The Back Pew

What is the Exchange of Peace?  For some people, the moments in the liturgy following the prayers of the church are awkward ones.  The presiding minister offers these words: “The peace of Christ be with you always.”  The congregation responds “And also with you.”  The members of the congregation are then invited to “share the peace” with one another.  What does that really mean?

Sharing God’s peace is not simply offering a friendly hello to those sitting around you.  Sharing God’s peace is not a time for catching up on news with your neighbor or for reminding someone about an upcoming meeting.

Sharing God’s peace with one another is an act of reconciliation.  It is an opportunity for God’s people to be reconciled with one another as they offer their gifts to God and before they receive the gift of Holy Communion.

Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, as recorded in Matthew’s Gospel, lays a foundation for the practice of sharing God’s peace.  “So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first to be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.” (Matthew 5:23-24)

Other sources from the early church confirm the practice of sharing the gift of peace.  Passages from the Didache (an early church writing nearly as old as the new Testament) confirms that the practice of passing the peace became a regular weekly occurrence in the early Christian’s practice of Holy Communion.  That the sharing of the peace follows the prayers of the church is not accidental.  Having been forged into a common people in Holy Baptism, the congregation prays for peace in the Church, peace in the world, and peace for all those in need.  Then the congregation follows through with the people offering peace and reconciliation to one another.  This in not human peace alone, but the peace which is possible only through Christ.  It is a time to set aside our human differences and to recognize and enact our baptismal unity as children of God.

What can the exchange of peace teach us for daily living?  Christians are a people who seek reconciliation with one another.  Making peace is a daily action in our lives.  We do not need to wait to come to church on Sunday morning in order to make peace with our neighbors and our family members.  Sharing God’s peace is a daily opportunity.  (Redacted from “Worship Wordbook”, Ralph R. Van Loon and Anita Stauffer.  Augsburg Fortress Press, Minneapolis, 1995)

 

Holy Week at Advent – Good Friday – April 22, 2011 12:00PM and 7:00 PM

GOOD FRIDAY – April 22, 2011 at 12:00 and 7:00 p.m.  ¨ Easter Sunday is so much more powerful when we dare to spend time at the foot of the cross.  Here we understand the power of Jesus’ love for us. ¨ Choir will sing at 7:00 worship.

March 13, 2011 Second Worship Opportunity added. Now worship at 9:00 AM and 11:00 AM

Our Worship life together is at the heart of our community experience here at Advent.  In order to welcome more people.. “So that all may know Christ’s love!”  we will add a second worship on this week, the first week of Lent to continue through the Spring.  The 9:00 AM worship and the 11:00 worship will be much the same for now.  Sunday School will start at 10:00 AM and Adult Bible Study will take place at 10:15 AM.  Now you can sleep in a little and still get in on the blessings of worship!

New Member Sunday – March 6, 2011

Folks interested in membership at Advent will be welcomed into our community with an “Affirmation of Baptism” worship on March 6 at 9:00 AM.  There’s still plenty of room.  Call Pastor Barb if you are interested in membership.

Ash Wednesday – Lent Begins – March 9, 2011

Worship is offered at 12:00 PM followed by a soup lunch, and 7:00 PM

On March 9th the liturgical Christian Church begins the season of Lent with a solemn day of prayer called Ash Wednesday.  This deeply moving worship experience includes letting go of the things that weigh us down through a thorough confession of sins, and the placing of ashes on our foreheads.  This ancient symbol of repentance reminds us of our mortality with the words, “From dust you have come, to dust you have return.”  While this may sound morbid to some, the experience is truly a welcome “letting go” of the things that separate us from God and each other.    The wrongs we hold on to, both our own and others, and the realization that this life is short, and nothing can separate us from God’s love.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

And just then some people were carrying a paralyzed man lying on a bed. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, ‘Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven.’ Then some of the scribes said to themselves, ‘This man is blaspheming.’ But Jesus, perceiving their thoughts, said, ‘Why do you think evil in your hearts? For which is easier, to say, “Your sins are forgiven”, or to say, “Stand up and walk”? But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins’—he then said to the paralytic—‘Stand up, take your bed and go to your home.’ And he stood up and went to his home. When the crowds saw it, they were filled with awe, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to human beings. Matthew 9:2-8

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

               Have you made your New Year’s Resolutions yet?  Every year I make a list of things I’m going to change in the coming year.  Sometimes I do this consciously, but mostly I just have a growing list in the back of my mind the year before that sounds something like, “after the first of the year I’m going to…”   We do this because each January 1st feels like we’re getting a fresh start and of course everything will be better in the year ahead.  That’s really not such a bad thing.  Based on this principle it occurred to me in the early days of parish ministry that if we begin each new year with new hopes and expectations of ourselves and the world around us, it is “right and salutary” that we should begin each year with a worship that is centered around healing.  Of course anyone who has ever been wounded knows that in order for healing to happen the wound must be kept clean and protected.  So, this “Healing Worship” must begin with an extended order of “Confession and Forgiveness”.

               Please plan to make the healing worship on January 2 a part of your new year celebration.  I promise there will be no snakes, incense, rolling in the aisles, or speaking in tongues (I can’t even learn Spanish!).  There will be an opportunity to come to the altar, say a prayer for whatever needs healing in your life, and hear a word of peace.  This worship is aimed at starting your year with an awareness of our constant need for God’s healing in body, mind, spirit, and soul.  There will also be an extended order of “Corporate Confession and Forgiveness”.  Both of these liturgies come right out of our Evangelical Lutheran Worship hymnal.  Healing starts with letting go of the old grudges, hurts, annoyances and issues that we hold against ourselves and those who move in our lives.  What better way to start the new year.  What better way to start our year together.  I can’t wait to see what happens next!  With you on the Journey, Pastor Barb

Merry X-mas

And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son,^* full of grace and truth. ¹⁵¹⁶From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. ¹⁷The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. ¹⁸No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son,^* who is close to the Father’s heart,^* who has made him known. John 1:14-18

I ask myself whenever I see the words “Merry X-mas” which is worse?  To keep Christ’s name in the celebration and then make it the most important economic holiday of the year, or to take Christ’s name out and forget the origins of the holiday all together?  On the one hand maybe this civic holiday needs the name so folks will know that in the Christian Church anyway, we are celebrating something much more powerful than the best gifts from Toys r us.  On the other hand, do we want to have one of our most important celebrations, no less than the celebration of a God that dared to become human and live among us, cheapened to the point that more suicides happen during this season than any other (even Valentine’s Day!)?  Then there’s the whole issue of inviting folks who do not adhere to the Christian faith to join in a celebration that at its core at least is an invitation to focus on radical ideas like peace, joy, and love.  What a conundrum. 

As usual I don’t have the definitive answer.  But I do know this, this season is a celebration of Love.  And it is absolutely imperative that we who use the name of Christ to describe ourselves (“Christian”) live out the holiday in ways that model to the culture the importance of the God of Love.  So this year think about how you and your family will do that.  Put Christ back in the center.  Use the Advent devotionals and Advent wreaths to remember daily what it means to celebrate CHRISTmas.  Make a pledge to donate at least as much time and money to Christ’s work as you do to gift giving.  Find away to put Christ back in the middle of Christmas.  Then, share your ideas.  We all need to teach and encourage each other.  The Word became FLESH.  Let it live among you this holiday season.  With you  on the Journey, Pastor Barb

All Lands Summoned to Praise God, A Psalm of thanksgiving

Psalm 100

¹ Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth. ² Worship the Lord with gladness; come into his presence with singing. ³ Know that the Lord is God.  It is he that made us, and we are his;^* we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.  ⁴ Enter his gates with  thanksgiving, and his courts with praise.  Give thanks to him, bless his name.  ⁵ For the Lord is good; his steadfast love endures forever!

The Greek word “Eucharist”, the word we often use for our practice of communion, means “Thanksgiving”.  Every time we come to the meal, we come to remember that all that we have, all that we are is a gift from God.  And we give thanks.  Which means that every Sunday is Thanksgiving Day!

Here’s a challenge for you!  What if all of us committed for this month, this month of Thanksgiving, to spend time each day remembering the blessings of our lives.  There’s a ton of them.  People who live lives of gratitude are happier, fuller, and have much more to give.  Today I am thankful for all of you.  I pray that you are thankful for each other.  Each day this month I will thank God that I am…

With you on the Journey, Pastor Barb.

O Come, Let Us Sing to the Lord!

“This, then, is the one, and the most precious, religious service of the New Testament: to glorify and praise the Son of God by singing, writing, and preaching.” Martin Luther 1533

Do you remember the last time you heard a song on the radio or your I-Pod that just made you stop and say, “HUH?”.  It might have caught your imagination, or mood, or life circumstance just right, or even wrong.  But for just a moment someone spoke to you through song.  It used to happen to me all the time when I was a teenager in the early 70s.  Of course they stopped making decent pop music when the disco era arrived, so I only listen to the oldies now.  (Note:  one of the rarely mentioned life passages is when they start playing  your favorite music on the oldies stations, when it’s only on public radio classics station you know you’re old!)  The only time it happens to me now is when I actually take a moment to listen to the words of the hymns we sing on Sunday morning.  For instance this last week I marveled at the amazing way all of our hymns highlighted the biblical texts and the sermon I spent many hours preparing.  Nice work Hymn Pickers!!  Sometimes I listen to the “Hymn of the Day” that comes after a sermon and say to myself, “self, why didn’t you just say that?”

Music and poetry have been a staple for worship since the cave people first started to utter words.  The Word of God which is central to all Christian worship is filled with poetry and songs.  Every month a wonderful group of music minded folks here at Advent sit down and look for songs that match the Bible readings we will hear that week.  Our “liturgy”, aka the order of worship you have in your bulletin each week comes almost entirely directly out of the Bible.  The words are there to speak to your heart.   And now and then, if you manage to block out the person behind you that is singing too loud, or the fact that the tune may not be familiar, or the fact that you just wish the pastor would just stop singing altogether, they will speak to your heart.  I so rarely hear from folks, “oh my pastor, the words to that hymn just made me think!”  Unfortunately I often hear “that hymn was just too hard to sing.”  So, I thought it would be a good idea to offer advance absolution (forgiveness) to anyone who is struggling with the melody, to just read the words and let the great singers among us do the tune.

Sometime in the coming year, I hope to offer an Adult Bible Study on the liturgy and hymnody of our worship.  In the meantime, I invite you to pay close attention this week to the words on the page.  As a test to all of you to see if you really read these articles I write, I actually play one of the instruments in this picture.  If you’ve read this far, I challenge you to guess which one.  When you offer your guess, you can also tell me which hymn or liturgy words spoke to your heart on that Sunday morning.

I’ll close with the words of one of my favorite hymns coming up this month at a church (very) near you:

“God of grace and God of glory, on your people pour your power; crown your ancient church’s story; bring its bud to glorious flower.  Grant us wisdom, grant us courage for the facing of the hour, for the facing of this hour.”

With you on the Journey, Pastor Barb

“. . . Prepare the Way of the Lord”

A voice cries out: ‘In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord, Make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, and every mountain and hill be made low; the uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places a plain. Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all people shall see it together, for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.’ Isaiah 40:3-5

On May 13th the Christian Church celebrated “The Ascension or Our Lord”.  You may have missed it as it fell on a Thursday.  As the writer of Mark tells us, “So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. ²⁰And they went out and proclaimed the good news everywhere…”  I have this picture in my mind of the disciples standing there, looking up while passerby’s stop and look up with them.  Sometimes this picture captures the danger of being the church 2,000 years after the ascension.  We may have a tendency to stand together and look up as if somehow the work of God will be done while we’re standing still waiting for Christ to return.

Of course the disciples didn’t spend the rest of their lives staring into heaven.  They did what they had been commanded to do, if they hadn’t we wouldn’t be gathered in the name of Jesus’ love.  If they hadn’t gotten busy, the life, death, resurrection, and ascension would have no meaning.  Lead by the Spirit they got busy.  They didn’t let little obstacles like persecution, lack of public transportation, differing theologies and understandings, and not having a written account of what just happened keep them from getting out there and getting busy.  They knew that the world had just changed.  They knew that it was up to them to translate the incredible love they had experienced with Jesus to the world around them.

Summer is coming and the road in front of the church is about to be torn up.  I think I’d like to spend some time staring into heaven right now, maybe with a fishing pole in front of me.  The obstacles to shepherding this congregation into the future seem sometimes overwhelming.  With summer and construction we seem to have a built in excuse for letting the work we do together slide until the fall.  News flash:  The work of the Lord is a year-around exercise.  Someone you know needs to know that God’s love is complete.  Someone you know needs to know that they are not alone.  Someone you know would be embraced by this community of faith if they got through the front doors.  The city of Westminster is about to “make straight the highway” in front of our building.  This obstacle doesn’t even compare to the ones the disciples faced after they watched Jesus go to the Father.  So, let’s commit to spending this summer making the way straight for people who need to know God’s love.  That’s everyone.  Let’s pump each other up and get busy.  Tell your story of God’s work in your life to at least one other person this summer.  It will be more powerful than any bulldozer.  And if you ever see me staring into the sky hoping something will happen, I invite you to gently redirect my attention.  I’ll do the same for you as I am as always… With you on the Journey, Pastor Barb