I believe that all baptized children are welcome to the Altar. The following is a guide that will hopefully help parents with bringing their children forward to receive communion. First, for all children, it’s important to see what’s going on at the altar. There is a drama unfolding at the the table during the liturgy and like any good drama it should be seen and heard first hand. Parents might sit in a pew closer Read More …
For the last couple years I’ve had the opportunity to share some ideas with the congregation I’m currently serving. One idea that I am particular fond of is taking Sunday worship to a local park. This is a little outside the comfort zone of most Lutherans, so I put together the following proposal for consideration of the church council whom pretty quickly decided we should try it. Worship in the Park Proposal WHAT: The worship service Read More …
I have been a big fan of Late Nate with Jimmy Fallon for some time. I try to stay up as much as possible with my night owl wife, but often I fall asleep just before the opening monologue. However, I almost always end up catching highlights of Jimmy’s show on Hulu the next day. When Jimmy has guests who are willing to play water gun games, race tricycles, crack eggs on their heads, and Read More …
Part of the requirements for my pastoral internship is that I complete some sort of project. Here it is. The Project The Church’s context: I noticed that the church is near a high school and many youth walk by the church on a daily basis. For several days I stood outside the church during the half hour or so youth were walking home and counted how many young people passed our building. So I put a Read More …
Sometimes church annual meetings can get long, dare I say boring, especially when the discussion descends into worry about finances/declining attendance etc. As a youth minister I would often make videos for the annual meeting, in addition to a written report, in order to break up the stream of talking heads. It was usually a much needed intermission. I wanted SHOW the congregation what the Youth and Family Ministry did during the year, not just Read More …
Rachel Held Evans posted on her blog a wonderful article, 11 Things I Wish More Pastors Would Say. As a Pastor in training, I think the flip side of the coin is also important. Here are 10 Things I Wish More Parishioners Would Say in no particular order. “Take some time off, we can handle it around here.” “I pray for you daily” (And actually does it). “Can I take you out to lunch?” “I didn’t understand Read More …
In Lent of 2013, I coordinated an art project @ Faith Lutheran Church of Castro Valley that consisted of the 14 Stations of the Cross. Each station was created on an 8X11 canvas by a member of the congregation. We had everyone from a 3-year-old to an 80-year-old participate with all skill levels. I placed the canvases on a table in the church entry with a sign up sheet. Attached to each canvas was the instructions Read More …
During my brief stint attending an Evangelical church and for 6 years at an Evangelical seminary, I was struck by the boldness of faith from most of the people especially their willingness to pray for others on the spot. I find that mainline Christians don’t really do this. Last month, I was at a Synod Assembly and received a text from my wife that our son had a very high temperature. At the time I Read More …
Everyone & Everything This board is an art project I did with the youth group @ Lutheran Church in the Foothills in 2011. It took 3 months of planning/preparation and 4 youth group meetings to put it together. The title comes from a response to a question I asked while we we’re working on it, “For whom did Jesus die?” A youth responded with, “Everyone.” Another followed with, “Everything.” We used this as our central Read More …