The Listening Ear

New Blog Is Up And Running!

(My apologies, but typepad doesn’t seem to want to link to my new blog correctly. Jealous or something. Anyway just paste or type awakeatsunrise.com in your browser and you’ll get to the new sight.)

After publishing nearly a thousand posts on The Listening Ear, I have decided that it has served its purpose. Originally I thought of this blog as a way to reach out the people in my congregation and community.I have now come to the conclusion that there are better ways to do that.

I am working with our church staff to set up a Facebook page for St. Paul Lutheran that will offer congregation and community oriented information. I think there are many more people in Treynor that use Facebook, but seldom if ever read blogs. I think a Facebook page will prove to be more effective in reaching my original goal.

At the same time, I have felt a call to begin writing for a broader audience. While I hope that many people will find my writing to be interesting and informative, I plan to write especially with pastors and leaders of congregations in mind. I want to write especially for leaders in small to mid-sized congregations because I don’t think there are many people who are writing specifically for the needs and interests of such leaders.

I hope that people who have been following or at least checking in on this bog occasionally will migrate over to <awakeatsunrise.com>. After a couple of introductory posts, my first project will be to do a series on discerning a vision for a congregation. One of my chief goals will be to offer ideas that can be put to use in the practice of ministry and of life.

So I invite you to join me at Awake At Sunrise for my new venture. I am excited to see where it will lead. 

If you like what you see on the new blog please be sure to share it with others with a Facebook ‘like,’ a Tweet or any other way that you can help others discover my blog. I would be very grateful.

 

New Blog Ready For Launch

I still plan to begin publishing my new blog this Sunday. I already have the new site set up and if you want to take a peek just go over to awakeatsunrise.com. As the header states, the purpose of this blog will be to reflect on the art and practice of ministry and of life.

I hope that many who have followed this blog, will find my new effort to be even more helpful and interesting. At the same time, the specific audience I will have in mind as I write will be pastors and leaders in small and mid-sized congregations. I still think others will find it to be of interest to them as well.

Even though from time to time I'll mention details from my personal life and include some eclectic posts of things I find interesting, I plan for the bulk of what I post to be practical in nature. For instance, my congregation is currently working on a new vision for our ministry. I plan to do a series of posts soon on ways to develop such a vision.

I have begun to develop a list of topics that relate to the art and practice of ministry. I want to draw on my years of experience as a parish pastor while at the same time providing an opportunity for others to tell about what they have learned.

This will be one of the last posts I'll be making to The Listening Ear. It has served me well these last year, but now it is time for something new.

How To Harness The Power Of Words

I have developed in abiding interest in the power of words. Well-crafted words possess beauty and energy. Recently, I discovered a video featured on Katya Andresen’s blog, a video that demonstrates the power that the right words can have. As Mark Twain said, it’s the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.

Here’s the video:

 

What’s Good About Failure

Most of us hate to fail. Sometimes failure results from our own mistakes and sometimes it arrives because of forces we can’t control.

Nevertheless, the fruits of failure have often been misunderstood and under-appreciated. With the right frame of mind, failure can actually yield some positive outcomes. That’s the theme that Seth Godin pursues in one of his latest posts.

I usually find Godin’s blog to be thought-provoking. I was particularly struck by his last two points regarding failure. 

• Concentrate your energy and will on the elements of the project that you have influence on, ignore external events that you can't avoid or change.
• When you fail (and you will) be clear about it, call it by name and outline specifically what you learned so you won't make the same mistake twice. People who blame others for failure will never be good at failing, because they've never done it.

Both are important things to remember when we face failures which is just apart of being human.

 

Looking Forward To Tanzanian Visitors

The Tanzanians are coming! In about a month and a half our congregation is looking forward to hosting two visitors from our Companion Congregation, Pr. Nuru Kahwilli and Pr. Wallace Lupenza. They should be arriving in Omaha about May 25 and will be in Western Iowa through June 7.

They will spend much of their time in the Treynor area, meeting members of our congregation and community, learning about life in Western Iowa and visiting Christian ministries in our area. This will provide an excellent opportunity for us to deepen out relationship with the people of Kidugala.

Sometimes people wonder whether such exchanges are worth the cost. Admittedly, it isn’t cheap for people from Tanzania to travel here or vice versa.

Nevertheless, if we are serious about helping our sisters and brothers in the Majority world, the world of  poverty that most people on this planet live in, we need to develop solid relationships with them. Good relationship are the key to making sure that any aid we offer is really what others need, not what we think that they need.

Also it is important to realize that people from the Majority world have things to offer us. We can learn from them. It is likely that we don’t even realize the social and spiritual effects poverty can have on others. We don’t recognized the deep faith that people from others cultures possess. We can be enriched by our relationships with them.

I am looking forward to renewing the friendship that has developed with Pr. Wallace and Pr. Nuru. They were such gracious hosts to us when we visited them last year. We want them to experience the same kind of hospitality when they visit us.

What Really Happened To Jesus In the Wilderness?

I almost literally stumbled on this animated version of Jesus’ 40 Days in the wilderness. I wish I would have found it earlier. I might have used it for the first Sunday in Lent.

 

What do you think happened during that time in the wilderness? We only hear about what happens at the end. Do you think that the animator is on to something as he depicts this event?

What’s The Purpose of Death Anyway?—The Good Death

Previous ages spoke about ars moriendi, the art of dying. If we desire to cultivate such an art, we can’t wait until death is imminent. Learning to die is the task of a lifetime. It is both gift to us and achievement by us.

Many years ago Bertha, an elderly member of my congregation, entered the hospital suffering from pneumonia. When antibiotics failed to stem the disease, the hospital staff inserted a ventilator tube down her throat. The time had come to assemble her family.

Once they inserted the tube, Bertha couldn’t talk. Nevertheless she remained alert and wrote messages on a pad of paper. Bertha started filling the pad with names, making a list of people she wanted to see. During the next several days, friends and relatives trickled into Bertha’s hospital room. She greeted each one with a smile, conveying final instructions, writing notes to say how much she loved them, facing the uneasy good-byes. When a visitor left, she crossed the name off her list.

Finally the last two grandchildren arrived and that evening her family surrounded her bed where she sat beaming in their presence. She greeted their tears with her own, but strove to console her children and grandchildren. Together her family prayed and sang a hymn.

The next morning when they offered the tablet to Bertha, she gently pushed it aside and that afternoon she slipped into a coma and died. After her death, Bertha’s family looked at the list she had written and discovered that only one name had not been crossed off. The name that remained was Jesus.

Bertha had prepared herself for her death. She accepted death in the hope that new life is still possible. She believed there is One who is working so that life will finally triumph over death.

Acknowledging our losses, listening to our pain, and looking for the opportunity that lies in life’s uncomfortable moments are ways to affirm a belief that life will spring forth in spite of the prunings of death. Living a good life, a complete existence, involves coming to terms with death in all the ways we encounter it. We learn how to live by learning how to die. We learn how to die by learning how to affirm life in the face of death.

That’s the kind of life and death I would seek—-one like my friend, Bertha. I think she had about as good a death as anyone could want.

What’s The Purpose of Death Anyway?—Learning To Die

Throughout the whole of life one must continue to learn to live and what will amaze you even more, throughout life one must learn to die.—Seneca

All living creatures seem to have an innate desire to live and will make tremendous efforts to preserve their lives. That’s true for the smallest single-celled organism to the most complex creatures including humans.

Yet, we as far as we know, no organism escapes death and often the life cycle includes specific stages where one generation surrenders life so that the next can take it up. The salmon swims to its death in a mountain stream to lay eggs that will produce its offspring. This is one way that death serves life.

Nevertheless, I want to suggest that death is not simply an event at the end of life. It is a pattern that is repeated as we go through life, a pattern that leads from the death of the old to the emergence of something new and usually better. This must happen again and again for us to successfully travel the path of life.

For instance, I recall that time in life when first one of my sons and then the other left home to start college. It was a painful transition for our family because we were all letting go of an old way of life so that something new could emerge. We all shred some tears of grief.

Yet, there are many good things that emerged from that transition. My wife and I have had more time to invest in our relationship, our sons continued to mature, eventually they married and have brought grandchildren into our lives. Change doesn’t always yield so many benefits, yet to live is to change. And to change is to grieve and to die in one way or another.

The Christian faith proclaims a belief in death followed by resurrection. Sometimes Christians seem to think that this is something that only kicks in after we take that final breath.

By contrast, I believe God intends this pattern of death leading to life to be one that permeates the life of a Christian. Here’s an example. Whenever we visit a friend who is sick or when we sit with a person in grief, we share a bit of their sorrow and pain. If we allow ourselves to enter into their situation, we taste some of bitterness that they taste. We die just a little.

Yet, those acts can bring new life to the person whose pain we share and in a strange way those acts of compassion can enliven us as well. We experience a sense of purpose for our lives.

One way of live successfully is to learn how to incorporate those ‘little deaths’ in the way we live. Too often people try to avoid such experiences or to numb the pain. Yet real life is able to enfold the pain in such a way that it produces something that enhances life itself—our own life and the lives of others

Learning to live means learning to die.

Next up: I’ll give my view on makes for a good death.

Still Working

I know that I haven’t been able to post as much as I would like and for that I apologized to my readers. I still have at least a couple of things I want to finish in my ‘What’s the purpose of death’ series, but haven’t had time to complete them.

Two things have gotten in the way of my writing. First, it is Lent which has to be about the busiest season there is for many parish pastors. Secondly, I have been working on setting up my new blog.

I am excited about the new blog because I am creating a new name and a new design to go along with the new purpose for my blog. I hope that you will like it and that you’ll be able to recommend it to your friends.

I am also work on ways to integrate what I do on the blog with other social media including Facebook and Twitter. My goal is to make my blog better known. That will involve offering quality content and doing my best to spread the word.

I hope that you can help with that last part by ‘Liking’ posts that you find especially helpful and making comments on what I write. I appreciate all the support and encouragement that I get from you, my readers.

New Design Soon To Emerge