Lutherans and immigration

I am reading a fascinating book right now titled They Are Us: Lutherans and Immigration by Stephen Bouman and Ralston Deffenbaugh…

…I have yet to finish the book but I will be done shortly.  It’s a short book and a quick read.  It is also an eye opening book.  I hope to have more insights for you soon but in the mean time, here are some thoughts and highlights that have jumped out to me.

–We are all descendants of immigrants.  How often do you actually think about that?

–Scriptures command us to welcome the widow, orphan and the stranger.  How often do we do THAT?

–Our immigration system is indeed broken.  I do not have the answer, but something needs to be done.  Families are being torn apart.

–Since 9/11 it has become “okay” to discriminate against immigrants all in the name of national security.

–I need to readjust some of my attitudes and pray for my brothers and sisters who are simply here to make a better life for them and their families.

Like I said I do not have the answer to the problem of our broken immigration system, but as Christians how are we called to respond to these brothers and sisters in Christ?  Maybe our first order of business is to pray for our national leaders that they may actually figure something out so all people are treated with respect and dignity.

More to come later…

God bless!

-edh-

Lutheran Study Bible feedback

I have been following Lutheran Study Bible on Twitter recently.  Today’s update was the following:  “Lots of feedback from church leaders that Lutheran Study Bible will be used for confirmation classes post Youth Gathering.“  Other updates that I have noticed through out the ELCA National Youth Gathering suggests that this Bible has been a big hit with the youth.  Seeing reports like that is very encouraging.

Have you been using this Bible with your youth?

Are you planning on using this Bible in confirmation this year?

-edh-

“New” blogs and websites

O.K…they’re not really new sites but they are fairly new to me…in any case…

…I thought I would highlight a couple recent additions to my blogroll and my favorite website section on the right side panel of this blog.

First my blog roll:
(1) Angry Lutherans is an interesting site I came across through a new website I will mention in a bit.  It is worth your time to check out.

(2) Augsburg Fortress: One Mission Blog obviously is the blog for Augsburg Fortress.  This is a great way to read about new publications coming out or things going on in connection with Augsburg Fortress.

Favorite websites:
(1) Lutheran Central is a website I stumbled upon through someone else.  It is a site that has a bunch of Lutheran information, resources and links.  They are currently updating some links but what they do have is neat.  My blog is also featured on Lutheran Central (hence part of my motivation to return the favor here).

(2) Working Preacher is a great sermon prep resource.  Each week there is an in depth write up about each of the lectionary texts.  There are also various other preaching resources and even a discussion board to chat about the upcoming texts.  I have found this sight to be very helpful in my sermon prep during the week.  Even if you are not writing a sermon you can still find some helpful insights into scripture.

I hope you find these useful/interesting.

God bless.

-edh-

P.S.  It is VBS week here so hence my relative lack of posting anything recently.  I am checking back to see if any comments need to be responded to though.  Hopefully I will have a “meatier” post coming up soon about the Sunday texts and maybe even some thoughts/highlights from VBS.  So I will catch ya later.

More reading — Missional Congregations

I started reading a new book today (I often have a couple I am working on at the same time).  This book is called, “A Field Guide for the Missional Congregation” by Rick Rouse and Craig Van Gelder.  It is an Augsburg Fortress selection that was recommended to me.

I am just getting into this book but I wanted to share something with you that has already struck me and got me thinking.  Here’s a short excerpt:

The premise of this book is that becoming an effective witness to the gospel in today’s world — becoming a missional congregation — requires us to revision the way we ARE the church in order to more faithful DO church.  Consider the following shifts in an understanding of what the church is and does.

FROM:                               TO:
Maintenance                  Mission
Membership                   Discipleship
Pastor-centered           Lay-empowered
Chaplaincy (Self)         Hospitality (Others)
Focus on ourselves     Focus on the world
Settled                              Sent

That above list got me thinking about my own setting and context.  Are we a missional congregation or are we satisfied with the status quo?  Are we inward focused or outward focused?  Or consider this question:  If this congregation ceased to exist, would the community miss us?

More from this book later.

-edh-

Spark Story Bible

At the risk of sounding like an Augsburg Fortress commercial I wanted to highlight this story Bible that I came across.  This Bible is geared towards age 2 through grade 2 kids and contains 150 Bible stories. It has great color pictures, stories that are short and each have a question or an action statement; something to help the kids think more about the story.

After buying one copy to look at I bought another 10.  So far two people have come in to buy one and others said they are also interested.  I may need to buy more.  There is also a Spark Bible geared towards grade 3 through grade 6 students.  And all of this is part of the Spark Sunday school curriculum.

My plan is to read out of this story Bible on Sundays for the children’s message (trying to coordinate with the Gospel text)  and also to give one to parents who have their children baptized here.  I have been trying to encourage people to get into the Bible more so let’s start them young.

My point here is not to give Augsburg Fortress free advertising but rather to highlight a resource for getting kids into the Bible.  One of my fondest memories took place one Sunday morning.  One of my 3 year olds came into the narthex before worship and was carrying a couple books.  She ran up to me to show me and the first one she showed me was her new Bible.  She was pretty excited and proud of her Bible.  Now…what pastor is not going to get excited about that.

I hope more kids will develop a love for scripture early and keep scripture as a huge part of their lives as they grow up, but it all begins with the family.

-edh-