The end of Advent

If you could have anything you wanted for Christmas, what would it be?  I mean, think big … anything at all.  I’m willing to bet, the bigger you think, the less personal it is.  Because if you go big enough, you’re talking about conditions, not things.  And then you’re probably thinking in terms of the end of bad conditions, you’re thinking of how some tragedies will just plain finally stop.  An end to something like world hunger, or an end to war, or an end to illness and suffering.  The things that strike us as big are often the things that we want to go away.  And if we could have anything our heart desires, it would probably be the end of something.

And it’s funny to think about how that word “end” can also mean “the point of” something.  The end of eating is the removal of hunger.  The end of treaties is the cessation of war.  The end of medical research is the cure for disease.  This word, “end,” can work on both ends of the problem, if you consider it.

Christmas is the end of Advent … in both senses of the word.  Advent comes to a close with the birth of the Christ Child.  And that, of course, is fitting, since Advent only exists to prepare us for this observance.  And that is exactly why the end of Advent is Christmas, since it’s really just four weeks of preparation for the answer to the deepest questions of our troubled souls.

All of which sets us up for this:
The end of your life.  

What is the end of your life?  In every sense of the word, the end of your life is Jesus.  The biggest and best gift you could receive this Christmas is the end of Advent: God becoming flesh and blood in Jesus.  And that same gift is the end of your life: the redemption that is for all people, in all times and places.

The truth that God walks among us changes everything—most importantly, it changes the end of life itself.  We need not fear the darkness, because the Light of the world has overcome the darkness.  Because God walks among us in Jesus, then we also walk with God, both now and at the end.  The end of Advent is the beginning of life; and the end of life is the beginning of new and unending life.

May you get exactly what you want and need this Christmas!

Remember Your Baptism

Today, I noticed that my two-year-old daughter seems to be rejoicing, and, judging by her sheer delight in the tiniest of activities and sights, that her heart perhaps finds wonderful comfort.  To be honest, to watch her running around, today is not much different than most other days. She seems to do a lot of rejoicing.  One thing to know about Geneva, too, is that specific anniversaries are not her forte.  She’ll sing “Happy Birthday,” as heartily on any random day to almost anyone at lunch as she would on someone’s actual birthday. So, I don’t think her zeal is a result of her remembering that today is the anniversary of her baptism.

But, I think the extra little zip in my step this morning, despite a late night, is. I know that at dinner tonight, we’ll invite Uncle Mark over, and we’ll light Geneva’s baptismal candle.  We’ll pray—certainly her favorite, “Come Lord Jesus be our Guest…,” which we are learning to say in German, “Come Herr Jesus sei unser Gast, und segne, was du uns bescheret hast.”  She will shout “Amen,” and clap her hands a bit, as she always concludes a prayer.  Along with our daily bread, we’ll also thank God for one another, for the gift of family right across the street, for neighbors and friends, for fulfilling work and supportive colleagues, for faith communities, and for belonging.

And as we sit and chat we’ll remember Geneva’s baptism.  We’ll talk and laugh and reminisce about our trip to Germany in November 2009, with the ten-week-old Geneva.  We stayed in Berlin a bit, visited the museums and the Christmas Markets, walked throughout the beautiful capital city, and enjoyed long breakfasts. We went down to Erfurt for a couple of days. We visited our close friends the Utpatels and learned how four little boys make Christmas cookies and how their mom makes the house feel like the perfect intersection of Europe, the North Pole and Anthropologie.  And, we spent a day in Eisleben, where Geneva was baptized by our friend Rev. Scott Moore, who was serving the St. Peter and St. Paul Church.

In this very church Martin Luther was baptized.  Get this—the original font survives (with repairs).  That is, on November 29, 2009, Geneva was baptized in the very font in which Martin Luther was baptized on November 11, 1483.  Those in the congregation who had them, brought their own baptismal candles and lit them for the service (something it might be fun to see here), and Geneva received a candle from the congregation and one from a German friend on the occasion. She giggled and smiled, while Scott mixed hot water from the kettle in the sacristy with the water already in the font (which had been amply chilled by the November air filling a medieval nave) in order to reach a “room temperature” that would not shock the baby. As he swirled the waters, he reminded us of God’s presence through the ages and also in that place, of God’s promises, and of the community of saints including Geneva that knows no limits of time or national borders.  And that’s what we want Geneva to know when we tell her about her baptism—she is part of something Big.  God’s love and the community of saints.

Martin Luther said, “Remember your baptism,” and while I only remember mine in faith and theory and times of trouble, my wife and my brother and I, along with some friends in Germany, remember Geneva’s baptism quite well.   And we’ll remind her of it, tell her the stories, and show her the pictures every 29 November for as long as we can—even after her candle, a very large pedestal one—has burned its last.  And I hope that in celebrating and marking this anniversary each year, she will be reminded of this sacrament of belonging, and she’ll simply know, as sure as she’ll know there is gravity, that she is claimed, marked and sealed.  She’ll know that despite the ups and downs of her feelings, the strength and weakness of her convictions, or the good and bad of her behavior, she belongs to the one from whom and from whose love nothing can separate her.  And somehow—initiated in Eisleben in the chancel of a fifteenth-century church, continued this evening around our favorite yard-sale-purchased dining room table, and hopefully for years to come (even without her mom and dad) in a college dorm, a first apartment, a home of her own one day, or maybe, who knows, on a mountain in Tibet or in outer space—this little candle ceremony will be something to remind her that this is a special day, and that she is part of something Big.  Life, one might say, is a journey of faith, from loneliness to having a home; and Baptism is a sacrament of belonging.  

Join us at the Luther500 Festival in 2013.  Remember your baptism.  Let your faith be revitalized as you walk where Luther walked, and as you learn, serve and celebrate with friends.  Take the day trip to Eisleben and visit the birthplace of Martin Luther, the church where he was baptized, and the pulpit where he preached his final sermon.  While you are there, you’ll also have the chance to serve the Eisleben community with a special project that will leave a sign of God’s love in action and remind you that you are part of something Big.

Happy Birthday Martin Luther

Happy Birthday to you, Martin Luther!

You know what?  I owe a lot of the enjoyment in my life to my involvement with the Lutheran Church and to the Church’s involvement with me.

Now, please understand, I’m not saying many of the great experiences I’ve had couldn’t have happened in other denominations; this is just a personal reflection, and I happen to have been baptized and confirmed in the Lutheran Church.

When I was a kid, I remember making our way as a family to our Church.  We made our way through snow, on Christmas Eve for the candlelight service; after photos of new clothes on Easter Sunday (sometimes also through snow); on Wednesday evenings during Advent, and during Lent to get there in time for the soup dinners after my mother came home from work; on odd non-religious nights like Thanksgiving and New Year’s Eve; on multiple nights during Holy Week for the drama of a trial on Thursday and darkness of death on Friday, where the much-anticipated metaphoric loud slamming of a large book (“It is Finished”) and drama of the few Aramaic words we all knew along with dark sanctuary left silently was about the most solemn moment we knew; and just about every Sunday of my childhood for Sunday School and Church.  We propped the sanctuary windows open in the humid summers, and we listened to the ticking and banging of the heaters in the winter.  We went to church.  It was a constant.  And somehow through those services, and a celebration of the Church year, I heard the stories that would shape my life.

In the summer, my mom always signed me up for VBS.  And I always went.  I made friends, did crafts, learned songs, played sports.  In fourth grade I started singing in the “Junior Choir.”  You know, we weren’t much, but I spent one evening every week up the balcony of the empty church with a group of kids and we sang the songs of Avery and Marsh or sometimes Taize.  I got to know a particular kid named George during those evenings, and thought “Wow!  He can really play the piano!”

Later, when I started my own piano lessons, the Church Council was nice enough to say, “Sure.  You are a twelve-year-old kid who needs a place to practice the piano.  Why don’t you have this key, and just come here when you need to after school or on weekends or evenings or whatever to practice your lessons?”  We had no piano in our apartment, and this was the only way to practice.  I learned a lot about music in those hours at the empty church with a baby-grand piano, and I think I learned a lot about the Church too.

In high school, we had a lock in once and a “paper drive” twice. Those were our activities, and of course, I participated, as did the other kids in high school who went to our church.  We made friends. We goofed around.  It wasn’t splashy, shiny, or loud, but it still felt kind of spectacular, and I still remember moments from all three youth-group events during high school.  There was this sense that we belonged. 

We quickly figured out how to do things with other congregations in the area who had all kinds of activities for teens, and before we knew it we had a basketball team in the church league, and we were going to dances way the heck up in North Tonawanda, a lock-in in the aptly-named Lockport, and sledding with the kids from St. Peter’s on the Ridge. We even took the occasional bus trip to visit Lutheran Colleges for a weekend in the New York, Ohio, Michigan and Indiana area.  We listened to late-night dorm-lounge sages who imparted the wisdom of their nineteen years to our eager tenth-grade minds.  And, somehow, I found out that college was an option after high school.

And then, I went to Camp.  The local Lutheran Camp was owned and operated by the churches in our area, and they let me go there for a week.  One turned into two the first summer.  The next summer it was four.  And after that, I worked there for the whole ten-week season.

Changed.  My.  Life.

During college, 500 miles from my hometown, I worked at the local Lutheran Church leading the youth group.  All I knew was this: it was all about relationships.  Oh, there might be music.  And there might be trips.  And there might be servant events.  And there might be games, snacks, study, and lots of laughs.  But what we had was relationships.  The adults in that congregation, along with the two Pastors, and those in the youth group proved it to me again and again.  They made me feel like I belonged, and they gave me a chance to contribute.

After college, my old friend from Junior Choir, George, and I rode our bicycles 8,000 miles around the USA.   Guess what?  We stopped along the way and sang songs and made friends at Lutheran Churches, schools, camps and colleges.  We thought we would camp for the 340 nights we were traveling.  But at every stop, people would say, “You are not camping!  You are staying with us!”  And we did.  Soon, we mailed our camping equipment home, and came to rely on the folks we met along the way.  We played for nursing homes and pre-schools, juvenile-delinquent homes and honors students at Lutheran High Schools, a hundred K-8 schools and 50 or more Sunday services and Advent and Lent Wednesday nights.  We learned about the Church.  We encountered hospitality.  We met families sustained by faith. We ate and drank with seniors in high school and well, seniors.  We spent the night in 310 family homes.  We received an education about the Church.  And we met God.

After a sojourn in politics, I went to seminary at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago.  All I can say is: the perfect combination of college and camp!  Great new friends, CPE, theology, church history, squash, swimming, afternoon naps, little discussion/study groups, dinner with pals every evening – what could be more fun?

And somehow, by blessing, coincidence, good fortune or elbow grease, I’ve made a living for more than twenty years playing music informed by faith. I’ve spent a few hundred weekends with teenagers and their youth leaders at gatherings and festivals.  I’ve had the thrill of traveling all around the world to perform and to meet people in their homes, at their jobs, and in their congregations every week for all these years. 

I’ve had the chance to make friends in Germany from Berlin and Eisleben to Homberg-Efze, and to see my daughter baptized in the very church and font where Martin Luther was baptized.  And, now, in the past few years, I’ve had the joy of helping put together a week-long festival to observe the events surrounding the Reformation, and to invite hundreds of friends to visit Germany and walk in the steps of Martin Luther.

I knew it was kind of fun sliding down the hill and playing crazy-tackle behind our church during VBS as a kid, but who knew where that path would lead?

So, hey Martin Luther:  Happy Birthday. I’m not looking to debate theology, especially nuances, here.  I just wanted to say thanks.  Because for whatever reason, and through whatever series of circumstances, and by whatever accidents, twists, and perhaps divine interventions of history, there was a church in my hometown that had the word Lutheran out front, and it shaped my life.

Michael

Luther500 2013

Well, it’s Reformation Day, 2011, and a perfect time to open registration for the Luther500 Festival 2013.  The festival still feels a long way off and there is plenty of time for everyone to gather groups, find the best flights, raise money for the trip, and work on the Deutsch spreching.  Yet, to those of us who have been hard at work making plans and reserving spaces, calculating costs and designing day trips, working on the website and contacting vendors, asking for favors and promoting the Festival, today feels very momentous—like the 2013 Festival begins today! 

And what a great day to begin.  Nearly 500 years ago on this date, an Augustinian monk in Wittenberg who was undoubtedly devout and widely viewed as a scholar was about to take an action at the intersection of faith, scholarship and conscience that would lead him to be remembered as a reformer.  His bold act on that day, and in those times—standing up to the authorities and asking for a good-faith discussion of some honest concerns—was an important part of the rebirth of human discovery in Europe and around the world in the 16^th Century, and a catalyst for the changes that transformed society and Church in the years to come. 

Luther’s impact on the Church, his articulation of Law and Gospel along with the primacy of faith and scripture, his sermons and essays, and his influence on his fellow reformers are well known….and often hotly debated.  Yet, the role of the Protestant Reformation in the expansion and understanding of human and civil rights is often overlooked by those scratching at the surface of understanding Luther.  The importance of bridging cultural gaps and bringing people into contact with one another is not always at the fore of thinking about the Reformation.  And of course, Martin Luther himself would be the first to admit he was not some kind of pure saint, but, like all of us, a saint and sinner at the very same time.   At the Luther500 Festival participants will get a great look at all these aspects – and put them into practice as the Luther500 Festival bridges cultural separations by drawing participants from around the world and bringing us into fellowship, service, celebration, recreation, study, laughter, song, and worship together.

There are too may things to name about which I am especially excited when it comes to the 2013 Luther500 Festival. But I can’t help mentioning a few.

• We’ll get to see friends from 2011 and the new friends they bring. 
• The service projects will have new and exciting options.
• The day trips are expanded to five options.
• We’ll add a morning program just for kids under 12.
• Some close friends in music and ministry will participate:  Justin Vetrano (who has traveled with us on the LOST AND FOUND Christmas Tour for thirteen years and was our friend for ten years before that) will join us and bring a group, Mandee and Christy of Alathea will return as will Rachel Kurtz.  Our pal Dave Scherer aka AGAPE* will be there to make some music.  Our friends Aimee and Joel Pakan of Tangled Blue will also join us to provide musical leadership.
• Placeholders will give groups a chance to plan early and plenty of time to get ready.

Speaking of the Placeholders, go to the site and reserve your spot today.  Get a placeholder for everyone in your group!  This way, you will have from today until May 1, 2012 to figure out who exactly from your group is going, what type of accommodations you’d like to reserve, how you will raise the funding, how much the flights will cost (bearing in mind that the Luther500 Official Airline, Lufthansa, will offer a 10% – 15% discount on fares for those attending the Festival), and whether you’d like to stay for an additional four or five days to see more of Germany or of Europe.  This way, you can be confident that while you are busy planning, your space is being held for you until May 1.  After May 1, 2012, you’ll have a month to convert your placeholder to a full registration with a deposit of 200 Euro.  And then, once you’ve made your reservation and despoit, you’ll have nearly another year to get ready and even raise funds until the final balance is due for your Festival Pass in the Spring of 2013.  (You’ll be able to switch group members up through the Spring of 2013 if necessary.)

Here’s the thing: once the place holders are sold out, no more spaces at the Festival will be available until possibly June 1, 2012 in the event that some people who reserve spaces with place holders do not make full reservations.   I certainly hope you will join us.  And so, I hope you’ll get your placeholder as soon as possible.

The next Luther500 Festival is nineteen months away, but we are strongly aware, too, that the time between now and June 17, 2013 will pass before we barely have time to say Gemutlichkeit.  

The Plans

Well, the International Festival Committee will meet in Wittenberg next month to finalize schedules and plans for the daily activities at the Festival.  Now that we are officially part of the “Luther Decade” celebrations being organized by the German government and officials, we are very happy to have their support.

At the festival there will be opportunities for learning—history, theology, culture, language—and for recreation and celebration and service and vacation.  You won’t have to decide what you will do on which day of the week until you are there.  That is, you don’t have to sign up for a canoe trip on the Elbe until you wake up that morning and assess the sunlight situation.  You’ll have the chance to take into account your state (or non state) of jet lag and energy for attending tours, lectures, concerts, worship, service projects, games and so forth.

When participants arrive, all the options will be clear at the opening celebration and welcome event.  Throughout the week, everyone will have the chance to pick and choose from all kinds of offerings.  The only thing you’ll have to decide in advance are the days you’ll go on the trips to Berlin, Erfurt, The Wartburg, Eisleben, and all that.  Since these plans require organizing busses, we’ll need to know in advance.  Otherwise, it is your opportunity to explore and learn and participate at your own pace.

More to come….