyone comfortable, everyone will be happy.” Centering on comfort keeps us from experiencing growth. At the Gathering we will experience disruption. Our normal routines will look different. Our normal thought patterns will be challenged. Our thoughts about who God is will be disrupted — and, we hope, expanded.

There is grace in each disruption. By God’s grace we were created to sit and wait in that uncomfortable space, trusting that God will stir something new — a new relationship, new imagination, new hopes, etc.

As disciples of Jesus, we know that disruptions don’t end there. They are an invitation from the Holy Spirit to be part of God’s creative, redeeming, disruptive work in our world. When we witness injustice, we are invited to disrupt, challenge and embody change. Beloveds of God, the world is waiting for us to move beyond our comfort to disrupt injustice. We were created to be disruptive.