A Church Divided

Image: churchgraphics.blogspot.com

Last Sunday, my church had a big party celebrating the retirement of our senior pastor. There were tears and laughter, as we had a full church for service and then a full room for the meal afterwards. It was bittersweet, especially since Pastor Mark has been Emily's pastor her whole life.

And now, our church will get an interim senior pastor and we will start the call process. May not seem like a big deal but for me, it brings up bad memories. Because when I was not all the much older than Emily, this exact situation tore the church I grew up in apart.

When my parents moved to Holland when I was fairly young, we joined Peace Lutheran Church. It was a great church that my family loved. But the senior pastor was getting older and finally when I was in high school (I think), he retired.

The new pastor that was called was very different. He introduced a lot of pomp and circumstance that we had never had before into the services and in general left a bad taste in people's mouth. I wasn't very privy to the ins and outs, but I do remember my mom saying that she was just angry all the time going to church because of the new pastor.

Enough people agreed with my parents, which caused the church to split in half. The people who left, including my family, left the ELCA (one of types of Lutherans) and formed a brand new Missouri synod church called Christ Our Savior.

Starting a brand new church is really hard. I'm sure it was more stressful on my parents and the other adults, but as a young person it just felt strange. We had no home for a while because we had to rent space before we could raise enough money to build a new building. And one we had a space, it took a while for it to feel church-y and home-like.

And there was quite a bit of drama that sounded the 2nd church as well, having to do with different pastors and the like. I don't remember a lot of the details because it was years ago.

In the end, I have a very uneasy feeling. I hope that my current church is able to find a pastor that fits in well with our congregation. We've been lucky to have Pastor Mark for 22 years, and now there is unfortunately a big hole. I pray for my community because I don't want to go through having a church divided again.

Lent and Soda

Image: www.gianteagle.com

I'm Lutheran and for us, it's not required we give something up for Lent. Over the years, I've sometimes given things up but most of the time I don't. But this year, I originally decided to give up soda. Right before Ash Wednesday (which is the start of Lent), I decided to also give up fast food because I was eating far too much of it.

It's been a big pain in the butt - which I suppose is the point. It's not worth giving something up if you don't suffer a little bit without it.

The fast food part isn't a huge deal. I miss it but not like how I miss soda. Oh soda, I wish I could drink you up!

Especially this week, I've been really wanting Vernor's badly. I caught a bug and I've been very nauseous all week. This also gave me a pretty bad migraine because my body hates me. I've been mostly drinking water and V8 Strawberry Lemonade (which I water down because it's too sweet on it's own).

But I can't have water when I'm sick to my stomach, and the lemonade isn't great either. But I will be strong! I will not drink soda or eat fast food until Easter! And even after that, I'm hoping to eat / drink much less of both.

Jesus suffered and died to wash away my sins. Least I can do is give up on a few conveniences for those 40 days.

Kindergarten Bible

I spent the weekend feeling pretty sick - I had a cold that gave me a migraine. But I made myself go to church on Sunday.

Once a year, our church has a service at Lutheridge which is a camp close to the church. There is a beautiful open air chapel where we all gather. I honestly have only been to this service once, because I was singing in the choir. I always, always get lost in Lutheridge so I don't like going there.

I actually pointed us the wrong way on Sunday and we got a little lost. But we made it before the service started. Every year, our church has the blessing of the backpacks and the last couple of years have been at the Lutheridge service. This usually is not enough to convince me to go into the woods where I get lost, but this year I got an email that kids going into Kindergarten would be getting their Bibles.

So we went so Emily could get her Bible. The service was lovely - I do like the woods. And Emily was very excited to get her story Bible. She flipped through it the rest of the service. She also got her backpack blessed and all the kids got a rubber bracelet that said 'stop bullying' on it.

Since Sunday, every night I've been reading Emily a story out of her Bible. She'll be learning how to read better in school and hopefully she'll be able to read it herself soon.

It's a really great thing that our church does. I feel very blessed to have a great church that is very invested in the youth of the congregation!

Holy Week Services

Easter 2011

Holy Week is a big deal in the Lutheran church. We do extra services throughout the week to mark the different parts of Jesus' Passion at my church.

On Thursday we had a Maundy Thursday service that had a worship meal. Emily and I went and we sat for supper with Emily's best friend from school and her family. The meal was really good and it was nice to have some fellowship time. We did communion with the bread before dinner and the wine after, just like Jesus did on that day all those years ago.

The service was nice, but it was really hard for Emily and her friend to stay completely silent since they are five (at least Emily is). By the end, Emily's friend's mom offered to take the girls out. They are generally quiet in church but when they are together they tend to get a little loud.

Todd had yesterday off from work, and let me go to church by myself for Good Friday service. There were a few kids there, but mostly adults because it's another 'be completely silent' kind of service. Good Friday is always a really intense service for me - to think that Jesus went through that pain and agony of dying on the cross to save us from sin can be really overwhelming.

I admit that I got very teary-eyed from the beginning. I felt the presence of God very strongly through the service so it was very powerful for me. But I think that Emily would have been either completely overwhelmed or just really bored.

Our church has done an Easter Vigil service on Easter Saturday before but not this year. So we just have Easter Sunday service tomorrow. It is will be a lovely finish to Holy Week.

Palm Sunday and Family Time

 After our busy day on Saturday, it would have been nice just to relax on Sunday. But that didn't happen since I was up early on Sunday to get ready for church.

We are Lutheran and Holy Week is a big deal in our church. Holy Week starts with Palm Sunday and ends with Easter. This past Sunday was Palm Sunday and my choir was singing at the early service.

Everyone got to process in with their palms at the beginning of the service - Emily was very excited to wave her palm. Because Todd came to church, I got to sit with the choir which was nice.

After church, we left right away. Todd's Aunt Denise lives outside of Charlotte. Todd's cousin Mandy, her husband and daughter were down visiting. Since it's only a couple of hours drive, we wanted to make sure to see them while they were in NC.

It was great to spend time with family and to meet Kenzie who is now a toddler. Living in NC is great but we don't see a lot of our family because we haven't been able to get to Michigan for a couple of years now.

Emily and Kenzie played great together despite the age difference. While Kenzie was napping, I took Emily to the neighborhood park was only a few blocks away. They have the standard playground equipment including a merry go round, which none of the parks we frequent have. So Emily loves the merry go round.

I made the mistake of letting Emily push me on the merry go round. I hadn't bee on one in years and once I got off I had a migraine. Beyond that, we had a great time.

I ended up in bed as soon as we got home. With as full as our weekend was, I really over did it. But it was worth it to see family and have family time with just me, Todd and Emily.

Ash Wednesday

Emily's cross from last year

Today is Ash Wednesday and the start of Lent. I'm Lutheran so we observe Lent and Ash Wednesday.

My church here is the first church I went to that did the ashes on the forehead. My other churches would have a service but that was it. It was a little strange the first year I went but it's a great symbol. I have pictures of Emily with ashes on her forehead from every year she's been alive.

I like Ash Wednesday service. It's a somber reminder that we came from dust and to dust we will return. Lent's a somber season so it's a great beginning.

I remember one year in college, Ash Wednesday fell on my best friend's 21st birthday. We went to the service but then we went out drinking a little. It was a rather surreal day!

For this year, I'll be going to church early for choir practice and then will be going to the service where I'll be singing with the choir. Emily will be with me, of course, so there will be another picture of her tonight with ashes on her forehead.

Trick or Treating - Church Edition

I’m still recovering from our Disney trip but I’ll be posting about that soon. Now that we are home, we are trying to get back into the groove of things. But with Halloween right around the corner, we have several Halloween activities we are taking part in.

Tonight was the annual trick or treating at the retirement community that is associated with our church. It give all the people who live in the retirement community a chance to see all the kids in their costumes and give a safe place for the kids to trick or treat at.

Emily’s been looking forward to it all day. After dinner, she donned her Cinderella dress and we headed off. The actual trick or treating was first. All the kids looked cute in their costumes and Emily had a great time filling up her bucket.

After everyone finished trick or treating, we all went to the community room so the youth choirs could sing for everyone. Emily didn’t want to sing, just eat her candy and sit in my lap. The songs were lovely.

We headed out after the singing was done, though stopping briefly for punch and a cookie. Emily skipped all the way to the car. It was a lovely way to spend the evening.

Emily and her Oddly Named Imaginary Friend

When Todd and I started dating, I let him know that religion is very important to me. Thankfully, he was already a Christian with a belief in God. He didn't really care what domination we were, so we are Lutheran since that’s what I grew up as.

Emily’s been a member of the same church since she was a baby. She was baptized when she was about three months old. She started going to preschool at our church last year and attended her first Vacation Bible School this summer.

Because we are a Christian household, we pray and talk about God a lot. Since Emily is four, she is able to understand some of it. We focus on how God loves us and I have also told her that thunder is just God bowling because the noise freaks her out.

Right after VBS this year, she started talking more about God and how he was with her. It morphed into god being her imaginary friend. Her friend, god, is a little boy about her age who likes cars. She doesn't talk about him all the time but sometimes, and she does know he’s imaginary and that it’s just a game.

I haven’t discouraged her at all, but I do wonder what some people might think when she starts talking about her friend, god, in the store. But I want to encourage her to use her imagination because I think imagination is a good thing.

Did your kids ever have an oddly named imaginary friend?