September 8th, 2024
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Sunday School Rally Day is September 15th! Sunday School is for youth 4 years old through 6th grade. We invite you to head down the hallway to get your child registered for the year. We also need your help teaching our youth! All materials are provided and plans are laid out for you. Please consider giving an 45 minutes of your time to share the love of Jesus with our youth.
Mission Trip Informational Meeting after worship on September 15th for all high school youth. We are going to St. Louis July 20-25, 2025
Lagers with Lord is Monday, September 16th, at 6 pm at Buckshots! All are welcome for a time of faithful conversation.
Outdoor Worship/Blessing of the Animals is next Sunday, Sept 22nd. Bring your pets and a chair, though you can also sit in your vehicle if you so choose!
Sunday School Begins on Sunday, September 15th at 9:45 am.
Crew begins on Wednesday, September 18th, for all 3rd-6th graders from 3:30 pm till 5 pm.
Crew snacks needed! We invite individuals and families to sign-up to provide snacks for 50-60 youth for Crew! Feel free to team up with others! You do not need to serve the snacks, just provide them! You can provide whatever you want. Items should be here by 3 pm on the day of Crew. Sign-up in the Narthex or call the office. Questions? Call PB or talk to Lonna Borgert or Trudie Chernak.
Volunteers Needed! We are packing Lutheran World Relief boxes on Wednesday, September 25th, at 9 am. We thank you for your help in advance!
MUSINGS FROM PASTOR BRAD
We have a member of our congregation that always astounds me. They will contact me and tell me about all of their latest challenges. Challenges with health, challenges going on with their family life, challenges going on with the people they love, concerns they have about the world in general. And yet, at the end of a list difficulties, will express incredible gratitude. Gratitude for life. Gratitude for the blessings of God. Even gratitude for me for listening. Just straight up praise for the ways in which God has blessed them throughout life. And I’m always amazed, because most of the time when I get contacted in that manner it doesn’t end that way. It usually ends with messages of why is life so bad and terrible and awful.
It is easy to look at the world and only see the bad and awful. There is a lot of bad and terrible. And we get pumped with a lot of terrible and bad at us at all times from a variety of sources, whether it be from the media, politicians, or even our own personalities and perspectives. Things aren’t ever good enough. We aren’t getting what we think we deserve or should have. Someone is always screwing us over. I’m always looking at the things I’m doing wrong instead of the things I’m doing right. It is a constant cycle of negativity that feeds upon itself in an endless loop.
But here it the thing. Life is not fundamentally bad. Life is fundamentally good. I thought of this as I was teaching my first confirmation class of the year and we were talking about creation and God is constantly calling his creation “good.” Everything around is fundamentally good. Sure, we have mucked it up with sin, but that doesn’t make it less good at its very essence.
At the same time, everything around us is also a gift. It has been given to us by the loving Creator who made it and then has trusted us with it. We are the stewards of it. We haven’t earned anything it. It all has been given to us, even our salvation. Given by grace through faith in Jesus, won by Christ’s death and resurrection. We are surrounded by gifts. The food that we eat. The people in our lives. The vocations that we have. The things that bring us joy. The beauty that we see. All of it are gifts.
I would even go so far to say that the challenges that we face in life can be gifts because how can we know the joy if we don’t experience the other side. We can never know gratitude without challenge. We don’t know strength without knowing weakness. We don’t know hope without despair nor faith without doubt. But maybe the challenge comes in what eyes will we use. Will we view the world and our lives with eyes of negativity, of fear, of doubt, of hate? Or will we view the world with eyes of positivity, of hope, of faith, of love? Will we be people of gratitude or people of selfishness?
I want to be like that member that can list all that is going wrong and yet be incredibly grateful. I pray every day for the Lord to give me a heart of thankfulness and to see life as the gift it is, even when it is hard. To see the blessing in the midst of the hardship. To see that life is good. Because even in the worst of times, there is always hope because there is always the Lord, who has already won the victory for us. For you. “God saw everything that he had made, and indeed, it was very good.” Genesis 1:31
May God bless you today and always.