May 8 Trinity Tidings

Posted on: May 12th, 2022 by Brad Peterson

ANNOUNCEMENTS .

Men’s Band Concert, Sunday, May 22nd, 9 am.

Simply Giving Mania!  From May 1st till June 5th, if you join our automated giving program Simply Giving or increase your current Simply Giving by $5 a month, you will get entered into a drawing to win four tickets.  What tickets?  YOUR CHOICE!  Choices are: Brewers-Twins game at Target Field, an event at the Pablo Center in Eau Claire, or an event at the Mabel Tainter in Menomonie.  Pick up a form on the round table in the Narthex or included in this Good News. 

Vacation Bible School! Sign-up today for VBS on June 13-17th, 9 am till 12:00 pm every day for ages 4-6th grade.  Cost is $10 per student. 

VBS Help Needed:  Luther Park will not be running VBS for this year.  We need help with setting up crafts and helping to watch kids.  Please talk to PB or Katie if you can help. 

VBS Snacks Needed:  Sign-up in the Narthex to provide snacks for Vacation Bible School in June.

Graduate Recognition Sunday May 22nd at 9 am.

Don’t forget that you can support Trinity through the Vanco app OR using the donate form on our website.  Download the free app, search for Trinity Lutheran Boyceville, and go from there!

MUSINGS FROM PASTOR BRAD

  “Surely goodness and mercy  . . .” Psalm 23:6

   If you talk to my friends, they might tell you that I can be pretty negative, especially when it comes to my sports teams.  I’m always complaining about them.  Of course, I usually have a good reason, but I’m also the guy that states a game is over when my team is down by one early in the game.  I’m also pretty negative about my own sporting output, especially on the golf course. 

   Frankly, I sometimes think we as a society are pretty negative about the world.  We look at life and only see . . .bad things.  I can’t blame us, with all that is going on.  But I also think it is a collective symptom of looking only for the negative.  We tend to downgrade the present and romanticize the past.  Lord knows I have been known to do it.  But then I think of these words almost at the end of Psalm 23: “Surely goodness and mercy.”  The key word for that is “surely.”  There is a confidence in that statement.  Surely there will be goodness and mercy, goodness and mercy provided by the Lord.  It is a statement of faith.  Surely.

   I’ve been trying to remind myself of this.  No matter what is going on the world, no matter how much the news I hear makes me fearful or sadness me, in the Lord there is always goodness.  There is always mercy. There is the smile of a child.  A sunny day.  A flower blooming from the ground.  The love of family.  The snuggle of a dog.  A good song, a funny TV show, the delicious bite of a good meal.  Surely.  We are surrounded not just with suffering, pain, and hardship.  I contend that we are surrounded by more blessing, more joy, more gifts then we often see for we take them for granted.  Surely.

   We need a reset of the way we look at our lives.  As I write this, the Wild just lost a playoff game that they really didn’t play well in.  I normally would be depressed and sad and ranting.  But I’m thankful for a great team to watch, a hope that they will win the next game, and trying to be positive.  Why?  Surely goodness and mercy.  I see the terrible headlines in the news but I also have been trying to find stories of hope, of achievement, of people doing amazing things for other people. Surely goodness and mercy.  I’m trying look to see how God is working in and through the people around me. 

   Take a moment to remind yourself of the blessing of life.  Try to see the world through the eyes of your great shepherd Jesus Christ.  Try to exist in the world with these words always on your lips and in your heart: “surely goodness and mercy.”  Surely.  May God bless you this week and always!