Joy, Joy, and more Joy!

   Greetings to you in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.  Last Friday may have been the best day off I have had yet.  I spent the day with one of our members who was a gunsmith his whole life.  I took a couple of my antique guns out to him to look at.  The one was in pretty bad shape, but he just called me today to tell me he test fired it and it worked fine.  He was excited cause it was one he had never seen before, and we had to look it up in the book to see what it even was.  I was excited cause I knew he would be able to actually fix it up and getting it working.  Besides working on that gun, we also just sat around his shop talking and smoking cigars.  It was a great way to spend a day off.  
    It was snowing most of the day Friday and then Saturday it got bitter cold.  It has been in the negative teens all weekend, so I didn't get a chance to go snow shoeing or anything outside.  I spent all day Saturday working on tax prep stuff and just having a nice lazy day.  Then yesterday I was at the church all day.  We had two really nice services with an awesome Bible study in between.  We are still working through Romans and yesterday we covered Romans 6 and baptism.  It was an amazing discussion, and not only did I enjoy it, but I think the people enjoyed it as well.  We are getting a really good crowd of people every Sunday morning which makes it that much more fun.
     Then after church, we had our new members dinner and orientation.  Then I changed the church sign and almost lost a few fingers to frost bite.  We still have the old fashion, change the letters type of sign.  Pastor Ludwig gave me that duty after dealing with it for so long.  Yesterday, in the negative twenties was a fun time to change the letters.  You can't wear gloves either because the letters are flat plastic, so they are really hard to get a hold of with bare fingers.
    Then last night we had Bible study with our Sunday night group.  We are working through the book Spirituality of the Cross.  It is a small group of people who have been Lutheran their whole life, so I wasn't sure how the discussion would go, but it actually went really well.  Today has been very quite around the church.  With the holiday, there was no preschool.  So it was just Ruth, her daughter who did not have kindergarten, and myself holding down the fort.  Tomorrow is our blood drive and we don't have as many people signed up as I would like.  We will see how it goes tomorrow I guess.
    I didn't realize how much I miss Bible studies during the Christmas season.  It was nice to have the extra time, but now that we are getting back into them, I am realizing how much I missed them.  Especially the Romans Bible study, we work through some awesome topics and discussions.  I am always amazed at how much I learn one while I prepare for the study, but then two during the actually study itself.  Even though I am the one teaching, the Spirit giving me the words to say and the analogies to work through always surprises even me.  Just talking through these things out loud, with real life questions and examples, helps me grow in my own understanding and faith of God's Word.  So my plug for today, if you are not currently attending any Bible studies, find one and start going.  If you can't find any that are currently happening, start one yourself.  Call up a few friends, invite them to your home some evening, and just start discussing.  It doesn't matter if you don't have a pastor or church worker there to give you all the "correct" answers,  The growing happens in the discussion, the wrestling with the text, the new questions you never had before.  Then if need be, you can ask you pastor those questions at a later date.  But the important thing is just to be in the Word and be in the Word with fellow believers.  Where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am among them, says God.  He is with you, He will guide you and give you new insights, new understandings, and you will give each other encouragement and strength as you work through His Word together.  I am glad I am currently part of four Bible studies right now and hope that number only continues to increase.  Blessings on your reading, studying, wrestling, and growing.

Happy 2016!

   Greetings in Christ's Holy name!  Well I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and New Year.  I know I certainly did.  This was my first Christmas experience here at Peace in Christ.  Normally they have two services at 4 and 6.  However, this year, I added a 9 o'clock service.  All three went very well.  The first two were beautiful services with all kinds of special music.  There was a duet, a soloist, a cello, flutes, and the choir.  Outside the church, a member had made ice candles.  So right along the main road we are located on, there were 20 luminaries (as some called them) flickering and grabbing people's attention as they drove by.  At the 4 o'clock service we had just shy of 500 people.  The church was busting at the seems and it was awesome.  500 people singing the beautiful Christmas hymns.   A few less than 500 candles flickering while singing Silent Night.  What a way to celebrate Christmas.  Then during the 6 o'clock service, I went to a families house for supper and Pastor Ludwig did that service by himself.  There were 200 hundred people there for that one.  Then I came back and had another supper with the organist and her husband since she played for all three services.  Pastor Ludwig had went home to be with his family since all his kids were home.  I did the 9 o'clock service by myself and we had 110 people there.  That service did not have all the special music, but had a very classic, traditional carols and lessons feeling to it.  On the day we had 790 people for Christmas Eve which they were pretty sure was the record.  I was pleased that the 9 o'clock service went well because now it will be in the normal routine.
    I preached that weekend right after Christmas so it was a short turn around time between sermons.  Then last week I took a little vacation.  I made my way over to South Dakota to see old friends and families I am still in touch with from vicarage.  Then I made my way down to Lincoln to hang out with some old college buddies for New Year's Eve. And then I spent New Year's Day at JoAnna and Steven's hanging out with Ava.  Mom and Dad were there so I did get to see them during the holiday season.  Overall, it was a good vacation and a nice way to relax after the busyness of the Christmas season.
    However, now I am back and January is shaping up to be just as busy.  I agreed to host a blood drive here on the 19th.  I am going on a Young Men's Ice Fishing trip on the 22nd to the 24th.   We are doing our big confirmation retreat on the 29th through the 31st.  Plus, I am starting up both small group Bible studies again.  Last time we did the same topic so it wasn't that bad.  This time I decided to do different books for the two groups.  We will be working through C.S. Lewis's Mere Christianity in one group.  And the other group will be working through Vieth's The Spirituality of the Cross.  Both are phenomenal books and I am excited to work through both of them again.  And then we also resume our Romans Bible Study on Sunday mornings.  All of this plus the fact that we have six weeks until Ash Wednesday and I will be busy.  However, it is a good busy like always.
    I have been playing catch up on my Bible Reading plan, and have been reading large portions of Jeremiah.  Jeremiah is a very unique book.  So much doom and gloom, wrath and punishment, and then just a glimpse of Gospel to keep the people going.  It sort of feels like my golf game, lots of frustrating shots, only to be redeemed by one great shot which is enough to keep me going.  However, it is the Word of God and the glimpses of Gospel are beautiful illustrations of God's mercy in spite of our sinful ways.  So as we begin the new year, just a simple reminder to love, trust, and fear in God above everything else.  However, even when you fail, He is a merciful God who has forgiven you in the blood of His Son, Jesus Christ.  Happy New Year in Jesus' name.  Amen.