Complete Story
08/18/2009
Day 2: Connected
I continue to run into friends and collegues that I haven't seen in awhile. It always interests me how we are brought together.
I was the first one to sit down at the table for lunch today. A pastor sat down next to me. Now let me back up a bit. I have a parishoner, Michael, who is attending Southern Seminary. He met his future wife, Lisa, at Southern. She is from Cary NC. The pastor that sat down next to me is Lisa's pastor from Cary, who performed their wedding. We continued to talk and realized we had several connections, even though we had never met before. We are a small connected Lutheran Church. We all have those experiences that remind us just how connected we really are.
This morning, the Churchwide Assembly approved by an almost unanimous decision, to support the Lutheran Malaria Initiative. LMI is a collective effort between the ELCA, the LCMS, United Nations, Foundation, and LWR to combat the deadly spread of Malaria in sub-Saharan Africa. Our discussion on the issue showed just how small of a global community we really are. What happens around the world affects all of us. We are connected to the lives of everyone on this planet.
In the worship space here are prints from the St. John's Bible. I had seen a few of these panels while they were in Columbus a couple months ago. This St. John's Bible is an attempt from a community of faith here in Minnesota to produce a hand-painted, hand-copied English version of the Bible. A volume like this hasn't been done in centuries! We have images of the way the Bible was produced so long ago. And in seeing these prints, we are somehow connected to the past, by claiming the present.
And so we gather around a table. Christ promises to be present with us whenever we gather. As we hold the body and blood of Christ in our hands, we are united with the church on earth and the Church across all time and space. We join in the hymn the heavenly chorus is already singing. We kneel down together, this small connected group.
We are all connected, you and I. We are intricately connected to those we love. We are intricately connected to those who think the way we do. We are intricately connected to those with whom we disagree the most. We are intricately connected to those with whom we can't even stand to be in the same place.
We are connected in the fact we are all God's children. We are connected in the fact we are sealed with the promised Holy Spirit. We are connected in the fact that Christ came for us all.
Mike Poole
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Thanks Mike. I think this is a good piece on the images of the Assembly that would connect with others so as to show how connected and creative we can be. Thanks for sharing.
