Grace and peace to you in the name of God our Creator and Christ our Redeemer. Amen.

The global pandemic of COVID-19 is causing great anxiety in the world, including in our communities and congregation. It seems like every hour I receive another alert of how this pandemic is changing life as we are used to it being.

[Jesus] was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm.

Mark 4:38-39 (NRSV)

“Peace! Be still!” God speaks peace to us over and over again, calming our anxieties. Today is no different. Into our world, God still speaks peace and calm. Peace and calm do not mean inaction. The very next scene in the Gospel of Mark, as soon as the boat reaches the shore, shows Jesus healing a man and healing a community. Jesus Christ is God’s love active in the world and we as Christians are called to live out our faith active in love.

In “The Freedom of a Christian,” Martin Luther wrote:

The Christian individual is a completely free lord of all, subject to none.
The Christian individual is a completely dutiful servant of all, subject to all.

While many of us may never contract the virus, and while the symptoms will be mild for many of us, this disease is very serious and life-threatening for many in our community. As Christians living together, we have a responsibility to take seriously the risk this pandemic has toward the health and life of many in our community. We do this by taking sensible precautionary measures when we gather for worship and fellowship, continuing to feed the hungry through the New Berlin Food Pantry, and preparing to meet the needs of those in our community who are impacted by school closures and being asked to stay home from work. Last night the Messiah Church Council met and decided upon some steps that we are taking at this time. These are listed below. We will continue to assess the public health situation as the weeks progress.

We remain calm. We take heart. We prepare, hoping it is unnecessary.

As the President and General Secretary of the Lutheran World Federation wrote Wednesday:

We take courage in the knowledge that God never abandons us,
even if it means going through the experience of the cross.
We see the cross of Christ as the sign of our strength and hope.

Go in peace. Serve the Lord.

The Rev. D. Lowell Chilton, Pastor
570-884-4386 | [email protected]

The Messiah Church Council, meeting on March 12, 2020, has the following guidance for our congregation:

• All currently planned activities are continuing. This includes worship, fellowship, committee meetings, and Sunday School.
• If you are ill, please stay home. We stream the Gospel reading and homily on our Facebook page every week, join us there.
• When we gather for worship:
  • During the Peace, extend a greeting with a bow, a firm wave, a foot bump or some other gesture that does not involve a physical touch of hands and arms.
    • The pastor, greeters, and head usher will not shake hands but will extend other postures of greeting before and after worship.
  • The pastor, acolytes, and communion servers will wash hands with soap and water before worship (for the pastor and acolytes, after vesting) and then sanitize with Germ-X in front of the congregation immediately prior to serving communion.
  • The offering plates will not be passed, they will be placed on tables by the front pews and available when coming forward for Prayer around the Cross, during the Peace, during the Offering time, and during communion. If you are unable to join us for worship, please consider giving electronically, or bringing your envelope to the church during the week.
  • We will suspend the use of the common cup and only use the pouring chalices for the time being. The communion elements will be placed on the table in the chancel instead of in the narthex.
• During Fellowship
  • Snacks are to be served by someone wearing gloves, not self-served. Gloves are being procured and will be made available.
  • We will only use disposable flatware, cups, and plates for the time being.

If you or someone in your household contract COVID-19, please contact Pr. Chilton (570-884-4386) or any member of the Executive Committee as soon as possible. The Executive Committee (Pastor Chilton, President Sauers, Vice-President Showers, Secretary Trick, and Treasurer Foss) will meet weekly on Wednesdays to assess the current state of the pandemic and our community and discuss any modifications to this protocol.

“Give us this day our daily bread.”

Read Luther’s explanation of this petition (a little more there than I touch upon in the video).

Come Lord Jesus be our guest.

Let this food (or these gifts) to us be blessed.

Come Lord Jesus you are our bread.

May all the world be clothed and fed. Amen.

This is an old German Table prayer with an extra verse that I received a number of years ago from Lutheran World Relief. I went to their site to check the wording and was blessed with this video.  See how our sharing, our generosity makes God’s good changes happen!

Psalm 136:1  “O give thanks to the Lord, for He is good: For His steadfast love endures forever.”

Peace

Pastor Fitch

Which video do you prefer?

or

“Your will be done. On earth as in heaven.”

We want God’s will to be done, but in our time and the way we want it. We might like slo-mo videos to see the little bits of action that our mind can’t quite catch, but we would rather a long journey be on high speed time lapse!

I have found that the first part of this petition is an excellent small prayer piece to work against pride and to build up submission to God’s good and holy work.

It is a great challenge in a world that so fully rests on our own pride, accomplishments, awards, etc.–to turn over active control to God.

In what things, activities, and relationships could you see God’s will working a different resolution or reconciliation? Are there frustrations because things are not working the way you think they should? Pray this portion again, focusing on openness to what God has in mind for you and the situation.

Be patient. Often we don’t see God’s work at first. Often, the way God works may not be the way we want or what we expect. God is good, though, all the time!

Readings: Job 9:1-12

A few psalms, randomly chosen should help you tap into waiting on God’s will and timing.

Pray for God’s will to become clearer for you, for it to be done in you, for God’s will to be done through you.

How we start our prayers is important!

[Read the explanation in the Small Catechism]

How do you address God?

Yes, there is a connection here to the Second Commandment. A proper use of God’s Name is prayer. Much like you would call out to a parent for them to hear you or help you with something, so a good prayer starts.

The word the Jesus uses for “Father” is “Abba” which is the casual and loving Greek term, not the formal “Pater.” So, this best translation would be Dad, Daddy or Papa. It is necessary to be sure that this emotive connection is there, even if the formal word is used. If it is the wrong word, why do we use “father”? Many teachers wanted students learning the Lord’s Prayer to use an address that had a nuance of respect and recognized authority. It should not be too hard for us to acknowledge that we frequently have a hard time with what Jesus says and shift it to be closer to what we think is acceptable.

Still, the opening is important. If this is our loving and casually close God that is our daddy or papa in heaven, then what can we pray for? What will our Daddy withhold from us? This is a critical component of the incarnation–the chosen closeness and intimate love of our God, coming into our lives. Jesus becomes our brother and gives us permission to address God properly.

Have you ever known someone that, after introductions, said something like, “Oh, please call me Murphy, I don’t use my first name with my friends.” –how would that person feel if you then called them by their first name in a formal manner? Isn’t it an act of accepting and initiating a relationship to call someone how they want to be called? Should we address God as the loving and close Daddy that He is.

Matthew 7:7-11

Luke 11:5-13

Luke 12:32

Pray for those who do not know how to pray to or address God.

Pray for those who have difficult, conflicted, or non-existent relationships with their earthly father and might find it hard to think of the Heavenly Father in a positive way.

Pray for those who have grown distant from God, barely remembering or hardly using the Lord’s Prayer–that they may turn back and become close again with their heavenly Papa.