Of Cottage Meetings and Prayer Vigils

I want to thank everyone who was able to come to one of the cottage meetings that were held a few weeks ago.  We had great conversations and input. I hope and pray that people left each meeting with an awareness of our current financial and volunteer needs as well as a great sense of hope that Christ Lutheran Church and Preschool is a valuable asset to this community and to the Church of Jesus Christ. Together, I am confident that the ministries of Christ Lutheran will continue to change people’s lives near and far.

It was our hope that people would take the information gathered at the cottage meetings to the Lord in prayer, whether during the prayer vigil or during one’s own time of prayer.  If you would like to share with either of the pastors or council representatives how God spoke to you during the prayer vigil, please contact one of us. A word from the Lord is definitely worth discussing!

For those who responded to God’s call by donating their time, talent, or treasures—we are so very grateful.  Financial donations will allow us to proceed with finalizing the purchase of a new digital organ system, new furnaces, and to complete the playground. Thank you so very much to those who were able to help our dreams of a new organ and playground become reality. Please watch for further details about these in the near future.

We are still in need of people to step into leadership roles on the church council or to help with ministry needs, especially to keep our building and grounds looking beautiful. Please prayerfully consider helping out where you can. Check the bulletin board across from the mailboxes for details.

Again, thank you for taking the time to come to a cottage meeting and to enter into prayer on behalf of our ministries and for the future of Christ Lutheran Church and Preschool.  You are a blessing!

Yours in Christ,

Pastor Sue Beadle Lead Pastor

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say Rejoice.  Let your gentleness be known to everyone.  The Lord is near.  Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.  And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (Philippians 4: 4-7)

Every week we pray the Lord’s Prayer. It’s a familiar prayer and many people can pray it from memory. Sometimes that’s not such a good thing, because then the words become commonplace as they roll off our tongues with ease.

One of the phrases we pray is “Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” I wonder if we really mean that. Do we truly want to seek and follow God’s will for our lives and for the life of our congregation? I would guess that most of us would say that we do want to follow God’s will—as long as it doesn’t require too big of a change or too much of a sacrifice.

We are also uncertain of how to discern between our will and God’s will. How can we recognize God’s voice and promptings as opposed to our personal desires and goals? And are they always different?

Author David Benner writes, “Surrendering to God’s will makes little sense if we are not first convinced of the depths of God’s love for us. But surrender is far from complete and we have yet to unwrap the gift of our true-self-in-Christ until we are fully convinced of the absolute trustworthiness of God’s will” (from Desiring God’s Will: Aligning Our Hearts with the Heart of God).

The leadership of Christ Lutheran Church will be holding a series of Cottage Meetings the third week of April (see times and dates in newsletter). We will be gathering as a community of faith to discern God’s will for our congregation and ministries. As you prepare your hearts and minds to attend one of the meetings, please think about these two questions: Are you convinced of the depths of God’s love for us? Are you convinced of the absolute trustworthiness of God’s will for us?

I will be preaching a two-part series on April 14th and 28th about the process and gift of discernment, including how to listen for God’s voice in the midst of many voices vying for our attention. As a community of faith, it is my hope that we can honestly pray, “Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

Yours in Christ,

Pastor Sue Beadle Lead Pastor

I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God-what is good and acceptable and perfect. (Romans 12:1-2)

Please join us for an informational meeting on Sunday, April 14th at 9:30a.m. about the study of Sacred Rhythms. You will want to take this opportunity to grow in your relationship with God and one another. Please contact me with any questions.

Yours in Christ,

Pastor Sue Beadle

Dear Friends in Christ,
It is always good to gather together as a community of faith to give thanks to God for all He has done in us and through us. We also need to discern God’s will for us in this new year. As is custom for this congregation, we gather twice a year: once in February (usually) and once in June.

For our meeting on February 10th, I asked those in attendance at our January 27th worship
service to do 2 things:

1. Write down one dream or hope you have for Christ Lutheran Church
2. Write down one way you can help make that hope or dream a reality. Annual meetings are critical times for us to be together in order that we know where we stand financially—no browbeating, I promise! It is also important for us to know where we stand in relation to the mission and ministry God has called us to.

Please let your voice be heard—it is invaluable. Please let your hopes and dreams be heard—God speaks through each person. Please let your gifts and talents be a witness to the gospel of Jesus, who came to give life and to give it abundantly.

“When Jesus came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up, He went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day, as was His custom. He stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to Him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because He has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

Luke 4: 16-19

How is God calling Christ Lutheran Church to bring the good news in 2013?

Yours in Christ,
Pastor Sue Beadle

As many of you know, I started a Doctor of Ministry in Spiritual Transformation program last year at Northern Baptist Theological Seminary in Lombard, Illinois. I have been taking classes throughout the year, led by Dr. Ruth Haley Barton, a renowned author and spiritual director. These classes in spiritual transformation have indeed been transforming for me.

In February of 2013, the classes that start the dissertation process are scheduled to begin. But the closer the time came for me to start preparing for that class, the less passion and interest I felt. I have spent a lot of time discerning God’s will for me, my academic future, and the needs of the congregation. After much prayer, I have decided to withdraw from the Doctor of Ministry program and instead, to pursue the Master’s Specialization in Spiritual Transformation degree. This will allow me to remain engaged at the academic level, which has been very helpful for me. I can always apply the Master’s Specialization toward a Doctor of Ministry later on.

What I feel God is calling me to right now is to also be involved in Dr. Barton’s newest
community called, “Leading a Transforming Church.” These meetings/retreats are very  similar to the ones I currently attend for spiritual transformation, but they are geared toward how I, as your lead pastor, can bring spiritual transformation to the people of Christ Lutheran Church.

This means that I will be doubling up on the classes/retreats that I attend, lead by Dr. Barton. My last retreat for the Master’s Specialization in spiritual transformation is July 2013. But the retreats for the “Leading a Transforming Church will go until September 2014.

I am excited about this new path and what it could mean for Christ Lutheran. It’s an unknown path and I’m not really fond of the unknown, but I trust that God is leading us and as long as God is leading us and we are following Him, amazing things will happen!
Thank you for your prayers and support. I am blessed by you.

Yours in Christ,
Pastor Sue Beadle

“For surely I know the plans I have for you, “says the Lord, “plans for your welfare and not harm, to give you a future with hope.” (Jeremiah 29:11)

I was born and raised in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. I graduated from Oak Creek High School (never mind what year).

On my way up to the Wisconsin State Fair in August, I learned about the tragic shooting and murders of six people at the Sikh Temple in Oak Creek. The Temple was not there when I was growing up, but I knew exactly where the news reporters were talking about.

How odd to come home that night, turn on the national news and see places and people so familiar to me. It was all very surreal to me—that was where I grew up. Oak Creek was a semi-rural community with plenty of farmland, a Dairy Queen and a couple of grocery stores; a bowling alley and plenty of bars.

To think that the blood of innocent people has soaked into the soil of my hometown sends chills down my spine. The worshippers at the Temple were gathering to do what you and I do every Sunday morning—come together as a community to honor and worship God. Such a sacred time was shattered by the hatred, violence, and intolerance of one person. My hometown will never be the same. In fact, I don’t think the world will ever be the same either.

We are seeing more and more violence in our country. In fact, we were still grieving the tragic killing of people in a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado when the news broke about my hometown. When will this stop?

What can we do? Without getting into a debate about the right to bear arms, or the violence in our media today—how about we focus on what we are teaching our children and grandchildren. How about we look at what we are doing and what our families are doing and pledge to live more peacefully and more tolerantly than before. How about we look at the morals and values our children are learning. They may or may not be learning those values and morals from their own parents or grandparents. They may not be learning them from their pastors or church community, but they are learning those values and morals from someone. Who is influencing your children? Don’t assume it’s who you think it is. Hatred, discrimination, violence are learned behaviors. Who’s teaching them?

“Garbage in; garbage out.” This is not someone else’s problem in some other part of the world. This problem does not belong to the poor, unemployed, people of color, immigrants, drug dealers, or drug addicts. This problem belongs to each of us. Bullets don’t have names on them. They don’t discriminate and don’t care what race, age, IQ, social class or anything else we use to separate us from the problems “out there.”

We can’t pretend the problems are “out there.” But we can raise our children and grandchildren in the peace and love of our Christian faith. Do our kids really know Jesus? Or do they only know about Jesus. There’s a big difference between the two. Let’s work together to raise strong, faith filled, loving children and grandchildren.

“Jesus in; Jesus out.”

For those of you who were in church on the Day of Pentecost (May 27th), you already heard what I’m going to write on. But, since that was also Memorial Day weekend, I know there were a lot of people out of town. That being said, I want to write this article about something that is quite disturbing to me—and I hope to you as well.

Down in North Carolina, the controversial topic of same-sex relationships has reached an unbelievably intolerable level—fueled, I’m angered to say, by a few pastors. One in particular made headlines for his ignorant, hate-filled sermon that he preached on Mother’s Day to his Southern Baptist congregation. It went viral on YouTube. He told the people that he had figured out a way to “get rid of all the homosexuals” (I won’t repeat his exact words because I find his language so offensive). He suggested that someone build a fence 100 miles by 50 miles and electrify it so they can’t get out. Women (not the word he used) behind one fence; men (also not the word he used) behind another. Drop some food down for them and then wait for them to die out. He preached this in the name of God as if he were speaking God’s truth. As he was preaching, you could hear the people in the congregation agreeing with him.

My friends in Christ, regardless of how you feel about this controversial subject or any other controversial subject—Jesus never ever preached that kind of hatred—anywhere at anytime. And neither should we. There will always be issues that divide the people of God. Where you stand on those issues is according to your own conscience. But our language should never, must never be such that it destroys other people because they believe differently, act differently or look differently.

What were the two greatest commandments that Jesus taught His disciples? “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength; and love your neighbor as yourself.” That’s it, my friends. That’s what we need to remember. May you have the courage, integrity, and faith to live those words of love to everyone you meet— even those you disagree with; even those you don’t like; even those you don’t think deserve God’s love.

I wonder if there’s people out there who think we don’t deserve God’s love. Let’s leave the judging up to God. Share the good news of Jesus and love people to the Lord.

Yours in Christ,
Pastor Sue Beadle

A few weeks ago, I was up at Catholic Retreat Center in Wisconsin writing a paper for my Doctoral program. I love the hermitage there because it overlooks the lake and is right next to the prayer labyrinth. It’s a very peaceful, serene environment and since the hermitage has no TV or internet access, it’s a great place for me to go when a paper is due. No tempting distractions!

While I love the peace and quiet, I can only take just so much of it before I need to go find someone who will converse with me. Since I’ve been to this retreat center three times, I’ve come to know Sister Susan. She’s a feisty, down-to-earth nun and instantly bonded as fellow Packer fans. Whenever we talked, it seemed as though we had known each other for years. Before I left the hermitage a few weeks ago to return home, I stopped in to talk with Sister Susan. I had heard from Rod about the Pope’s decree regarding the Catholic women’s organization needing a representative from Archbishop’s office at their gatherings. I asked Sister Susan what she thought of that and we talked at length about the ramifications for the Roman Catholic Church as well as the climate in general regarding the rights of women in various conservative organizations.

She shared a story with me that was in the national news (I missed it though) about a nun who was a chaplain at a hospital in Texas. She was on the ethics committee that debated and decided to allow the abortion of a nonviable fetus that was endangering the life of the mother. If the mother had not aborted the fetus, both the fetus and mother would have died. If the mother had aborted the fetus, the mother would live. This woman and her husband had other children to care for. In my opinion, which was also the opinion of that ethics committee, the decision was a fairly simple decision to make. Either way, the baby would not have lived. That was a fact established by the doctors. But there was a chance to save the mother’s life, which would allow her and her husband to raise their other children together. The nun I am referring to was excommunicated from the Catholic Church. I find that to be rather disconcerting.

I pray for the Catholic Church and for the thousands of religious women who have given their lives to the service of the church caring for the least and lowliest of God’s people. How ironic that it is these people who are coming under the scrutiny of the church hierarchy.

Sister Susan fears that many women will leave their roles as nuns in the church and live out their life in the secular world, continuing to care for all God’s people but without the heavy hand of those in authority. I pray for my friend, Sister Susan, and for all women in every corner of the Christian Church who are struggling to find their place and to faithfully live out God’s calling. May they listen and follow the voice of their Good Shepherd.

I’ve been thinking a lot about writing this particular newsletter article for at least a year. It’s an article that is easier to write than it is to read and acting on it is even more difficult. I will raise more questions than give answers and some of you might be offended by what I say. I don’t mean to offend anyone, but I do want to ask some questions.

What price are we paying for the horribly busy schedule that we keep? Will you at some point look back on your life and wish you had made different choices?

For families with children involved in theater, music, dance, or sports—what price are you paying for allowing your children’s schedule to keep them (and you) out of church for months on end, sometimes for years? I think we will have a generation who are really good at extracurricular activities, perhaps even great. They will have had many exciting opportunities to travel around the country competing against other great athletes, musicians, and dancers. But at the end of the day, whether that end comes in junior high, high school, college or even sooner, what price will have been paid to have great athletes or musicians or dancers, but who have no relationship with God? No connection with their church family?

What price will we pay because we as a society are not standing up to the various sports associations, dance companies, theater companies—and everything else that is vying for our souls and the souls of our children and grandchildren?

Is God getting the leftovers instead of our first fruits? It concerns me greatly as a pastor and it confuses me even more as a parent. I also caved into the travel sports mentality and saw my daughter miss years of church because of it. Was it worth it? Was it worth seeing the varsity letter on her jacket and listed on her college resume? Would she have gotten accepted to Purdue without it? Would her life have been as fulfilled if she hadn’t had those experiences?

I have no answers to those questions. Just like I have no answer to what I would have wanted to have done as a former athlete growing up. Thank God those opportunities were not available to me back then, because I would have wanted to have taken every travel sport opportunity I could.

But that’s not the way the world turns anymore.

So as you can see, I have more questions than answers; more challenges than courage to stand up to the “powers that be” by myself. What good would it do anyway, right?

I guess we will just keep on paying the price. May God help us all.

“Train up your children in the ways they should go and when they are old, they will not depart from it.” (Proverbs 22:6)

“Let the children come to me and do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the Kingdom of God belongs.’’
(Mark 10: 14b)

Yours in Christ,
Pastor Sue Beadle

A few weeks ago, when I preached on the prophet Jonah, I remarked at how much I love that story. Not long after that, I was looking through some Lent worship resources and was thrilled to see an entire Lenten series based on the story of Jonah! Pastor Sue Ellen agreed that it would be a neat mid-week Lenten series.

Ash Wednesday begins on Wednesday, February 22nd. Our worship service at 7:00 p.m. will include the distribution of ashes, a special children’s sermon (hiding the Alleluias), and celebration of Holy Communion. During all other Wednesdays of Lent we will gather at 6:00 p.m. for a soup supper, followed by worship at 7:00 p.m. The services will not include Communion and should be around 45 minutes long.

The theme for each week is:
Ash Wednesday: God is Calling
2nd Wednesday: Saved in the Storm
3rd Wednesday: Our Providing God
4th Wednesday: Praying from the Belly of the Great Fish
5th Wednesday: The God of the Second Chance
6th Wednesday: About Face

As people who live in a chaotic, stressful world, why not take an hour of your Wednesday evening to settle into the love and grace of God and to be surrounded by others who are also on a journey of faith. We’ve all been in the belly of a Great Fish. Some of you are there right now. Come and hear the good news and worship the God of the Second Chance.

Yours in Christ,
Pastor Sue Beadle

And the people of Nineveh believed God; they
proclaimed a fast, and everyone, great and small, put on
sackcloth. When the news reached the king of Nineveh,
he rose from his throne, removed his robe, covered
himself with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.
(Jonah 3: 5-6)