Mount Olive Lutheran Church

Midweek Lent 2015 + Clay Jars filled with Grace (Paul’s second letter to Corinth)

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Week 5:  “God’s Appeal”

We are not our own people anymore: made a new creation in Christ, reconciled to God, we are now entrusted by God to bear this reconciling treasure that makes us into a new creation, bear it into the world as ambassadors for Christ.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
   Wednesday, 25 March 2015; text: 2 Corinthians 5:14-21

Sisters and brothers in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

It’s hard to speak for another person.

When someone criticizes our loved one, or has an issue with a friend we know well, we want to defend them.  We want to speak for them, act on their behalf.  Sometimes our friend is the one having difficulty with another, and out of love, we want to help.  We’ll talk to another person on their behalf, smooth the way.

It’s just not the easiest thing to do.  Often it’s the difficult situation that we’re not sure what our loved one would want us to say or do.  Or, we can’t always explain another’s motives.  Especially when others criticize someone we love, and the criticism seems valid.  When our heart feels there must be a good reason for the problem, but our head isn’t sure what that is.

So what should we feel about Paul’s words today, that God is entrusting us with the job of “Ambassador for Christ”?  If it’s hard to speak for a loved one, how much harder to speak for God?

The way some other Christians are living into this role of ambassador doesn’t help.  They speak of a God whom we don’t recognize in the Scriptures, who doesn’t seem to be the Triune God whose love faced death for us and the world.  When we’re offended or angered by how others represent Christ, we sometimes fear to be ambassadors ourselves.

There’s no need to fear.  God’s taken care of both the job description and our ability to do it.

Paul reveals a joyful mystery of the treasure of God we bear within us.

Paul’s said we carry this treasure, God’s grace and love and forgiveness for us and the world, in clay jars, in our fragile, broken selves.  Paul’s also said our bodies are a temporary tent compared to the house prepared for us in the coming world.  This is only part of the grace.

Because even now, Paul says, this treasure of God’s reconciling with us and all humanity in Christ’s death and resurrection, is re-making us to be unrecognizable from what we were.  Paul declares we are already transformed into this new creation, now, even with our fragile, clay lives.  Even if we only see our failings, our weakness, in fact the forgiveness and life we already know has changed us.

We may need perspective to see this, a look back at the arc of our lives.  Close up, we see how flawed we are.  But if we climb to a better vantage point, turn around, and look back over the past five years, ten years, twenty years, we could see how the Spirit has transformed each of us into a new person.  With this perspective, we realize Paul’s right: we aren’t looking at each other from a human point of view anymore.  We see Christ in each other; others see Christ in us.

God makes us new so we can carry in our bodies God’s appeal to the world.

The Gospel truth is God needs us.  God’s plan to restore all things in Christ will not happen without humanity being transformed from within.  As people who are being transformed, God needs us to live this reconciliation into the world.

God has entrusted this message to us, Paul says.  The treasure we carry in our hearts and lives is not given to us to keep.  It changes us into new people, people who give the treasure away by our very lives in the world, so it reaches everyone.  Only by sharing it can it change the world.

This transforms evangelism for us.

We are made new creations so we can be ambassadors for Christ, not sales people.  An ambassador speaks for the one who sent her, carries messages on behalf of the one in whose name he comes.  Ambassadors stand for their senders.  We represent Christ in the world in our being, in our doing.

So we’re not selling “church” to anyone, or selling God.  Evangelism – “Good Newsing” – isn’t about trying to attract people or increase numbers or convince others only we’re right.

Evangelism is bearing the Good News of God in Christ in our very bodies.  So when people meet us they meet Christ.  We bear forgiving grace so people actually experience it through us.  We bear transforming love so people actually are touched by it when they are with us.  We bear God’s relentless desire for all people to know God and know they are loved, so that people can’t miss it when we are with them.

Really, we’re like Mary.

Today is the feast of the Annunciation, which wasn’t on my mind two months ago when choosing this part of 2 Corinthians for today.  But how wonderful to remember with this word from Paul that today Gabriel came to Mary and invited her to bear God’s Christ into the world.

That is precisely what God is doing to us through Paul.  Except instead of giving birth to a child, we are made into God’s Christ ourselves, so that our lives, our words, our love, our hands, our voices, everything about us bears God’s grace in Christ.

We can do this, be this, because God is making us new so we can.

So we go, filled with joy in our calling.

And all our incentive is with Paul’s words: “the love of Christ urges us on.”  This love we have come to know in Christ not only changes us.  It gets us up in the morning eager to be Christ, motivates us to seek to grow and deepen as disciples, gives us the little bump we need to reach out to another in grace and love rather than hold back.

The love of Christ urges us on.  And gives us all we need for this job.

What a joy and purpose for our lives.  What a delight that God reaches people through us so they, too, know the hope and love and grace we so deeply drink in from God every day.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

The Heart That Matters

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The only thing that matters in the dark places of our hearts and minds is not our nature but God’s, not our heart but God’s.  And God’s heart is incessantly and always love willing to lose all to draw us in.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
   The Fifth Sunday in Lent, year B
   texts:  Jeremiah 31:31-34; Psalm 51:1-12; John 12:20-33

Sisters and brothers in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

What if I’m not worthy of being loved?

What if I’ve not been good enough to be loved?

If people knew the truth about me, would they still love me?

These frightening thoughts are deeply rooted in our hearts.  Even the most confident-looking have inward darkness of unworthiness haunting their outward boldness.  We all want to be loved.  We all need to be loved.  We often find it hard to believe we can be.  And if we are loved, we fear it can be taken away.

Whether we are loved by other people is enough to make us anxious.  As people of faith, even more troubling is the question of God’s love.

This steady talk of God’s covenant promises we’ve heard this Lent raises in us feelings of anxiety, guilt, shame, fear.  We know we are not always what God hopes for us.  We can say God is not our enemy, and God’s law is a good for us, not to be feared.  It is true, God has said so.

That doesn’t mean we easily believe it.

We struggle as if it’s all about us, our failings, our weakness, our unlovability.

There’s truth in that.

If we fear there are things in our heart others find unlovable, things God doesn’t want to see, it’s because we know it’s true.  We can’t easily look into the heart of another; we have to live with our own hearts, and we know them, we know the flaws.  It’s not outlandish to fear we’re not worthy, not good enough.

As to God, we’ve made centuries of theology describing how broken we are, how sinful, how our human nature is warped.  We talk about our relationship to God most often from the perspective of how messed up we are.  As if there’s only one nature that matters, our human nature, which is no good.  As if there’s only one heart that matters, our human heart, which is turned away from God.

Our problem isn’t that we don’t know the truth about ourselves, our failings.

Our problem is we’re often forgetting a deeper truth, the only one that matters.

The Scriptures tell us about the nature of God, about God’s heart, as if that’s what’s important.

Our readings today aren’t about our unfaithfulness; they’re about God’s intractable love.  Jeremiah’s people are in exile, their homeland destroyed, their hope in tatters.  From the words of their prophets to the knowledge in their own hearts, these people know they failed God.  They know they were unfaithful to God’s covenant promises, their sinfulness led to their downfall.

But Jeremiah declares an astonishing truth: The LORD, the God of Israel, can’t let go of them.  Yes, God kept every covenant God made with them and they broke every one.  It’s true.  They were and are unfaithful to God, not living as God dreamed and hoped.

None of that matters, Jeremiah says.  God still wants to create a relationship of love with them.  God’s going to try a new covenant.  God says, I won’t write this one on stone or scroll, but on my people’s hearts.  They will know me and love me, and know and love each other, from the least to the greatest.

This is the stunning revelation of Jeremiah: The only thing that matters about human sinfulness, about your brokenness, about our unfaithfulness is one thing: the God who made all things loves you, loves us, with an incessant, unexplainable love.  The heart of God is irrevocably turned toward you, toward us.

Hear this again: God loves you completely and eternally, no exceptions.

We often say, “God loves you anyway.”  “God loves you in spite of your sin.”  “God loves you even though you are a failure.”  We are doing God’s love a great injustice.

Jeremiah says, “God loves you.  Period.  End of sentence.”  No “anyway”s, no “in spite of”s.  But, . . . we sputter, what about all that bad inside us, what we regret, fear, are ashamed of, what about our sinful human nature?

Jeremiah says, You’re not listening.  God loves you.  And that’s that.  There’s nothing you can do about it.  You are worthy because God says so.  You are good enough because God thinks so.

This is made abundantly clear in God’s final statement: “I will forgive their iniquity and remember their sin no more.”  For the first time God builds into a divine agreement the promise of forgiveness and forgetfulness.

This is not Sinai, where God saved the people and said, “Now, here’s how you will live.”  This is not Abraham and Sarah, where God promised land and blessing and family, and said, “Now, follow me and be faithful.”

Here God says, I will make a covenant relationship with you and I will change your hearts.  And built into my part of the bargain is my forgiveness and my forgetfulness.  Before you even think about failing, I promise to forgive you.  That’s what God’s love truly is.

God wants this to be so clear it’s tattooed on our hearts.

The new heart David asked for is what God now promises.  This heart will be marked with the love of God, “I love you eternally” written on every surface.  Forgiveness from God isn’t about avoiding punishment.  Forgiveness from God transforms us, gives us heart transplants, makes us new.

Now we are closer to Jesus’ mystery today.  “When I am lifted up, I will draw all people to myself,” says the One who is God-with-us.  Once again, the only heart that matters is the heart of God that will not rest until all people are drawn in.  But God will have to die, be “lifted up,” to make it happen.  God’s heart of love will break in order to break ours and begin to make ours new.

This willingness to lose everything for love of us is at the center of this new covenant first promised in Jeremiah and now fulfilled in Jesus: if the loving relationship comes with a guarantee of constant forgiveness, it will cost God dearly to keep that promise.

In God’s willingness to die out of love for us, we find our path.

God says, “Follow me into this loss.”  Like a seed that must die when it is planted before it can become what it is meant to be, getting this new heart will be death for us.

But everything that will die is what we want gone: all our deepest wrongs, all those things in our heart we don’t want known, all our failings, all our stubborn resistance, all these die away when we are drawn into God’s love.  Shame, fear, guilt, anxiety, they die, too.  They’re tossed away, the shell of the old seed that gets discarded while the new growth comes forth.

The new heart made in us will be like God’s, willing to break for love of others, willing to begin and end with love and forgiveness, no matter what.  The only way we get to that kind of heart is this path God’s heart makes possible for us.

Sometimes the truth that really matters isn’t the one we fear, no matter how true it is.

The only truth that can save us is the relentless, obsessive love of God for us and for the world.  God’s is the only heart, the only love, strong enough to change our own hearts.

We will soon see at the cross how much it costs God.  We begin to see in our own lives what it costs us to be so changed in heart.  But today we rejoice that such unbreakable love is ours, always, and cannot be taken away, not even by those things we think only we know about.

God loves you.  Period.  End of sentence.  And you will never be the same for it.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

The Heart That Matters

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The only thing that matters in the dark places of our hearts and minds is not our nature but God’s, not our heart but God’s.  And God’s heart is incessantly and always love willing to lose all to draw us in.

Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
   The Fifth Sunday in Lent, year B
   texts:  Jeremiah 31:31-34; Psalm 51:1-12; John 12:20-33

Sisters and brothers in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen

What if I’m not worthy of being loved?

What if I’ve not been good enough to be loved?

If people knew the truth about me, would they still love me?

These frightening thoughts are deeply rooted in our hearts.  Even the most confident-looking have inward darkness of unworthiness haunting their outward boldness.  We all want to be loved.  We all need to be loved.  We often find it hard to believe we can be.  And if we are loved, we fear it can be taken away.

Whether we are loved by other people is enough to make us anxious.  As people of faith, even more troubling is the question of God’s love.

This steady talk of God’s covenant promises we’ve heard this Lent raises in us feelings of anxiety, guilt, shame, fear.  We know we are not always what God hopes for us.  We can say God is not our enemy, and God’s law is a good for us, not to be feared.  It is true, God has said so.

That doesn’t mean we easily believe it.

We struggle as if it’s all about us, our failings, our weakness, our unlovability.

There’s truth in that.

If we fear there are things in our heart others find unlovable, things God doesn’t want to see, it’s because we know it’s true.  We can’t easily look into the heart of another; we have to live with our own hearts, and we know them, we know the flaws.  It’s not outlandish to fear we’re not worthy, not good enough.

As to God, we’ve made centuries of theology describing how broken we are, how sinful, how our human nature is warped.  We talk about our relationship to God most often from the perspective of how messed up we are.  As if there’s only one nature that matters, our human nature, which is no good.  As if there’s only one heart that matters, our human heart, which is turned away from God.

Our problem isn’t that we don’t know the truth about ourselves, our failings.

Our problem is we’re often forgetting a deeper truth, the only one that matters.

The Scriptures tell us about the nature of God, about God’s heart, as if that’s what’s important.

Our readings today aren’t about our unfaithfulness; they’re about God’s intractable love.  Jeremiah’s people are in exile, their homeland destroyed, their hope in tatters.  From the words of their prophets to the knowledge in their own hearts, these people know they failed God.  They know they were unfaithful to God’s covenant promises, their sinfulness led to their downfall.

But Jeremiah declares an astonishing truth: The LORD, the God of Israel, can’t let go of them.  Yes, God kept every covenant God made with them and they broke every one.  It’s true.  They were and are unfaithful to God, not living as God dreamed and hoped.

None of that matters, Jeremiah says.  God still wants to create a relationship of love with them.  God’s going to try a new covenant.  God says, I won’t write this one on stone or scroll, but on my people’s hearts.  They will know me and love me, and know and love each other, from the least to the greatest.

This is the stunning revelation of Jeremiah: The only thing that matters about human sinfulness, about your brokenness, about our unfaithfulness is one thing: the God who made all things loves you, loves us, with an incessant, unexplainable love.  The heart of God is irrevocably turned toward you, toward us.

Hear this again: God loves you completely and eternally, no exceptions.

We often say, “God loves you anyway.”  “God loves you in spite of your sin.”  “God loves you even though you are a failure.”  We are doing God’s love a great injustice.

Jeremiah says, “God loves you.  Period.  End of sentence.”  No “anyway”s, no “in spite of”s.  But, . . . we sputter, what about all that bad inside us, what we regret, fear, are ashamed of, what about our sinful human nature?

Jeremiah says, You’re not listening.  God loves you.  And that’s that.  There’s nothing you can do about it.  You are worthy because God says so.  You are good enough because God thinks so.

This is made abundantly clear in God’s final statement: “I will forgive their iniquity and remember their sin no more.”  For the first time God builds into a divine agreement the promise of forgiveness and forgetfulness.

This is not Sinai, where God saved the people and said, “Now, here’s how you will live.”  This is not Abraham and Sarah, where God promised land and blessing and family, and said, “Now, follow me and be faithful.”

Here God says, I will make a covenant relationship with you and I will change your hearts.  And built into my part of the bargain is my forgiveness and my forgetfulness.  Before you even think about failing, I promise to forgive you.  That’s what God’s love truly is.

God wants this to be so clear it’s tattooed on our hearts.

The new heart David asked for is what God now promises.  This heart will be marked with the love of God, “I love you eternally” written on every surface.  Forgiveness from God isn’t about avoiding punishment.  Forgiveness from God transforms us, gives us heart transplants, makes us new.

Now we are closer to Jesus’ mystery today.  “When I am lifted up, I will draw all people to myself,” says the One who is God-with-us.  Once again, the only heart that matters is the heart of God that will not rest until all people are drawn in.  But God will have to die, be “lifted up,” to make it happen.  God’s heart of love will break in order to break ours and begin to make ours new.

This willingness to lose everything for love of us is at the center of this new covenant first promised in Jeremiah and now fulfilled in Jesus: if the loving relationship comes with a guarantee of constant forgiveness, it will cost God dearly to keep that promise.

In God’s willingness to die out of love for us, we find our path.

God says, “Follow me into this loss.”  Like a seed that must die when it is planted before it can become what it is meant to be, getting this new heart will be death for us.

But everything that will die is what we want gone: all our deepest wrongs, all those things in our heart we don’t want known, all our failings, all our stubborn resistance, all these die away when we are drawn into God’s love.  Shame, fear, guilt, anxiety, they die, too.  They’re tossed away, the shell of the old seed that gets discarded while the new growth comes forth.

The new heart made in us will be like God’s, willing to break for love of others, willing to begin and end with love and forgiveness, no matter what.  The only way we get to that kind of heart is this path God’s heart makes possible for us.

Sometimes the truth that really matters isn’t the one we fear, no matter how true it is.

The only truth that can save us is the relentless, obsessive love of God for us and for the world.  God’s is the only heart, the only love, strong enough to change our own hearts.

We will soon see at the cross how much it costs God.  We begin to see in our own lives what it costs us to be so changed in heart.  But today we rejoice that such unbreakable love is ours, always, and cannot be taken away, not even by those things we think only we know about.

God loves you.  Period.  End of sentence.  And you will never be the same for it.

In the name of Jesus.  Amen

The Olive Branch, 3/18/15

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Accent on Worship

      Toward the end of winter, I always yearn for renewal, and this year is no exception. Learning and changing takes a lot of energy, and winter demands enough as it is, just to stay warm! The infusion of spring we have had this week has been very welcome, indeed. I have been soaking in the longer days and warmer temperatures, reveling in the freedom of leaving my coat at home. Our cats sense it, too, and beg for a chance to be outside anytime we are close to the door.

     And as I walked around our yard this week, I saw them . . . buds coming out on every branch of the tree we planted last summer! Nothing symbolizes the coming of spring like buds, and this proof that our new tree had made it through its first winter somehow seemed to carry extra promise. The grain that fell to the ground and died is now bearing fruit. The world is being renewed, before our very eyes!

The process of rebirth that we witness every spring is a tangible reminder of the faithfulness of God. The weariness and grief and suffering and death of Jesus was followed by resurrection, and new life. Our own experiences of weariness and grief and suffering and death are always followed by resurrection, and new life. And as I have passed the midpoint of my time with you—the hump, if you will—I have been filled with gratitude for the Mount Olive community, and with energy for the remaining months of my internship.

     The miracle of spring is that trees and bushes and flowers don’t simply come back the way they were before winter stripped them of last year’s green. God’s promise is not just life, but abundant life, one that bears fruit! The bushes grow bigger, the trees more full with leaves, and seeds burst into new life wherever they are planted. Spring is coming! What fruit are you preparing to bear?

– Vicar Meagan McLaughlin

Sunday Readings

March 22, 2015: Fifth Sunday in Lent
Jeremiah 31:31-34
Psalm 51:1-12
Hebrews 5:5-10
John 12:20-33

March 29, 2015: Sunday of the Passion
Isaiah 50:4-9a
Psalm 31:9-16
Philippians 2:5-11
Mark 14:1—15:47

Sunday’s Adult Forum: March 1-22, 2015:
Scholar-in-Residence, Dr. Craig Koester, on the book of Revelation.

Can You Help? 

     Mount Olive’s Congregational Care Committee wants to help what has been a “naturally occurring experience” become more inclusive and available to all of its members. The goal is to increase awareness and responsiveness to needs such as:

• A new baby in the family. (A few starter meals can ease the adjustment.)
• A spouse suddenly alone. (A meal, coffee or lunch out, and/or companionship can ease the loneliness.)
• An unexpected illness in the family. (Meals to drop off or share can provide a needed break for caregivers.)
• The loss of job and income. (Meals, a listening ear, and supportive conversation may help lessen feelings of discouragement.)
• A single person experiencing a significant life change. (Help with meals, transportation, etc. can support continued independence.)

     How will this work? The hope is to develop a list of people who would be willing to bring a meal, take someone out for lunch, and to participate in the sharing of food and conversation. Think about it! The opportunities are wide open.

     Can you help? Please call or email Marilyn Gebauer (phone: 612-306-8872, email: gebauevm@bitstream.net).

Book Discussion Group Update

For the April 11 meeting, the group will read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain; and for May 9, The Boat of Longing, by O. E. Rølvaag.

Paschal Garden

     Volunteers will be on hand for the next two Sundays (March 22 and 29) before, between, and following the liturgies to receive your donations to purchase Easter flowers for this year’s Paschal Garden.

Midweek Lenten Worship, Wednesdays during Lent
Holy Eucharist, at noon
Evening Prayer at 7 pm

Final Vestry Listening to be Held This Sunday

     Vestry Listening sessions conclude this Sunday, March 22. This is an opportunity for the congregation to discuss the Vision Expression statements introduced earlier this month.

     This week’s focus will be on Education.  Following both the first and second liturgies, Education Committee Director, John Holtmeier, will be available in the East Assembly room to hear your ideas on the work of his committee.

     Grab your coffee and join the small group to talk. Each session will last 30-45 minutes, and you may move in and out as you wish.

March is Minnesota FoodShare Month!

     Donate cash or groceries to the local food shelf during Minnesota FoodShare month in March!

     A donation of money more than doubles the amount of food available to food shelves, because food shelves can purchase food at discounted prices.  If you choose to give in this way, make your check payable to Mount Olive and write Food Shelf on the memo line. If you prefer to donate non-perishable groceries, they may be brought to the grocery cart in the coat room.

Chancel Cleaning Day

     The Mount Olive Altar Guild invites interested persons to participate in the chancel cleaning to prepare for the Easter season. The cleaning will take place on Saturday, March 28, from 9 am – noon. If you would like to help, please contact Steve Pranschke at 612-803-0915 or by email to hspranschke@gmail.com.

     Your helping hands are truly appreciated.  I find it is enjoyable to work alongside one another in preparing our worship space at such a special time. Thanks!

– Steve Pranschke

Holy Week at Mount Olive

Sunday of the Passion/Palm Sunday, Sunday, March 29
Holy Eucharist, 8 & 10:45 am

Monday-Wednesday of Holy Week, March 30-April 1
Daily Prayer at Noon, in the side chapel of the nave

Maundy Thursday, April 2
Holy Eucharist at Noon
Holy Eucharist, with the Washing of Feet, 7:00 p.m.

Good Friday, April 3
Stations of the Cross at Noon
Adoration of the Cross at 7 pm

Holy Saturday, April 4
Great Vigil of Easter, 8:30 pm, followed by a festive reception

The Resurrection of Our Lord, Sunday, April 5
Festival Eucharist at 8 & 10:45 am
Easter Brunch at 9:30 am

Night On the Street

     Night On the Street (NOTS) is coming right up! On Friday, April 17, TRUST Youth will once again participate in helping raise awareness and funds to help alleviate youth homelessness. Sponsored by Beacon Interfaith Housing Collaborative, hundreds of youth from around the Twin Cities will participate in an overnight in the parking lot of Plymouth Congregational Church near Downtown Minneapolis. The youth (and chaperones) will get their own cardboard box to sleep in for the night, have a soup line meal, and learn from former homeless youth and those that help them what can be done to help.

     Donations from Night On the Street go to help fund the interim housing facilities run by Beacon Interfaith. If you would like to help make a difference, you can make a tax deductible donation through April 16. Please make checks payable to “Night On the Street.” You can give your tax deductible donation to Julie or Eric Manuel or leave it in the church office. If you have any questions, please contact Julie or Eric Manuel.

Sabbatical Information: Interim Pastor to Serve

     During Pr. Crippen’s sabbatical (April 6 through July 15), The Rev. Robert Hausman will serve as full-time interim.  He will be covering the normal duties of our pastor, and also supervise Vicar McLaughlin’s next months.  Rev. Hausman was ordained in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod in 1965, holds a master’s and a doctorate from the University of Chicago, and has taught at both the seminary and undergraduate levels.  He most recently served 25 years as pastor of the Lutheran Church of the Resurrection (ELCA) in Roseville.  He has two sons and five grandchildren.  

     When asked about what to include in this biographical sketch, he mentioned his ordination, and then added: “God has called me to tasks both in academia and in parish ministry.  I love the church.  I kind of think that is enough.”    

     He will begin among us on Tuesday, Apr. 7, with his first Sunday being Apr. 12.

News From the Neighborhood
Anna Kingman

Better Halves Workshop

     Register for the Better Halves Workshop! This Saturday, March 21, 9:00- 11:30 am at Mount Olive. This is a financial enrichment workshop for ANY couple that wants to practice talking about money well with their partner.  *Childcare and donuts will be in supply!

     Register at: brighpeakfinancial.com/betterhalves Promo code: mountolive15.

Opportunities to BE Involved

     Check out the information located in front of the main office for more details.

     Needed: Food donation deliverer! Is anyone available and willing to take a load of food to CES at 1900 11th Ave. S.? A drop-off time can be arranged and helping hands to load. Please let Anna K. know.

Spanish phrase:

     Part of sharing in community is understanding one another through language, culture, or experience. As we explore our community and get to know our neighbors, let’s continue with some helpful language lessons:

English: “How can I help you?”
Spanish: “Como le puedo ayudar?” (Coh-mow lay pooh-ay-doh eye-u-dar)

Review: “Do you live in this neighborhood?”
Spanish: “‘Usted vive en este barrio?” (Oo-sted vee-vay ehn es-tay bah-ree-oh)

Mark Your Calendars for the May Day Parade:  Sunday, May 3, 2015!

     The May Day Parade and Festival is produced by In the Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theatre. Since 1975, Heart of the Beast has invited the entire community to participate by brainstorming, organizing, sculpting, sewing, building, painting, and joining in the parade and festival as actors, singers, dancers, musicians, and attendees.

     The May Day Parade and Festival has become a joyous annual rite of spring. More than 2,000 participants, along with amazing puppets and floats, parade down Bloomington Avenue telling a story and creating a moving theatrical performance. Thousands more line the streets to watch the parade and participate in day-long activities. Following the parade, a pageant and tree of life ceremony in Powderhorn Park ushers in the renewal of a new spring season.

     For more information or to get involved check the HOBT website: http://hobt.org/mayday/

Who We Are, Where We Are Map
     Have you “pinned” yourself yet? If not, please do so by letting us know where you live, using the map hanging in the East Assembly room. Instructions are posted by the map – please contribute your pin!

Meeting Our Somali Neighbors Over Rice and Bananas
     This winter, a small group of Mount Olive members met to talk about culture—who we are as individuals, and how we welcome those different from us. We shared experiences that took us out of our comfort zone. Four of us visited Karmel Square Mall with new Somali friends, Abdi and Osman. We looked in shops, saw the Mosque entrance, and went to Abdi and Osman’s preferred coffee shop for sambosa and Somali tea and conversation. We discovered that Osman practices Islam, Abdi does not. They explained the importance of having a male in our group, since we were meeting Somali men. We learned about each other.

     To continue our friendship, we joined Abdi and Osman at Hamdi Somali Restaurant for lunch. We washed hands in nearby sinks, and got our tea from the dispenser on the wall. Osman and Abdi ordered one of everything on the menu, including chicken, and the best fish I’ve had in a restaurant. We had two goat dishes, one roasted and one steamed. Our guides taught us to eat green bananas with rice–wonderful! And then, spaghetti. Yes, spaghetti. Who knew Somalia had spaghetti?

     The conversation was as wonderful as the food. Abdi came to the US in the 1980’s to go to college, before the wars, and lived in Washington DC. Osman and his wife came to Texas as refugees in the 1990’s through the Lutheran Church, and moved to Minnesota, where all eight of their children were born. His children love American food, especially burgers, but Osman eats Somali fare at Hamdi, nearly daily. Two of Osman’s children attend St. Olaf College in Northfield! By sharing food with Osman and Abdi, we were able to share things like how we define success and what cultures we relate to. We discovered that Osman and Abdi disagree about wearing a hijab, and that both of them identify as Minnesotan.

     This experience showed me that we really are more similar than different.

– Julie Manuel

Action Alert

     Sign up now to visit Guatemala and our Common Hope partners. One or two groups will be going. Pick your dates and get in on the action. Leave your name at the office, sign a yellow info sheet or contact Judy Hinck either by email to judyhinck@gmail.com or by calling 612-824-4918. Teams will be set by Easter.

How’s our giving going?

     Our committee’s letter last November outlined some of the reasons our president, Lora Dundek, described our 2015 budget as “challenging,” requiring increased giving totaling some 7%. Among those reasons: increased health-care premiums, paying an interim pastor during Pastor
Crippen’s sabbatical (which starts after Easter), and increasing our support for the work of the ELCA (churchwide and synod) from 3% to 4%—the level at which we continue to fund Missions and Neighborhood Ministries.

     With the first two months of the year behind us, how are we doing? We got off to a strong start, with January giving up 25% from the same month a year earlier. Giving in February showed a more modest 4% over the previous February. Giving for the two months was 14% over the same period a year earlier.

     But it’s still early in the year. Let’s be cautiously optimistic that our giving will remain strong throughout the year. Our treasurer, Kat Campbell-Johnson, reminded the Vestry that January giving was 108% of that month’s expenditures, while February giving was only 81% of that month’s expenses. For now we’re not needing to use our line of credit at the bank, thanks in part to members’ gifts to last year’s campaign (some members are continuing to give), which fully funded our restrictive accounts and left us with a modest but important reserve fund.

     Let’s also keep that word “challenging” in mind as we consider and make our gifts in the months
ahead.

– Donn McLellan, Director of Stewardship

The Olive Branch, 3/18/15

By

Accent on Worship

      Toward the end of winter, I always yearn for renewal, and this year is no exception. Learning and changing takes a lot of energy, and winter demands enough as it is, just to stay warm! The infusion of spring we have had this week has been very welcome, indeed. I have been soaking in the longer days and warmer temperatures, reveling in the freedom of leaving my coat at home. Our cats sense it, too, and beg for a chance to be outside anytime we are close to the door.

     And as I walked around our yard this week, I saw them . . . buds coming out on every branch of the tree we planted last summer! Nothing symbolizes the coming of spring like buds, and this proof that our new tree had made it through its first winter somehow seemed to carry extra promise. The grain that fell to the ground and died is now bearing fruit. The world is being renewed, before our very eyes!

The process of rebirth that we witness every spring is a tangible reminder of the faithfulness of God. The weariness and grief and suffering and death of Jesus was followed by resurrection, and new life. Our own experiences of weariness and grief and suffering and death are always followed by resurrection, and new life. And as I have passed the midpoint of my time with you—the hump, if you will—I have been filled with gratitude for the Mount Olive community, and with energy for the remaining months of my internship.

     The miracle of spring is that trees and bushes and flowers don’t simply come back the way they were before winter stripped them of last year’s green. God’s promise is not just life, but abundant life, one that bears fruit! The bushes grow bigger, the trees more full with leaves, and seeds burst into new life wherever they are planted. Spring is coming! What fruit are you preparing to bear?

– Vicar Meagan McLaughlin

Sunday Readings

March 22, 2015: Fifth Sunday in Lent
Jeremiah 31:31-34
Psalm 51:1-12
Hebrews 5:5-10
John 12:20-33

March 29, 2015: Sunday of the Passion
Isaiah 50:4-9a
Psalm 31:9-16
Philippians 2:5-11
Mark 14:1—15:47

Sunday’s Adult Forum: March 1-22, 2015:
Scholar-in-Residence, Dr. Craig Koester, on the book of Revelation.

Can You Help? 

     Mount Olive’s Congregational Care Committee wants to help what has been a “naturally occurring experience” become more inclusive and available to all of its members. The goal is to increase awareness and responsiveness to needs such as:

• A new baby in the family. (A few starter meals can ease the adjustment.)
• A spouse suddenly alone. (A meal, coffee or lunch out, and/or companionship can ease the loneliness.)
• An unexpected illness in the family. (Meals to drop off or share can provide a needed break for caregivers.)
• The loss of job and income. (Meals, a listening ear, and supportive conversation may help lessen feelings of discouragement.)
• A single person experiencing a significant life change. (Help with meals, transportation, etc. can support continued independence.)

     How will this work? The hope is to develop a list of people who would be willing to bring a meal, take someone out for lunch, and to participate in the sharing of food and conversation. Think about it! The opportunities are wide open.

     Can you help? Please call or email Marilyn Gebauer (phone: 612-306-8872, email: gebauevm@bitstream.net).

Book Discussion Group Update

For the April 11 meeting, the group will read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain; and for May 9, The Boat of Longing, by O. E. Rølvaag.

Paschal Garden

     Volunteers will be on hand for the next two Sundays (March 22 and 29) before, between, and following the liturgies to receive your donations to purchase Easter flowers for this year’s Paschal Garden.

Midweek Lenten Worship, Wednesdays during Lent
Holy Eucharist, at noon
Evening Prayer at 7 pm

Final Vestry Listening to be Held This Sunday

     Vestry Listening sessions conclude this Sunday, March 22. This is an opportunity for the congregation to discuss the Vision Expression statements introduced earlier this month.

     This week’s focus will be on Education.  Following both the first and second liturgies, Education Committee Director, John Holtmeier, will be available in the East Assembly room to hear your ideas on the work of his committee.

     Grab your coffee and join the small group to talk. Each session will last 30-45 minutes, and you may move in and out as you wish.

March is Minnesota FoodShare Month!

     Donate cash or groceries to the local food shelf during Minnesota FoodShare month in March!

     A donation of money more than doubles the amount of food available to food shelves, because food shelves can purchase food at discounted prices.  If you choose to give in this way, make your check payable to Mount Olive and write Food Shelf on the memo line. If you prefer to donate non-perishable groceries, they may be brought to the grocery cart in the coat room.

Chancel Cleaning Day

     The Mount Olive Altar Guild invites interested persons to participate in the chancel cleaning to prepare for the Easter season. The cleaning will take place on Saturday, March 28, from 9 am – noon. If you would like to help, please contact Steve Pranschke at 612-803-0915 or by email to hspranschke@gmail.com.

     Your helping hands are truly appreciated.  I find it is enjoyable to work alongside one another in preparing our worship space at such a special time. Thanks!

– Steve Pranschke

Holy Week at Mount Olive

Sunday of the Passion/Palm Sunday, Sunday, March 29
Holy Eucharist, 8 & 10:45 am

Monday-Wednesday of Holy Week, March 30-April 1
Daily Prayer at Noon, in the side chapel of the nave

Maundy Thursday, April 2
Holy Eucharist at Noon
Holy Eucharist, with the Washing of Feet, 7:00 p.m.

Good Friday, April 3
Stations of the Cross at Noon
Adoration of the Cross at 7 pm

Holy Saturday, April 4
Great Vigil of Easter, 8:30 pm, followed by a festive reception

The Resurrection of Our Lord, Sunday, April 5
Festival Eucharist at 8 & 10:45 am
Easter Brunch at 9:30 am

Night On the Street

     Night On the Street (NOTS) is coming right up! On Friday, April 17, TRUST Youth will once again participate in helping raise awareness and funds to help alleviate youth homelessness. Sponsored by Beacon Interfaith Housing Collaborative, hundreds of youth from around the Twin Cities will participate in an overnight in the parking lot of Plymouth Congregational Church near Downtown Minneapolis. The youth (and chaperones) will get their own cardboard box to sleep in for the night, have a soup line meal, and learn from former homeless youth and those that help them what can be done to help.

     Donations from Night On the Street go to help fund the interim housing facilities run by Beacon Interfaith. If you would like to help make a difference, you can make a tax deductible donation through April 16. Please make checks payable to “Night On the Street.” You can give your tax deductible donation to Julie or Eric Manuel or leave it in the church office. If you have any questions, please contact Julie or Eric Manuel.

Sabbatical Information: Interim Pastor to Serve

     During Pr. Crippen’s sabbatical (April 6 through July 15), The Rev. Robert Hausman will serve as full-time interim.  He will be covering the normal duties of our pastor, and also supervise Vicar McLaughlin’s next months.  Rev. Hausman was ordained in the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod in 1965, holds a master’s and a doctorate from the University of Chicago, and has taught at both the seminary and undergraduate levels.  He most recently served 25 years as pastor of the Lutheran Church of the Resurrection (ELCA) in Roseville.  He has two sons and five grandchildren.  

     When asked about what to include in this biographical sketch, he mentioned his ordination, and then added: “God has called me to tasks both in academia and in parish ministry.  I love the church.  I kind of think that is enough.”    

     He will begin among us on Tuesday, Apr. 7, with his first Sunday being Apr. 12.

News From the Neighborhood
Anna Kingman

Better Halves Workshop

     Register for the Better Halves Workshop! This Saturday, March 21, 9:00- 11:30 am at Mount Olive. This is a financial enrichment workshop for ANY couple that wants to practice talking about money well with their partner.  *Childcare and donuts will be in supply!

     Register at: brighpeakfinancial.com/betterhalves Promo code: mountolive15.

Opportunities to BE Involved

     Check out the information located in front of the main office for more details.

     Needed: Food donation deliverer! Is anyone available and willing to take a load of food to CES at 1900 11th Ave. S.? A drop-off time can be arranged and helping hands to load. Please let Anna K. know.

Spanish phrase:

     Part of sharing in community is understanding one another through language, culture, or experience. As we explore our community and get to know our neighbors, let’s continue with some helpful language lessons:

English: “How can I help you?”
Spanish: “Como le puedo ayudar?” (Coh-mow lay pooh-ay-doh eye-u-dar)

Review: “Do you live in this neighborhood?”
Spanish: “‘Usted vive en este barrio?” (Oo-sted vee-vay ehn es-tay bah-ree-oh)

Mark Your Calendars for the May Day Parade:  Sunday, May 3, 2015!

     The May Day Parade and Festival is produced by In the Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theatre. Since 1975, Heart of the Beast has invited the entire community to participate by brainstorming, organizing, sculpting, sewing, building, painting, and joining in the parade and festival as actors, singers, dancers, musicians, and attendees.

     The May Day Parade and Festival has become a joyous annual rite of spring. More than 2,000 participants, along with amazing puppets and floats, parade down Bloomington Avenue telling a story and creating a moving theatrical performance. Thousands more line the streets to watch the parade and participate in day-long activities. Following the parade, a pageant and tree of life ceremony in Powderhorn Park ushers in the renewal of a new spring season.

     For more information or to get involved check the HOBT website: http://hobt.org/mayday/

Who We Are, Where We Are Map
     Have you “pinned” yourself yet? If not, please do so by letting us know where you live, using the map hanging in the East Assembly room. Instructions are posted by the map – please contribute your pin!

Meeting Our Somali Neighbors Over Rice and Bananas
     This winter, a small group of Mount Olive members met to talk about culture—who we are as individuals, and how we welcome those different from us. We shared experiences that took us out of our comfort zone. Four of us visited Karmel Square Mall with new Somali friends, Abdi and Osman. We looked in shops, saw the Mosque entrance, and went to Abdi and Osman’s preferred coffee shop for sambosa and Somali tea and conversation. We discovered that Osman practices Islam, Abdi does not. They explained the importance of having a male in our group, since we were meeting Somali men. We learned about each other.

     To continue our friendship, we joined Abdi and Osman at Hamdi Somali Restaurant for lunch. We washed hands in nearby sinks, and got our tea from the dispenser on the wall. Osman and Abdi ordered one of everything on the menu, including chicken, and the best fish I’ve had in a restaurant. We had two goat dishes, one roasted and one steamed. Our guides taught us to eat green bananas with rice–wonderful! And then, spaghetti. Yes, spaghetti. Who knew Somalia had spaghetti?

     The conversation was as wonderful as the food. Abdi came to the US in the 1980’s to go to college, before the wars, and lived in Washington DC. Osman and his wife came to Texas as refugees in the 1990’s through the Lutheran Church, and moved to Minnesota, where all eight of their children were born. His children love American food, especially burgers, but Osman eats Somali fare at Hamdi, nearly daily. Two of Osman’s children attend St. Olaf College in Northfield! By sharing food with Osman and Abdi, we were able to share things like how we define success and what cultures we relate to. We discovered that Osman and Abdi disagree about wearing a hijab, and that both of them identify as Minnesotan.

     This experience showed me that we really are more similar than different.

– Julie Manuel

Action Alert

     Sign up now to visit Guatemala and our Common Hope partners. One or two groups will be going. Pick your dates and get in on the action. Leave your name at the office, sign a yellow info sheet or contact Judy Hinck either by email to judyhinck@gmail.com or by calling 612-824-4918. Teams will be set by Easter.

How’s our giving going?

     Our committee’s letter last November outlined some of the reasons our president, Lora Dundek, described our 2015 budget as “challenging,” requiring increased giving totaling some 7%. Among those reasons: increased health-care premiums, paying an interim pastor during Pastor
Crippen’s sabbatical (which starts after Easter), and increasing our support for the work of the ELCA (churchwide and synod) from 3% to 4%—the level at which we continue to fund Missions and Neighborhood Ministries.

     With the first two months of the year behind us, how are we doing? We got off to a strong start, with January giving up 25% from the same month a year earlier. Giving in February showed a more modest 4% over the previous February. Giving for the two months was 14% over the same period a year earlier.

     But it’s still early in the year. Let’s be cautiously optimistic that our giving will remain strong throughout the year. Our treasurer, Kat Campbell-Johnson, reminded the Vestry that January giving was 108% of that month’s expenditures, while February giving was only 81% of that month’s expenses. For now we’re not needing to use our line of credit at the bank, thanks in part to members’ gifts to last year’s campaign (some members are continuing to give), which fully funded our restrictive accounts and left us with a modest but important reserve fund.

     Let’s also keep that word “challenging” in mind as we consider and make our gifts in the months
ahead.

– Donn McLellan, Director of Stewardship

MOUNT OLIVE LUTHERAN CHURCH
3045 Chicago Avenue
Minneapolis, MN 55407

Map and Directions >

612-827-5919
welcome@mountolivechurch.org


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