Sunday School Changes, New Member Classes, Confirmation, Youth Group

Sunday School
Tonight the Education Committee met to plan out the next month. We also decided that Sunday School was going to go back to 9-9:50 am starting this Sunday, Oct. 7. The Sunday School schedule will be 9 am singing, 9:10 lesson and activity, 9:50 dismissal. Please take note of this time change, we hope to see all the children on Sunday.
We are planning on having the children sing This Little Light of Mine on November 4th during worship service, in honor of All Saints Sunday.

New Member Classes
New member classes will be starting also on Oct. 7th at around 11:30 and continue each Sunday through Nov. 4th. Anyone interested in becoming a member please join Pastor Helsing for the next 5 Sundays. In new member training you will learn a little about our churches history what it means to be a member of Genesee Lutheran Perish, plus Lutheran history and philosophy.

Confirmation
Confirmation students will be joining the confirmation students at Grace Lutheran, in Lewiston every third Sunday of the month. The first class our students will be attending is Oct. 21.

Youth Group
High School Youth Group: Oct. 7, 5-7 pm Fellowship Hall. Food, faith, fellowship and fun!

Middle school and high school youth groups: Oct 27th the m.s. and h.s. middle school youth groups have been invited to join the Grace Lutheran Youth Group for a Haunted Hayride at Hell's Canyon. Grace Lutheran for pizza and games at 5 pm then on to Hell's Canyon for the hayride. Cost is cars are $5 for entry without the state park, and $2 per person for the hayride.

Sunday Nov. 13 Announcements

Announcements

Sunday Nov. 13th:

Sermon: You Think This is Bad......

Sunday morning Adult Study and Conversation:

Liturgy (literally "the work of the people"). It's really about the unity of the Church in our worship, on how we celebrate God's presence and the Church's story all year round, helping us to be one, holy, catholic and apostolic. 

Women's Bible study and conversation with Pastor Stewart on  Wednesday at 10am in the church fellowship hall.

The Word that re-describes the world: What the Bible is (and isn’t); what unifies it (even in its diversity); its authorship and God’s hand in it and on us.  All are welcome

Please talk to Pastor Stewart or John Marone if you are interested in attending the Palouse Cluster meeting  at Moscow, Emmanuel, next  Sunday Nov. 20, 4-6pm, especially if you are interested in helping to discern the hoped-for gifts and qualities of the next Bishop of the Eastern-Washington Idaho Synod. (The more the merrier, the fewer the poorer.)

Adult Sunday School

Adult Sunday School First Week:

In the Adult Sunday School we are having a discussion on the book “ Learning From the Giants”. We would like to give people maybe three or four bullets of what we took away from each week’s lesson.

This is what we took away from Sunday, February 7th class

1. This is an interesting way to learn about the giants of faith from the interesting. This book puts in the perspective of them coming and talking to us today. This week and the next few weeks we will talk with Elijah.
2. Elijah's pride of having been used by God to fulfill His will and the best day of his life turned out to not be as great as he thought because not everyone was happy with what he had done or believed him about God being the one true God. Lesson is that: You can’t ride your pride. You have to be careful of being too prideful lest you will likely be disappointed in the end.
3. You can’t live with the assumption that when good things happen that will solve your problems. In actuality life is not always that way.

Please come join us while we Learn With the Giants, each Sunday morning at 8:458 in the fellowship hall of St. John's

What You Can Learn From Church in Just One Day: Part 1

This week we're doing a series on things you can learn in church in just one day.  It'll focus on last Sunday, the 27th of October.  We'll talk about the events our church hosted and some simple lessons that came from them.

Part 1 talks about Sunday School.  Though we're not talking about all of Sunday School.  Though all ages of kids met together this Sunday for a special event, our Adult Sunday School class still met separately.  So if you want to learn what they talked about you'll have to ask them!  It's worth noting, though, that even these stories only paint part of the picture.

Last Sunday our Sunday School students gathered for a special Halloween treat.  At 9:00 a.m. we all trooped over to Pastor Dave and Careen's house to watch Room on the Broom.  This short movie is based on a children's book of the same name.  It tells the story of a kind witch and her cat who apparently do everything together.  Their favorite activity is soaring high in the sky on the witch's broom.  But the witch also has a bad habit of losing anything that isn't stapled to her forehead.  In the course of a day's flying she manages to drop her hat, hair ribbon, and wand.  Each time the lost item is found by a different friend:  dog, bird, frog.  Each new friend asks if there's room on the witch's broom for them to go flying too.  Even though her cat strenuously objects, the kindhearted lady always says, "Yes!"  Eventually they deal with a broken broom, a looming dragon, and all sorts of adventures together.

The movie is filmed in wonderful British stop-action style.  The music, artwork, and voice acting are wonderful.  It's an amazing piece of work.

More importantly, we asked the students what this story might tell us about God.  Part of it was easy.  There's always "room on the broom" with God!  No matter how many friends we have, more are welcome.  The witch's unfailingly kind response to the animals reflects God's invitation to us.  "Of course, you're always welcome!"

The witch's cat provided even more insight into faith and church.  From the beginning, and nearly throughout the whole movie, the cat was opposed to the addition of new animals.  Kitty loved precedence, the relationship with the witch, the prime place on the broom!  Those other animals were messy, annoying, unwelcome.  Every time the witch said, "Yes!" to one of them the cat slapped his forehead in chagrin.  He immediately began ordering them to get out of his space on the broom, to sit towards the back, to stop making noise and fussing and messing up the ride.

Kitty can reflect our attitude about church.  We don't hate other people, we just love the way we do things!  We want to preserve that way and our special relationship with God.  Therefore we're tempted to cite precedence and tradition, to keep other people off the broom...or at least out of the driver's seat!

It's worth noting that as soon as each animal got permission to get on the broom, they quickly joined the cat's side when the next animal wanted on.  Cat said no to dog.  After dog got on anyway both dog and cat said no to bird, and so on.

We have to remember that God, our broom driver, keeps up his "Yes!" no matter what.  Our job isn't to talk him out of it in favor of keeping us special and exclusive, but to happily make "room on the broom" for all he might invite.  Kind and welcoming, ready to celebrate the amazing flight...that's our job description as people of faith.

This was a great lesson for all ages, from the youngest who mostly just enjoyed the movie and learned that kindness matters to the oldest who are exploring their own relationship with God and his church.  It's just ONE of the things that you can learn in just one day at church!

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

HUGE EVENT SUNDAY!

Sunday night at 7:00 p.m. we're going to show the Bible Story movies our Sunday School classes filmed throughout the year.  The evening will include the World Premier of "The Story of Jacob and Esau".  Several dozen of our children and youth star in these films.  I don't know any other words to describe them but amazing, Spirit-filled, and an absolute MUST-SEE.  I can't even describe the combination of humor, faith, and Spirit that comes through these 10-15 minute movies.  The music, the acting, everything...you have to see them to believe them.  This is NOT your normal Christmas Pageant stuff! (Not that there's anything wrong with that.)

Not only should you come on Sunday night, you should invite friends, family, neighbors, everyone.  If you want to see faith, real evangelism, scripture, love, learning...everything our community is supposed to be about all bundled into one fun-filled evening, you can't miss this.

All six short films strung together total 80 minutes, about the length of a normal movie.  We'll have popcorn and drinks just like a night at the cinema.  It's going to be great.

Hope to see you there!

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Celebration of Discipline

"Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth" (Matthew 5:5)

Hmm what does that mean? What does the word meek mean? And where does it fit into discipline? These were the questions of this weeks Adult Sunday School class. 

Our focus for the day was: 
A disciple of Jesus is one who learns, who is teachable, and who seeks to follow. Learning requires discipline and humility to open the door to new discoveries and experiences. 
First thing we noticed was that the words disciple and discipline both start with the same suffix. This was interesting, I wonder how many of you ever looked at the two words and thought of them as being similar in meaning? I know none of us had really ever made the connection between those two words. It kind of makes sense when you think about it as you probably really have to have discipline to be a disciple of Jesus, you  have to be strong and able to stand up to the criticism and doubters out in the world. 
While we were still pondering this we moved onto the discovery and reading:

• Moses and Jesus were called meek. What have you learned about Moses and Jesus that would counter the popular notion that meekness is weakness or timidity? 

Wow-None of us had ever thought of either Moses or Jesus as meek. Of course for most of us meekness has always been interrupted as a weakness or timid. 

• A number of meanings are given to the word meek. Which of the following are the most helpful to you? How?

1. One who has control of his or her instincts, impulses and passions
2. A humility that banishes pride and allows one to be teachable
3. A compassionate use of one's strengths to help others
4. One who does not need to always be in control or always win
5. A gentleness (non-violence) that promotes harmony with others and the earth
6. A sense of awe and gratitude toward the works and mystery of God
7. Other

This gave us pause as none of these really seemed to fit what we thought of as meek so we decided to look it up on the internet to see if it would help us understand the meaning of meek.
First one we saw was as an adjective meaning: Quiet, gentle and easily imposed on; submissive. OK we could go along with quiet and gentle but not so much easily imposed on or submissive. Next we looked at Webster's meanings.

1. Enduring injury with patience and without resentment
2. Deficient in spirit and courage-submissive
3. Not violent or strong

Well now the first one pretty well described Jesus and Moses and three came close if you went with not violent but I am sure we all agree that both Moses and Jesus had to have been strong to endure all that they did. Of course two came the closest to what we all think of as meek. At least we had found a couple of meanings that were making sense. After looking up the meaning we were able to look at the list again and find the ones that were most helpful to us and how it was. We could see how each of the things listed would be helpful to us and would help us to understand how Moses and Jesus could be described as meek. It was all becoming clearer as long as you could get past our preconceived idea of meek being weak or timid, not really an easy task since it is almost ingrained in us to think of someone who is meek as being weak, but we were getting there at least.

• Choose one of the above descriptions and tell of an example of this that you have witnessed or read about. It could be an individual or group. What blessing resulted? 

My first thought given the events of the past week was the stories of the new Catholic Pope and how he seems to fit a humility that banishes pride and allows one to be teachable. The fact that he seems so far to be pretty humble and refused to partake of all the first rituals that come with being named a new Pope. I realize that it remains to be seen if he will truly be this way through his time as Pope but for now this was my interpretation of what I had seen.  
Mark and Brent both talked of the sense of awe and gratitude toward the works and mysteries of God, using being in the outdoors and being in awe of all that is there to see.

• Certain attitudes in society are inconsistent with a biblical understanding of meekness. Choose the one you have struggled with the most and tell about your struggle.  

1. Technology in our salvation, our priority
2. Competition is needed for growth/progress
3. Meekness is not a sign of strength for men
4. Meekness is not a sign of strength for women
5. A need to won and to be in control
6. Silence is seen as weakness or inferiority
7. Religion belittles knowledge
8. Little encouragement to learn from the environment or lack of connectedness to creation
9. Other

Yep we were right back to a list of what society and most of us think of as meekness and could see where these were all inconsistent with the biblical understanding of meekness. It was also easy to see how each of us has struggled with at least one if not more of these. My first thought was of technology and how when technology is not working how much we get frustrated with it and usually have to make a decision to give up or to figure out how to work with technology and the glitches that can go with it. At work at least we have to have use it so that we can get the job done, and technology sometimes really makes this hard to do but we have to figure it out. 
Mark looked the list and said he could see where each of this would take patience. Now that got us all to thinking and we could all see that meekness did not really mean weak but if you have patience you are closer to the biblical meaning of meek.

• Leaning takes discipline. Give examples of how has this been true in your life. 
• What opportunities for learning has the church offered that have helped you the most? What more might be done? How does learning about global issues teach meekness?
• What could we do to teach our children about the blessings of meekness?

We did not really get a chance to totally discuss the above list, so we are posing these questions to those reading this and invite you to give some of your ideas and thoughts.

The last part of the lesson always gives a thought for the journey:
Meekness comes when we connect with nature and each other in such a way that we see the sacredness in everything God created. Take time to connect.
Verse for the journey:
"Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls" (Matthew 11:2829)
Prayer for the journey:
Graciouse God, help us to be so in tune with your Word and your world that we are eager to learn and gentle in how we treat others and you creation. Amen

The Little Things

Do you know what song the Sunday School kids sang this morning?  I do!

Zacchaeus was a wee little man, a wee little man was he
He climbed up in a sycamore tree for the Lord he wanted to see
for the Lord he wanted to see!

He looked up in the sycamore tree and he said, "You come down here!"
cuz I'm going to your house today, I'm going to your house today!

Actually, I don't think this is exactly how it goes.  You see, I didn't hear it firsthand.  I know the Sunday School students learned this song today because my little boy has been singing in non-stop all afternoon.  That makes sense, really.  It has everything he could ever want in a song:  tree climbing, giving orders, and someone coming over to the house to visit!

It just goes to show you, though, that the smallest things can make the biggest impression sometimes.  You never know who you're going to reach with little things you consider ordinary, like a song we've all probably heard a hundred times before.  That old song finds new meaning in the mouth of a five-year old who never realized that Bible stories were that exciting!

Don't neglect the little things in your faith life.  The simplest moments shared faithfully can make a huge difference!

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Poor in Spirit

Today in the Adult Sunday School Class we started a new study about Following Jesus, our first lesson plan was on "Awakening The Heart". The studies we have been doing has different parts starting with the Focus. Opening Prayer, Community Building, Discovery and Daily Walk.
Focus for today: To discover that our positive response to God's love and Jesus' invitation to follow him rings us into a new experience of what is real, what is important, and what is satisfying. Community building is always a way to introduce ourselves and something they want you to share. The Discovery was from Matthew 5:3
Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
After reading this we were brought to the question of what this means to us especially the words blessed and phrase poor in spirit. It lead to quite a discussion. Blessed we looked up in the dictionary online and came up with these meanings: a. Held in reverence, b. honored in worship c. characterized by happiness or good fortune. There are many meanings these were just a few. For us Blessed was not as mystifying as Poor in Spirit was. We all agreed that when we hear that phrase we tended to concentrate on the word poor.
So my question to you now is what does this phrase mean to you?
The lesson went onto having us pick our a list when we are most open to the spiritual dimension of life and it gave us samples that we were to choose from:
A. When I am experiencing a crisis or loss
B. When I take time to connect with nature.
C. When I hear a good sermon or Bible study.
D. Music or art connects me to the spiritual.
E. When I hear the cries of hurting people.
F. In my quiet time or times of solitude.
G. Children help me the most because...
H. I don't know that I am very open to a spiritual reality. Maybe it's because..
I. When I am part of a worship service.
J. Other
All these made us stop to think about when we do connect and why. For all of us we had one that was the most but also felt all of them in one way or another was times we connect.
When do you feel you are connected most with the spiritual dimension of life and why?
We still were not sure we understood what the phrase Poor in Spirit meant, still we kept thinking of the word poor and thinking of this as meaning someone needy. So we went onto the next portion of our study this one asked us: In your opinion, what hinders many people from being "poor in spirit" or to open to God's presence and direction. What? We still were stuck on poor but this now made it sound like "poor in spirit" was something we wanted to be. Why would we want to b "poor in spirit"?  We still were concentrating on the word poor and what we all conceived poor to mean and for most of us we don't want to be poor if we can help it. So now that challenge was to read the following and figure how these things could hinder a person from being "poor in spirit":

• Their upbringing in the home didn't emphasize it.
• The pull of materialism or prosperity.
• Religion is seen as following rules or beliefs rather then healthy relationships.
• Easier to conform to the expectations of others.
• Needing God's help is seen as a weakness.
• Inadequate teaching from the church.
• Only the material word is real or important.
• Other.
• Think of ways you have been blessed (satisfied) by being aware of moments of spiritual transformation or amazement. For example, the story told in a sermon or movie, being changed through prayer, taking time to listen or help. What has helped to awaken your heart.

Now our challenge to you is come up with your answers to these questions we had and start discussing the answers. It will be quite interesting what answers you come up with. I was going to put the Daily Walk: thought for the journey on now but since it actually answers some of your questions I think I might leave if off for now in order to get a better discussion going. I will then post it later. Please join in and give your thoughts. Questions again are:
So my question to you now is what does this phrase mean to you?
When do you feel you are connected most with the spiritual dimension of life and why?

Genesee Lutheran kids created this poster:  looked up different virtues in the index of the Bible, found the Bible passages that talked about the virtues, selected a few passages and then using this art technique, journaled the message.  Cool, huh?

Children Tell The Christmas Story

I have a theory about why we love the little children to tell our Christmas story through a pageant: They are ADORABLE!

I can't take my eyes off them!  

So at least I will be paying attention when the greatest story ever is told.  

Besides, children are innocent,

they are sweet,

they are impish,

they are fun!

They have beautiful voices  

and they have pure love in their eyes. 

 

I can't think of a more fitting kind of person  

to tell this very important tale of the coming of our Lord.

So, Go Tell It On the Mountain!

Hark, the Herald Angel Sings!On this Silent Night

 A Savior is Born-

 and a child told me about it!

I am so grateful to be part of this church. I am grateful to Dana and Jennifer for all the work they put into this play.  I am grateful for the parents and grandparents of children who make it possible for me to see their kids every Sunday. Thank you, everyone, for the honor of listening to your children!

Ministry With Young Folks

I want to piggyback on something Rosanna wrote this weekend, expanding it into a larger discussion on youth and children's ministries.  Her piece was simple, describing the theologically teaching moments in carving pumpkins.  In one event and one essay she perfectly captured our strategy working with the younger folks of our congregation.

Since I started in youth ministry a couple decades ago I've been a proponent of conducting young people's ministries organically.  There's a time and place for sitting kids down and telling them all about God using chalkboards and worksheets and traditional teaching methods.  In our church this happens in confirmation and a little bit in Sunday School.  But if that's the only way you teach them about God, if that's the only experience they have of "God stuff", then you have the unintentional consequence of divorcing God from anything they do in the rest of their life.  You end up with young people who can recite correct technical doctrine in the classroom but who don't perceive God outside of it.  Entire generations have been raised to think there's "God stuff" and then there's "real life" and the two don't mix.  That, my friends, is an incorrect--OK, I'll say it--downright bad witness.

Organic ministry focuses more on finding God in the things the kids already do, how God is working in the lives they already have instead of how he's absent until they learn the chalkboard stuff.  We teach them about a God who is with them everywhere and always and not just during the hour they're learning at church.  The traditional message runs, "These things are holy, the things you do are not."  We try to teach them how to do the things they normally do in a holy fashion, not giving them holy moments but helping them see how to live holy lives.

From the outside this looks like doing a bunch of odd stuff in church:  carving pumpkins, playing games, sitting around and drinking pop and talking.  Some will say, "How is that different than what they normally do?"  It's not too much...and that's the point!  Little by little these kids are learning how to play games and be friends with each other in a holy way, how to see and invite God into their cultural rituals like pumpkin carving, how to share God in conversation and refreshments.  We're not happy with the kid who perfectly parrots our answers about the Trinity (which we do teach them) in class and then goes out into the world not caring about his neighbor.  We'll go a little light on the doctrine and show them what the doctrine means first:  sharing, caring, being together, getting over little bumps in our relationships and forgiving each other, celebrating this life God has given us, creating love and goodness in the world.  That way when they hear the doctrine they are able to embrace it because they've really been living it all along.

Organic ministry doesn't produce as many of the tangible moments by which we've traditionally gauged our results.  There aren't as many instances when we can say, "I taught the kids about  this theological concept today!"  In fact in a given moment one might say, "All I really did was carve a pumpkin or play a game.  What really happened there?"  But over the long haul giving up those single moments when we can be proud of ourselves as teachers in favor of multiple moments when we were integrating our lives and God's with the real, everyday lives of the kids really pays off.

In just a few years of doing ministry this way here I can point out case after case of young folks who have moved on coming back and touching base when they needed help, being concerned for the lives of their friends as much as their own, and bringing incredibly good things into the world.  And that's not going to end.  They probably didn't understand the significance of pumpkins and board games when they were 8 or 13, but when they're 35 or 40 they're going to look back and realize everything they got taught about God and life through this time together.  They're going to smile as they realize it didn't seem like teaching at all, that it was so deeply ingrained that it slid right into their hearts and stuck, and that God has blossomed like a flower in their lives as naturally as breathing.  We didn't give them a fish, we taught them how to fish, and that's going to affect everything they choose to do:  jobs, marriages, faith relationships, and hopefully raising the next generation of children.

Thank you to Rosanna and the rest of the Sunday School and youth ministry folks for putting it so perfectly and getting it so right.

--Pastor Dave (pastordave@geneseelutheranparish.org)

Huh? Carving Pumpkins in Sunday School?

Today we carved pumpkins in Sunday School!
 What in the world does that have to do with teaching kids about God?
Well, first of all, here is what the kids were asked to do:

1. choose a pumpkin
2. wash your pumpkin
3. clean out the slimy, gross stuff inside
5. carve a new face
6. put a light inside

What does that have to do with our relationship to God?!   Well...

1. He chose us. He did. And He does.

"You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you." John 15:16

2. He washes us clean.

"But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in

the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God." 1 Corinthians 6:11

3. He made a way to get rid of the seeds of hatred in us and our most terrible thoughts.

  "While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."Romans 5:8

 4. He forgives us our sins and throws them away; they are gone for good!

"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever

believes in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life."John 3:16

5. He makes us new!

 "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation;

the old has gone, the new has come!"    2 Corinthians 5:17

 

6.  He puts Jesus right into our heart, to shine out into the darkness, for all the world to see!

 "For God, who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,'

 made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge

 of the glory of God in the face of Christ."  2 Corinthians 4:6  

     

And

"In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds

and praise your Father in heaven." Matthew 5:16

 

Now the students in our class today learned that whenever they carve or see a jack-o-lantern they are to remember to let Jesus, the Light of the World, shine out into the world, through their smiles, hugs, their kindness, and most of all, through their love.