Pastor’s Pondering for June 2026

Proverbs 22:6 

Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it.

Deuteronomy 6:6-7 

These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.

How many of us have heard one or more of these verses and considered that the faith we have has been passe down to us through generations of family leading to grandparents, parents or others sharing that faith with us as children?  These verses from the Bible remind me that Christian education doesn’t start or belong in schools but in the home first and foremost. Luther wrote extensively in The Estate of Marriage that a well-ordered home is essentially "a proper church" where parents naturally teach wisdom, faith, and the value of serving God. One might say that Martin Luther encouraged home vs school and to some extent church as the main way to instill and grow the faith from one generation to the next.

Last month I participated in a two-day training with the theme “Faith Forward/Families passing on faith.” The philosophy that faith is passed on through generations: grandparents – parents.

As I shared last month their philosophy is: “Faith Forward wants to see parents and grandparents share the faith and values with the church’s treasure and future, our children and youth: Empower, Equip and Encourage. And part of that is The Five Faith Promises which include:

1.    Prayer: We promise to pray together every day.

2.    Bible reading: We promise to read the Bible together regularly.

3.    Faith conversations: We promise to talk together often about Jesus and our faith.

4.    Acts of service: We promise to perform acts of service together in our community, our congregation, and our home.

5.    Shared mealtimes: We promise to share five or more meals together each week, and to engage in other rituals and traditions together.

What is wonderful about this is that it is something that can be done in the home even with family members who don’t have time for church or Sunday school but helps give them the tools to share their faith with their children. Maybe you have one of those in your own extended family. I’m encouraging everyone in the congregation to participate in this exciting adventure of faith formation and growing the faith in not just our younger ones but within ourselves as well. We will provide you with what you need to do this and show you how as the presenters said, “We do it here (in the church) so that they can do it out there (in the home).” So come on along with us as we take it one step at a time to grow and nurture the faith in God within us all and do it here so that you can do it in your homes. Each month I will focus on one of the five in the ponderings and the importance of them so if you have a story to share let me know,

 

 

Pastor’s Pondering for May 2026

“64 And now a word to you parents. Don’t keep on scolding and nagging your children, making them angry and resentful. Rather, bring them up with the loving discipline the Lord himself approves, with suggestions and godly advice. “ Ephesians 6:4 Living Bible

This month I will be in Des Moines, Ioway at Grandview University for two days of training the a program called Faith Forward. I was nominated by our Bishop Meggan Manlove to apply to this program as it relates to small rural congregations and helping pass on the faith from generation to generation through grandparents, parents, other family members and mentors. As it explains below:

As the website explains “Faith Forward will teach congregations, parents, and grandparents to tell the Biblical and family stories of God’s mercy, grace, love, boundaries, protection, promises, and faithfulness. As parenting trends and church attendance change in a post-pandemic world, this program has been designed to help pastors, ministry leaders, parents, and grandparents pass on their Christian faith to the next generation. A paradigm shift to a home-centered faith formation requires trusted partners, a strong foundation of relationships and accountability, and an openness to God’s Spirit as it moves in new directions. Faith Forward wants to see parents and grandparents share the faith and values with the church’s treasure and future, our children and youth.

FAITH FORWARD HAS A THREE-FOLD AIM:

1.    EMPOWER rural and small congregations to more effectively work with parents, grandparents, and faith mentors through the normal routines of congregational life to help them hand down their Christian faith and values to the next generation.

2.    EQUIP parents and grandparents with doable, repeatable, livable faith practices. 

3.    ENCOURAGE parents and grandparents in creating homegrown faith through easy-to-use activities and resources which weave faith formation into the normal routines of family life.”

I believe this program will indeed be beneficial to our congregation and others in our community in passing on and encouraging the faith in our younger generations. Martin Luther believed that parents were bishops, pastors and deacons to their children in teaching then the gospels but also the faith of those who did so was passed on to their children in the home. I hope that all of us can help make this program possible and as a blessing for our community. Please pray for God’s spirit to be with us as we move forward in the coming year.

 

 

 

Pastor’s Pondering and editorial opinion for April 2026

“Every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.” Philippians 2:11 NIV

“God, Family, Work!” Harold Hansen International Personnel Director ELCA Global Missions

“CHRIST IS RISEN! HE HAS RISEN INDEED! ALLELUIA!

As we start off this April we are entering the final days of Holy Week. I recall a job I applied for where the owner said I couldn’t have Sundays or Holy Week off, I said no thanks. Work that required sacrificing one’s faith isn’t likely something Jesus would have required for his love and if we don’t think Easter is important enough to take time for it rather than just going to work to accomplish another person’s priority it tells me what the other person’s priority is which isn’t hearing the good news of Easter. 

We take time for Holy Week from Palm Sunday to Easter since these events are crucial to Christianity and what we believe and where we hear the promise of forgiveness in “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” Luke 23:34 freeing all from sin and to what Jesus’ has done for the whole world with the promise in John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son.” Holy Week reminds us of all this as we look at each occasion of it:

On Palm Sunday we found Jesus entering into Jerusalem cheered on as the Messiah and King, everyone having hope of their expectation, but what kind of Messiah King? Not what they expected, would we have expected it and do we expect it?

On Maundy Thursday Jesus’s last supper with his disciples, giving them the bread and the wine, his body and blood, to remember him by, our communion, Christ’s real presence with us.  Then Judas betrays him with the authorities, Jesus goes to pray alone in the Garden of Gethsemane with Peter and the sons of Zebedee with him but temptation overcomes them, have we been tempted the same way? Here Jesus also prays to his Heavenly Father asking a pass but accepts his fate and mission with the words, “Not my will but thy will be done”, leading to his arrest and trial while Peter denies him three times before the cock crowed as Jesus predicted. Have we denied him in our lives?

On Good Friday Jesus is tied and tried and crucified alongside two thieves and we hear his last seven last words before he gives up his spirit. And a Gentile proclaims, “Surely this was the son of God.” Again is this the Messiah they expected? What do we expect of Jesus?

And Saturday the Easter vigil when some will gather where they worship, baptisms will occur as we watch and wait for Easter morning. Mary and several other women don’t wait, go to the tomb to anoint the body where they find no body.

Finally Easter Sunday when we will celebrate the resurrection with those who first saw and declared the news, the women who came to the tomb were the first proclaimers of the resurrection meeting Jesus, that was not easy considering their status yet they didn't stay silent but ran to tell the disciples. Today as we hear this great message, will we proclaim as the women did?

Let us take time out of our busy lives to be Resurrection People as the fellowship of believers, for Easter and hear the Good News of Easter that Jesus does it for us!

CHRIST IS RISEN! HE IS RISEN INDEED! ALLELUIA!

 

 

Pastor’s Pondering for March 2026

Matthew 25: 35-41

40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’” New International Version

 

We know this text of the sheep and the goats, a reminder from Jesus that there’s more to our lives as his followers as those who didn’t do it to the least. Lent is a time when we turn toward God. To consider our lives and how they need to change. We also remember our baptism during this time, the promises made over us and the promises confirmed when we were confirmed as well as each time we recite those promises, a gift that provides with the gift of being new every day and never is rescinded but confirmed in the promises of God through Jesus’ death and resurrection. During Lent we are reminded that God of these promises, of However, when we follow Jesus, we are forced to leave our comfort zones, there’s no half way, not halfhearted, no easy out, Jesus’ way isn’t on easy street but on the hard and difficult roads that we may find ourselves on living out Jesus’ commands especially when it calls us to go against the current, counter the culture in which we live.  It’s hearing the stories of Jesus in his time being compassionate to the marginalized and then our seeing the pains and sufferings of our neighbors local or far away, who do not look, sound, act, or worship like us ask ourselves how compassionate are we? Neighbors with the same desires, hopes, dreams and fears. Neighbors who don’t ask for more but simply the same as everyone else, to receive the same justice, love, mercy and help that you and I have received, undeserved but freely given by God. It is a time of repentance for what we have done and left undone, not only on our lips but in our hearts. It is being reminded that we cannot turn blind eyes, claim ignorance, sit by while there is suffering in the world but respond to the needs of others out of love for our neighbors. And we do this not because it does us good but because it does our neighbor good, as Martin Luther declares. In Lent we look at our sinful lives and in the words of Jesus the woman caught in adultery: John 8:10-11 New International Version 10 “Has no one condemned you?” 11 “No one, sir,” she said.

“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.” Those words are for us as well as we live in Jesus’ promise that we also are not condemned but called to sin no more. In Lent we consider how might that look and in our baptism statement join me by asking God to help and guide us in this season of Lent.

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A Lenten Poem

The 17th Century poet, Robert Herrick wrote:  ‘To Keep  a True Lent’,

“Is this a fast, to keep the larger lean? And clean from fat of veals and sheep? Is it to quit the dish of flesh, yet still to fill the platter high with fish? Is it to fast in an hour, or ragg’d to go, or show a down-cast look and sour? No: ‘tis a fast to dole thy sheaf of wheat and meat with the hungry soul. It is to fast from strife and old debate, and hate; to circumcise thy life. To show a heart grief-rent; to starve thy sin, not bin; And that’s to keep thy lent.”

Herrick, Robert. Works of Robert Herrick. vol II. 

Alfred Pollard, ed.

London, Lawrence & Bullen, 1891. 240.