Memorial Day 2008

   Our pastor Steve Hemmeke asked that we read the Scripture text for the sermon before Sunday morning so as to be prepared listeners of the word. I didn't look at the e-mail suggesting that until Friday and I also noticed that one young married man, Dan, asked if we should also memorize it. That should have been a clue. The text: Genesis 1:1 - Rev. 22:21; John 17. At first glance I thought he meant Gen 1:1 AND  Rev 22:21, thought, what the heck?, and realized he meant THROUGH.  Given that it was already Friday I had to resort to my "Cliff Notes", the "Characteristics and Themes" section of my Ligoniers New Geneva Study Bible before each book. I got to Esther~! Steve was, of course, doing a theme of God's Word and did a journeyman's job of mentioning all 66 books, not in turn but in context, and grouping Paul's letters in places. He asked that the young people take notes and let him know if he missed any. I, the trivia buff that I am, noticed he skipped Job and Jonah in the old Testament and Jude in the new. He said later that he had skipped Job and Jude on purpose, but didn't realize that he had left out Jonah.

   I love our close knit, lively church body, our elders and pastor with both depth and a sense of humor. We do celebrate worship as well as communion every Lord's day. And can we sing! Hallelujah!

   And today we follow another "blest" Lord's day with a holiday. It'll be a work day for us as we participated in a Chicken Execution day Saturday (see Kathryn's Blog) and of course, yesterday was the sabbath day of rest and fellowship. It is a "normal" day for us, i. e. we have no family members working outside of the home who would have this day off and perhaps want something special planned. Kathryn and the girls will be gardening. Finishing the 2nd box, its slats and chicken wire, and making the third one. These three boxes are the only ones planned for this year.

   This holiday, "holy day", can be a day of prayer for families who have lost men in the military in Afghanistan and in Iraq, and for men actively serving now. We have several military families in our church family with men deployed at the present time. We have one young man who has just finished college and is being inducted into the Marines as an officer. I also remember family and friends of past service, though not in prayer, as they are gone.

   I am nearly finished William Barclay's  "Many Witnesses, One Lord," so I quote him on the subject of modern preaching:

  " It is a strange feature of the Christian message today that it has become apologetic - in both senses of the word - rather than dogmatic - again in both senses of the term. But the real disaster of the situation is the absence of didache, the neglect of the teaching ministry of the Church. One of the main faults of so much modern preaching is that it lives from day to day, looking each week for a "good text", instead of being a systematic and planned exposition of the Christian faith and of the Bible. There is little good in exhorting people to be Christian, when they have no clear idea of what being Christian means....

   "It may well be that there are many who fail to understand ...phrases like the Kingdom of Heaven, justification by faith, sanctification, atonement, eternal life simply because they are so often used but so seldom expounded and explained....

   "However much we may hesitate to say it, it has to be said that a great deal of modern preaching is trivial in its nature...In what direction lies the cure?...It lies in a revival of expository preaching...It lies in an approach of sheer honesty...It will involve a total approach to the New Testament...the mistake that so many of us make...is to limit  our preaching to that which specially appeals to ourselves...and to remember that while there is one Lord, there are many witnesses, and when we set ourselves to do that we will undoubtedly find that parts of scripture which we thought had nothing to say to us become strangely and amazingly eloquent. W.E. Sangster tells somewhere of the preacher who read himself full, thought himself clear, and prayed himself hot; and to read, to think and to pray is the only way to become a preacher in any century."

If any of you are still with me, I apologize for such a long and boring post. It is strong in my nature to "share", (i.e. I talk too much and I post too long, I tend to "pontificate" as well and I am one of the most opinionated persons that I know!)  I am very busy with Chicken Executions and church picnics and water aerobics and shopping with my girls, etc.etc etc. but, I remain the bibliophile and some of my best times are spent alone with my nose in a book.  Sometimes, in the middle of a ladies meeting, I will suddenly realize how thoroughly bored I am and how much I wish I were elsewhere, anywhere, alone with a book....

Currently Reading Dave Barry Is from Mars and Venus By Dave Barry see related

"Time Flies like an arrow...

Fruit flies like a banana". Quote source,: my favorite con button. Ye who knoweth not what a con button is missed the other side of the 80's and it would take too long to explain why I didn't....

That's as true as most things.  Did you ever ask yourself when the bananas ripen even beyond banana bread stage where did the fruit flies come from? Were they invisibly hiding with the bananas all along. If you had actually eaten the  bananas would you have ingested them? And that brings up another quandry? Where would they be then? Ummmm....

I decided I needed to post because I have such erudite momentous things to impart like the above ....

Quoting Dave Barry discussing his first experience of Laser Tag, "Over all I found the experience to be far more entertaining than anything being funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. And to those of you who feel that this kind of game is bad because it might encourage aggressive behavior in a society that is already far too violent, let me say that, while I understand your point, I also feel that this type of "play-acting" activity can provide a harmless release for aggressiveness and actually reduce violence. So shut up or I'll kill you."

I assume  the "threat" is limited to laser tag activities else I could not be responsible for encouraging this sort of thing. Being a serious minded grandmotherly type person, I try to maintain a place along the proverbial "high road". I'd go on, but dinner is ready.

Went to Hollywood and Vine

   "Hollywood, hurray for Hollywood", NOT!!

   Pastor Tom had to go to the DMV in Hollywood, which is in the 5500 block of Hollywood Boulevard, so Joyce and I tagged along, ("tagged" along, get it? (snigger, snigger) - I hate when I have to explain it, sheesh, but nobody ever gets me - except Gaelan who doesn't crack a smile - and sometimes Richard...)ate breakfast at a Cyber-cafe across the street and then after getting directions from the cashier there, we walked half a block to the "Metro" which took us to Hollywood and Vine. Soon as we got back to street level, I took a picture of the street sign. (I gotta get digital and learn to post pictures, I know - Cindy knows the joy of " a picture's worth a thousand words.)

   The area is now a rundown, seedy, shopping district, every other store either tattoos, sex stuff, or cheap hooch-mama clothes. Bums and panhandlers, 6 to a block and alleyways reeking of urine and unwashed bodies. What a culture! Hooray for Hollywood, indeed! We could not walk all the way to the "Grauman's Chinese" so we did 3 blocks, reading the stars that are imbedded in the sidewalk all the way. Joyce took my picture kneeling next to Carmen Miranda (she in the tutti-fruitti hat). We stopped in a convenience store, bought a few postcards, a mug, two scene snapper thingees and a detailed street map.

   Then being Joyce and I, we went to the nearest bench, stopped there and talked!

   Candace arrives tomorrow, and we plan to do a bus tour or something with her. Today we are going to Casey's school to see her Volleyball game. She's an 11th grader at First Lutheran. We saw Tim play football last Friday. He's the largest guy on their team, but there were 2 guys almost as large on the other team. BTW, his school won.

   Crista headed back to college in Kentucky yesterday. She was here for the installation, but had to get right back. Candace had to work the weekend in the emergency room. She is in pediatric residency in the same hospital that she did her internship.

   More LA adventures later.

Christ's church is alive in California!

   I've just been to an inspiring installation service for the pastor of the Sherman Oaks California Lutheran Church (Missouri Synod). The new pastor there is my nephew, Tom Clocker, (for the very few who look at my blog and don't know...) and his 50th birthday is this Tuesday, October 2nd.

   The District President, Reverend David Stechholz (name reminds me of Staupitz, Luther's mentor at Wittenburg) presided and preached an excellent sermon, "Blessed to be a Blessing", using Isaiah and Romans.

There were 5 other clergyman participating, including the pastor of the Hollywood Lutheran Church, and a pastor of a church, not far away who was with Tom  in seminary in the 80's and went from there to be a missionary/pastor in Panama. His church in So. Califormia is primarily Hispanic and in a really bad urban area of L.A.

   There were prayers in English and in Spanish, in German and in Farsi. Why Farsi? Tom's church here in Sherman Oaks which sits on the edge of Burbank and L.A., BTW, has a number of Persian (i.e. Iranian) members. Two of the elders, Shahram Panahandeh and Kamran Hassanpoor placed hands on Tom and prayed in Farsi.

   For those not familiar with Lutheran church services, There is a processional hymn, in this case "Here I am Lord", a modern hymn but a nice one, and they go from there to confession of sins;

Pastor: If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

People: But if we confess our sins, God, who is faithful and just, will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrigthteousness.

(This of course is IJohn 1:9,10.)

Then go on with:

Pastor: Let us then confess our sins to God our Father.

People Most merciful God, we confess....

You get the picture. The Missouri Synod and Wisconsin Synod Lutheran churches are still "People of the Book", and even have an Evangelical outreach by that name.

In the installation, the pastor is asked:

"Do you acknowledge that the Lord has called you through his Church into the ministry of Word and Sacrament?"

and:

"Do you believe and confess the canonical books of the Old and New Testaments to be the inspired Word of God and the only infallible rule of faith and practice?"

"Do you believe and confessa the three Ecumenical Creeds, namely the Apostles', the Nicene, and the Athanasian Creeds as faithful testimonies to the truth of the Holy Scriptures, and do you reject all the errors they condemn?"

and, being Lutheran, they add:

"Do you confess the Unaltered Augsburg Confession to be a true exposition of Holy Scripture and a correct exhibition of the doctrine of the Evangelical Lutheran Church?   etc. etc.

Well, you get the idea. Biblical, evangelical and alive!  And I was priveleged to be there. I love to be in different Bible believing churches to fellowship with others who confess our Lord. I love the Community Church in Queensville, Indiana, and Grace Church in Metairie, Lousiana and yes, I love St Andrews Church in Sanford Florida, and, yes, I love Willow Creek Church in Tuskawilla, Florida and are all far from perfect, and sometimes frustatingly wrapped up in their myopic pet projects, but they are Christ's church and we need to pray for them all. For wisdom, for maintaining true worship, for showing justice and mercy, and love to one another. Mostly to be obedient to their Lord and Master in these perilous times. For when has the church not had perilous times?

Love you all, gotta turn the computer over to my grandneices who need to type in a high school paper.

Toodles, Nananan from Virginia

From Indiana, with love....

Marla took me all over the 10 acres on the 4 wheeler. This included the old railroad track lane all the way to the deep pool and then back across to the creek and into the creek. The four wheeler is an amazing machine. Nothing seems to phaze it. It trundled through the creek bed, through water and across rock and sand and then up over the embankment and through the woods we went.

I am really looking forward to all my guys being here together in September! Uncle Billy was here this morning as he is helping Randy with tearing out the single wide section of the mobile. Randy has a major project going enclosing the house and creating a new one.

Randy took Hensley (Amanda's 4 year old) to church on the pony cart yesterday, pulled by the miniature, Navajo. (Chief. is away at the Amish farm being trained to obey cart commands and to be ridden.)  The route to church contains some serious hills. You should see that little guy pull that cart up those hills. He was rarin' to go home when we left church and he trotted and ran those hills. The miniature horses may look dainty, but they are very strong.

Gotta get back to you later. Rose and Marla are waiting for me by the door... Wal-mart calls.