Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ. Amen.
Acts 2:1-4
When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. 2And suddenly from heaven there came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting. 3Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. 4All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.
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Sunday, May 27th is Pentecost Sunday. In the course of our church year, it's a festival Sunday that usually doesn't come close to registering on the same level as Christmas or Easter. In worship that day, we'll read the story of the Pentecost event from the book of Acts, we'll sing songs about the enlivening, fire-y, power of the Holy Spirit calling, gathering, and sending us into the world as bold disciples, and then we'll go home. And the rest of the summer will feel just like the summer we've all been waiting for. We'll spend time tending the yard or lounging on the patio. We'll enjoy leisurely Sunday afternoons listening to Uke call the Brewers game on WTMJ. And the only rushing wind that we'll look forward to is the one that will cool down the house enough so we can keep the air conditioning turned off for one more day. The story told in Acts and the story of Pentecost is the story of the Holy Spirit building Christ's church and that church is built around worship and hospitality (Acts 2:42). This year, let's make the most of the season of Pentecost and (re)discover what it is that we value about worship and hospitality at Abiding Savior Lutheran Church.
Sunday, June 3 Holy Trinity Sunday and we will allow the wind of the Holy Spirit to move us from the space we usually occupy (just like verse 1 in the above reading) and out into the community for a unique purpose. In conversation and consultation with the Church Council and the Worship and Music Committee it seems like a choice moment to try something “out of the box” for the purpose of learning about ourselves and what we find important:
Sunday, June 3 morning worship at Abiding Savior is cancelled in order that members might attend worship at any congregation of their choosing to experience the worship and hospitality practices of another community.
- Please join in the experience! We need YOUR participation!
- This is a one time even for 2012.
- The reason we're holding the event is so that we can more deeply understand the worship and hospitality practices that we find meaningful.
- We will reconvene the evening of June 3 at 5 PM for brief worship with Holy Communion, a potluck, and a guided conversation about our experiences that day so we can share together what we learned.
- Resources will be provided in advance to all members to take with them on their visits to help them evaluate their worship and hospitality experiences.
- The event is related DIRECTLY to our congregational mission to “welcome all people and share God's grace in Jesus Christ” in that is a chance to reflect on what matters most about how we do that in our congregation in regard to worship and hospitality.
Watch and listen for additional advertising and announcements as we approach June 3rd.
This is certainly a unique event, but my hope is that it is one that we will find enjoyable, valuable, unifying, and edifying. The Holy Spirit calls us to be the congregation of Abiding Savior Lutheran Church, but it also calls us to be intentional about understanding what it means for us to be that church and how we want to live as that church – and that's something that we can only do together, sustained by prayer, worship, our love for one another, and our love of God. I hope you'll share in this wild experiment to see and experience how other communities communicate God's love and presence.
Peace and Blessings,
Pastor Mike