Pastor’s Pen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . …… . . . . . . . . . Pastor David Wold

        The Fifty Days of Easter on the Church’s liturgical calendar ends on June 8, Pentecost Sunday, and the celebration of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.  This year at PLC we have a special treat.  MaryAnn McKibben Dana, author of “Sabbath in the Suburbs” will be with us for Saturday and Sunday, and a chance to explore with her the gift of Sabbath.

        When we think of Sabbath as commandment only, it has a tendency to be relegated to something we do, or another religious box to be checked off. Even when viewed as gift Sabbath may not ignite much enthusiasm. We’ve all received gifts we didn’t appreciate or fell short of our expectations.  Consider the young boy told to write a note of thanks for a birthday gift. He wrote: “Dear Aunt Mable, Thanks for the gift. I’ve always wanted a set of encyclopedias, but not much.”

        Sabbath, in our harried and over-scheduled lives, may sound good as time off to do little or nothing, but as such is largely out of reach for most of us. But what if God, ever gracious and full of loving surprises, had much more packed into that gift than we may have yet discovered?  What if all these years of thinking Sabbath was just a period of time in the weekend to avoid doing stuff, especially fun stuff, and actually was much more?

        What if Sabbath is an invitation into the heart of God and to the wonderful complexity of God’s family and creation?  Then the gift of Sabbath could be the further opening up of life, a tuning to rhythms we haven’t heard clearly, a celebration of relationships we thought we already knew or attainment of ones we thought impossible?

So this weekend together, June 7-8, could be a lovely gift of grace and discovery, and not just one more thing to do. Come and see. Blessings await.

Dear People of Peace,

Thank you for the warm welcome that you have extended to me in my first month as your sabbatical preacher.  I am enjoying getting to meet you all and learn a bit about your neighborhood, your parish and its mission.  If I don’t call you by name, please keep telling me your name until I do.

I am looking forward to sharing Holy Week and Easter with you.  I am also looking forward to our study of Mary Ann McKibben Dana’s book, Sabbath in the Suburbs, that we will begin shortly after Easter. 

I have read enough to see that the “sabbath” she is talking about is not a return to the hated day that your grandparents or great-grandparents may have told about when certain (usually fun) activities were forbidden.  Rather, it is the Sabbath that is the good gift of God to the Hebrew people who had been forced to work seven days a week during their years in slavery in Egypt.  The “Sabbath” that she is advocating is a day to step away from achievement and productivity and make time for relationships, rest and fun.

Does that sound wonderful? I believe that it is, but in our 24/7 world  where everyone is so busy, staking out such a counter cultural practice is going to be a challenge. While the author is negotiating this challenge from the point of view of a pastor/mother with young children, my newly retired husband and I are facing the same challenge at a different point in life.  How do you get time off when you no longer have a day off? It is going to be an interesting exploration.

Pastor Martha

Dear People of Peace,

I am so much looking forward to our time together, to getting to know you and the ministry of Peace Lutheran and the community in which you live, to the adventures you have planned for this sabbatical time.  The old proverb says that “March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb”, and something like this dramatic transition is waiting for us in the Sundays of March. We will begin on March 2^nd with the last scene of the Epiphany season, the disciples’ glimpse of Jesus in the glorious light of the Transfiguration. We’ll be saying “Bon voyage” to Pastor Erik and his family and celebrating with them as they set off on the sabbatical journey that you all have been planning and preparing for during the last year. And we’ll be introducing the pastoral team for the duration of the sabbatical which includes faces very familiar to you, Pastors David Wold and Eldon Olson, and one not so familiar face, Pastor Martha Myers, which is to say, me. I will be your preacher for 3 Sundays each month from March through July, though not always the same Sundays. 

Then, on Ash Wednesday, March 5^th, we will make the dramatic transition from the season of Epiphany to the season of Lent. I will be with you for some of these Wednesdays so I can get to know you better, though not necessarily in a leadership role.  Our Old Testament readings for the Sundays of Lent are some of the most foundational stories: the garden of Eden, the call of Abraham, water from the rock in the wilderness, the call of King David and the dry bones of Ezekiel.  After the story of the temptation from Matthew on the first Sunday, our gospel readings are all major stories from John’s gospel, running from Nicodemus who comes to Jesus by night in chapter 3 through the raising of Lazarus in chapter 11.  I look forward to exploring these with you in the weeks ahead.

Let me share just a little bit about myself.  I am now in my 35^th year of pastoral ministry.  I began with 3 years as an associate pastor in Marion Iowa.  We moved to Washington when my husband began 31 years as a professor of accounting at Pacific Lutheran University and I was called as pastor of Renton Lutheran church. During my 23 years there Renton grew and changed dramatically, presenting new challenges and opportunities for ministry which resulted in the redevelopment of our entire site into the Compass Veterans Center, Renton and the café/music venue/worshiping community that is Luther’s Table.

In the years since I’ve served as interim or supply pastor in 6 congregations.  After 23 years learning the needs and gifts of one congregation in depth, it has been fascinating to get to know so many different congregations, their personalities and ministry challenges.  I love to preach so much that I attend the pastors’ text study here in Renton even when I am not preaching. But when I’m not preparing a sermon for you, I will be planting vegetables, tending our apple and plum trees, taking walks with my newly retired husband, Gerry, singing in the choir at Nativity, Renton, trying to get back to playing my long neglected folk harp, volunteering at Luther’s Table and enjoying our two grown daughters, Rachel and Lucy.

Looking forward to getting to know you better and to sharing this sabbatical journey.

Martha Myers, Sabbatical Word and Sacrament Pastor