Toolbox For Faith

Eula Rae, our oldest member, will turn 98 in less than two months. She lives by herself but loves for people to visit with her, especially her pastor. She has been through, in her words, “the most difficult time in my life” over the past two months due to the death of her only daughter.

Last week, I traveled the two plus blocks from the church to see Eula Rae and found her sitting on her porch behind her beautiful, blooming azaleas. As I walked up, she recognized me and got up from the glider where she was sitting. She asked me to come into her house but I suggested that we sit on the porch on the glider since it was such a magnificent day. “Oh, no,” she replied, “I need to entertain the pastor in my living room.”

I smiled and told her that I was fine on the porch so we stayed. I probably should have gone into the living room because she was constantly checking to make sure the glider was not too hard while telling me that we could still go into the living room.

Visiting Eula Rae is always a great experience as she shares wonderful stories with an even more exceptional outlook. I have discovered that if I need a lift, I visit Eula Rae and I feel better for at least a week afterwards. Even in the midst of death, she radiates hope. God’s world needs more Eula Rae’s.

Several years ago, St. Michael added the ability to receive online donations to our website. At the time, we were one of the few congregations I could find with an integrated donation section on our site. Over time, we have developed a small, but significant percentage of the congregation which makes use of this online giving option. In addition, we have several people who make donations through their online banking services. During an average week, we receive between 10% and 20% of our weekly offerings through online giving.

For years, congregations have tried to make it easier for people to give - offering plates, coin boxes, offering envelopes, and mailed offering envelopes. Since many people are paid electronically and pay all of their bills electronically, I seems reasonable to assume that the percentage of people giving electronically will continue to increase. If congregations want to continue to make it easy for people to support their ministry, then before long, an online giving option will probably be a necessity for most congregations.

My good friend, Gary LaCroix who is pastor of Christ Lutheran Church in Cape Coral, Florida, was hospitalized on February 27 and underwent major surgery a few days later. Last Sunday was the first time since his hospitalization that Gary was able to preach and lead worship. As he stood to make the announcements but before he could say anything, the congregation stood and applauded. Gary was overwhelmed! The joyous welcome back was a magnificent reinforcement of his ministry.

As Gary described what had happened, I kept thinking that we in the church do not thank people enough. We need to thank them and thank them again both informally and formally.

Informally, we can develop a life style that reflects our thankfulness that comes from God’s grace. I still remember the tears on the face of the head usher as I was leaving the church where he had served in that position for over 30 years. He grabbed my hand, then gave me a big hug and told me, “You were the only person to ever thank me for doing my job. That meant so much to me.”

Formally, we sometimes run into barriers because we do not want to leave anyone out and because we feel we are only doing what we should be doing. Don’t be afraid of leaving someone out so go ahead and list the names of all the people. If you leave someone out, list them next week. Even though we are doing what we feel we are called to do, we can still thank people for their ministry. A great example is the church where Pastor John, the other writer on this blog, thanks people in such a dynamic way by using a thank note with photos enclosed in the annual giving report sent to each person and by writing a thank you on their fund summary information (see his January 18 post for examples).

I love the way that Paul begins several of his epistles by saying, “I give thanks to God for all of you…” Like Paul, we need to thank people again and again. The standing ovation for Gary needs to be repeated in words and actions by all of us every day and by our churches as often as possible.

Some sermons and Sunday School lessons stick with people for a lifetime, while others are forgotten almost as the words are spoken. Chip and Dan Heath in their book, “Made to Stick,” explore the reasons why some ideas are sticky and others are not. The book offers a model for how you can make your ideas (read sermons and teaching) more engaging and more memorable. I have tried using a few of their six principles in my writing and speaking and they work. The six principles are known as the SUCCESs model: Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional and Stories. The book is wonderful and their website contains lots of free helpful resources.

For pastors and their spouses, the week or two after Easter is a wonderful time to take time off for re-creation after all the Lenten, Holy Week and Easter services. We waited a week before heading off for a few days to Williamsburg. One of our favorite adventures while there was a musical and historical presentation at one museum about hymns.

What intrigued me most was the observation that the hymns were not originally written for a specific tune but most could be sung to a variety of tunes. That is why in so many of the older hymnals, no music was included but only words. We sang “Amazing Grace” to one of the original tunes to which it was paired because the one with which we are all familiar was composed over 50 years after the words were penned by John Newton.

The other interesting observation was how the hymn composers of the pre-colonial era used familiar tunes when they did set the words to a specific melody. The story was shared of how John Wesley and his Method Club members were meeting in a room over a tavern when three sailors decided to interrupt the meeting by singing a bawdy sailing song. The next night, Wesley’s group was meeting again when the sailors came by and to the amazement of the sailors, they heard the same tune that they had been singing the night before set to Christian words that Wesley had written after the meeting the evening before. Wesley ended up composing over 6000 hymns.

Afterwards, I kept thinking of how much fun we had learning things that we didn’t know.

We talk often about what it looks like to live as God’s people in the world. Pastor Michael Foss in his book, “Real Faith for Real Life,” gives helpful suggestions for living out six marks of discipleship. He identifies these marks of discipleship as: Daily Prayer, Weekly Worship, Daily Bible Reading, Serving, Nurturing Relationships and Generous Giving. He offers helpful suggestions for integrating these marks of discipleship into your personal life and into the life of the congregation. At St. Michael, I taught a series we called “Wordshops” on each of these marks. The summaries and questions I used for the classes are available at St. Michael’s website on the Marks of Discipleship page.

With great fear and trepidation, I emptied the contents of the very large box labeled “utility dump cart” with the added note “assembly required” on the garage floor last Monday. I have been traumatized for life by “assembly required” boxes. I remember the utility building I put together for my mother. I put in 641 screws—not counting the over 200 I put in the wrong place and then removed—and this was before electric screwdrivers. And then there was the first swing set I assembled. It said “5 minute frame” on the outside but I discovered that even Superman could not have put it together in five minutes. And then there were the directions for the swing set. They included instructions for 9 different sets, none of which were the one we purchased, and were written by someone who had English as a very distant second language.

With shaking hands, I pulled the instructions from the heap of parts and started reading. These instructions had special rubrics—written in red—for the assembly challenged people like me. The first read in very large letters, “If you read and follow these instructions, this product can be assembled in 55 minutes or less. If you don’t read these instructions, assembly may take over two hours!” Simple and to the point which made sense to me. Then all the parts you were assembling in each stage were highlighted in red. Even with a break to get a large ice tea on the 90 degree, record high day and with another break to talk to my neighbor and corral one of our cats for the neighbor girls to pet, I finished in a personal best, amazing one hour and ten minutes.

As I reflected on the experience, Ken Callahan’s words came to me, “Give just enough help to be helpful!” The instructions did that. It is a wonderful lesson for life. Always give just enough help to be helpful. If we give too much help, we create a dependency relationship that is never helpful. That is a hard lesson to learn but my congratulations to Sears—you did it right this time. The instructions were easy to follow and made sense. I am still traumatized but I have hope.

I once heard a speaker describe the coming thirty years as a period of “mass aging”. There will be more senior adults than ever before and therefore we will have increased opportunities for ministry with senior adults. While there are countless wonderful ministry opportunities out there, we are considering applying for a grant from the Brookdale Foundation, to start a social respite program to assist families dealing with dementia. A social respite program provides free time for caregivers and social interaction for participants. Since social respite is designed for people in the early stages of memory loss, it is not a medical program and is therefore much easier to set-up and operate at a church. In my experience, social respite programs can provide a wonderful ministry to families who often struggle silently in the community. You can learn more about the social respite model and the Brookdale Foundation at their website.

Logan is a five year old member who enjoys coming to church and especially enjoys giving the pastor a big high five. At our congregation, we have open communion and Logan takes communion.

About six weeks ago when Logan came forward for communion, he did something different that mortified his mother. After I gave him the wafer saying, “The body of Christ given for you,” Logan reached up, gave me a high five and said, “Yeah!” I loved it but tried not to laugh as I moved to the next person, his mother, and saw her eyes squeezed shut as she clinched her hands. I knew what she was thinking—Am I going to survive this child?

Mom and Logan had a long talk after the service with him promising not to give me a high five during communion but, of course, being a typical five year old, he forgot. The next Sunday as he came to receive the bread, I was anxious to see what would happen. As soon as he received the bread, he gave me another high five but must have remembered the conversation with his mother so he gave me a very reserved “Yeah!” His mother, right behind him, nearly collapsed.

Now, I get a high five before and after worship but that was the last high five he has given me after receiving the bread. But we have reached an understanding. Now he looks ups and smiles when he receives the bread.. I know the smile indicates that I will get my communion high five and “Yeah” after the service.