Good News of Great Joy

I am writing this article as junior high students are preparing to scale the Tower of Terror at our JOLT Adventure Camp, near Crivitz, WI. It is an exciting time to watch them encounter the “challenge by choice” model. They are responsible for their own level of challenge, and almost all of them will choose to move far beyond their original decision to only go “so high” on the Tower of Terror. I often speak of this life we live as a journey of faith. We are certainly watching that journey unfold for our junior high students during this week of Adventure Camp.

The Angel Gabriel said to Mary: “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy.” In this adventure we travel as the people of God at Ascension, God has smiled on us with great blessing in these last weeks of June, and I can share joyful news.

First, I am excited to announce that Vicki Taylor, our Director of Music Ministries, has agreed to accept responsibilities and provide leadership as the Handbell Choir Director as of August 1. What wonderful news for our community!

Second, with the deep and abiding faithfulness of God by our side, we have pondered and prayed about the Children’s Ministry of Ascension. We have had a dedicated team of teachers and parents meeting, interviewing, and researching throughout the region best practices for children’s ministries. After several months, we are now ready to move forward.

I am thrilled to share with you that on August 1, our Director of Youth Ministries, Tony Acompanado, will accept the responsibilities for the shape and direction of Children’s Ministry into the future. Council has invited and Tony has accepted a newly created position – the Director of Faith Formation. Tony will now oversee our children’s ministries, junior high JOLT ministries, and our senior high CRASH ministries. We are already looking to the fall with great anticipation.

The month of July will also see the next step in our 2025 Visioning Process. Caring Relationships and Mission Outreach will each present their current and future vision statements to the church council for review and reflection. Joyful Worship and Spiritual Growth are now in the second phase of redrafting their current and future vision statements for the church council to review a second time. In September and October, we will have the opportunity for the congregation to reflect on and ask questions about the statements and action plans to move us to 2025.

God is offering so much in the midst of these summer months. Please join us in the celebrations of the new design of staff positions and in the continuing visioning for Ascension’s future.

On a side note – July 7 is the day Tony and I leave for the 2015 ELCA Youth Gathering in Detroit, MI, which begins on July 15. We covet your prayers for the final planning, the 20 participants from our own congregation, and the 30,000 other high school students, adult leaders, bishops, and pastors who will join us on the journey. Peace and joy be yours in these summer days.

Pastor Chris Marien

(This article was taken from Ascension’s July 2015 newsletter).

A Future Unfolding

By: Rev. Christian W. Marien

The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt – a covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. ~ Jeremiah 31:31-33

Counting down the days to summer used to be a joy in the season of spring. In grade school, summer vacation meant long leisurely mornings and playing outside. In high school, summer days meant getting to my summer job by 8:30 a.m. and working until 5 p.m. if I wanted to fill my wallet and savings account. Now, as a parent, counting down the days to summer means navigating childcare, day camps, and new routines for drop-offs and pick-ups. Needless to say, I do not count down the days to summer vacation with the same enthusiasm as I did as a child.

The days are surely coming says the Lord, prophesies Jeremiah, reminding us God is not finished with God’s people. It is a word spoken of a future yet to unfold. I am grateful for church council under the direction of Council President Nada Draeger as Vision ARISE 2025 begins to bring focus to the future direction of Ascension. Church council, staff, wing and leg leaders, and other ministry leaders gathered in May for the first substantial piece of our new vision of the future for the glory of God. The excitement was palpable. We are indebted to Craig Greenwood who lead the retreat and laid the groundwork for the months ahead. 2025 might be ten years away but soon enough we will welcome 2024 and look to the next ten years of ministry of Ascension. Daunting? Not at all! Exciting? Absolutely! The Church of God seeks new expression even as we love and live what we now know.

The days are surely coming says the Lord. Let them come, Lord God. A new covenant – yes! A renewing of your promise to be among your people – yes! As the Holy Spirit moves among us, may we seek out those places and people where we realize the Lord’s presence.

In the next few months, I will extend invitations to you to share in listening sessions to help shape ARISE 2025, Ascension’s vision for the next ten years. The church council, wing leaders, and members serving in ministries of each of Ascension’s butterfly wings are beginning the next step of the visioning process. So the excitement grows!

Where will the Holy Spirit lead? How will we be moved by the tending of our God? Interested in joining in the conversation? Let me know. Give Nada a call. Talk to any council member. We would all love to have you join us in this second leg of the journey towards the future.

Counting down the days to summer used to remind me that the school year was over. Now as an adult, the summer days find different shape and purpose. I am glad to share in this journey of faith with each of you. Join in worship inside and outside this summer. Find your summer days marked a by a moment of prayer – giving thanks to God for a day of rest or a time of renewal with family and friends. Finally, ask God to help you recognize the presence of God in those around you and in yourself. And instead of counting down the days to the end of summer, imagine counting down the days towards a fresh fall and a future filled with hope for our church and our world to the glory of God.

Peace be with you!

(This article was taken from Ascension’s June 2015 newsletter).

The Hovering of the Holy Spirit

How does one begin to say goodbye? Just a few weeks after Easter and already we are prepare to say goodbye to our Savior as Jesus ascends into Heaven to sit at the right hand of God the Father. We feel like we hardly have enough time with Jesus. Even though we have the Word to keep us in tune with the teachings of Jesus and the will of God, it never seems fair at the end of the day that God did not allow for a little more time with God’s people while residing in human flesh. The day of Ascension flies by on May 14 this year. We lose Jesus on the cross after some major ministry and teaching, only to be reunited with him at the empty tomb. And in our great joy, realizing that our Savior has now risen from the dead, we get 50 more days of appearances before he ascends into his Father’s heavenly kingdom.

It just doesn’t seem like enough. I want so much more. I want the time to spend talking with Jesus after he has been to the other side. What is death like? How did it feel to push aside the stone? What was it like to laugh in the face of death as you pulled the grave clothes from your restored body? So many questions we never get to ask. And then, before we know it, the day of Ascension is here and our Savior ascends into heaven and we are left with…what? Is there anything better than Jesus? Why not stay on earth and coordinate a new way of life – a little beginner’s course on living a new life in the afterglow of the resurrection?

However, Jesus clearly tells us that after he ascends into heaven, we will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit:

I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate, to be with you forever. This is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you. ~ John 14:16-17

What great promise can be heard in those words? It is as if Jesus says, “Not only have I died on the cross for your sins, but in case that wasn’t enough to convince you, I will be sending someone to make the whole idea of salvation and the free gift of God’s love and grace more understandable.” The Holy Spirit is the person who moves in and among us, preparing us for God’s will and to hear God’s voice and pushing us in directions we sometimes would rather not go. This is the person that now stands as witness to God’s great glory and who helps to change our minds, warm our hearts, surprise us, challenge us, and propel us into the work God calls us to do as the people of God.

If we still do not understand what the ascension of Jesus and the gift of the Holy Spirit have in common, Jesus offers these words:

I have said these things to you while I am still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you. ~ John 14: 25-26

It’s as if, in God’s great wisdom, the saints are being equipped to do the will and work of God long before we ever heard words like empowerment, equipping, and the priesthood of all believers. So while there are still millions of alleluias to be shouted from rooftops as we rejoice in the resurrection of Jesus, the tears of goodbye can be set aside in order to do his work.

We are not passive observers of the ministry of Jesus, his life, death, and resurrection. We are full-fledged priests and participants in the will and the work of the One who is, who was, and who is to come. Come and be party to the great glory of God. Let your hearts fill to overflowing as your joy brings service and your service finds expression. Let that expression be to the glory of God in both the ministry of Ascension, and especially, in the life you lead each day.

With alleluias still ringing,
Pastor Chris

(This article was first published in Ascension’s May 2015 newsletter).

Joy in the Journey

Dear People of God,

There is joy in the journey of this life. It’s all about the journey. We always talk about journeys as if they are something we are trying to complete. We speak of extended vacation, the terminal illness, the marriages on the edge of divorce, the job we wish we could quit, the educational process, the committee meetings that seem to go nowhere, the life we live each day, and the report that needs to be finished yesterday. We live our lives hoping to complete our tasks a little early so that we might have a little free time over the weekend, or when we retire, or when spring break comes. And somehow, we end up behind again. We look for the easy way out and road most traveled. We look to any option that might help us finish a project sooner or relieve the suffering more quickly. Yet when it is all over, most of the time, we find that we had to travel the entire journey to get to where we most needed to go.

Holy Week is one of those journeys. One of those journeys that offers no easy solution and no quick release of the suffering and pain that will come in the days ahead. Jesus walks the road, measures each step on this journey, from the triumphant entry into Jerusalem to the pitiful, humiliating death on the cross. We walk this road too. Jesus helps us to measure our steps as well. We look to the joy of Easter morning as the end of the journey. We know that there will be pain, sadness, betrayal, and guilt along the way, but we have this feeling that somehow it has to be this way in order for us to conclude the journey at Easter, at the empty tomb.

Yet, we have to look past the empty tomb. For Jesus, and for us, the empty tomb of Easter morning is not the end of the journey, it is only a measured step. The empty tomb surprises us with joy on Easter morning. A light in a journey of darkness. Yet it is just a glimpse of the light that will flood all around us when we enter into the Kingdom of God.

The end of the journey is not Easter morning. The end of the journey is eternal life with Jesus in the Kingdom of God. Easter morning and the empty tomb only share with us a glimpse of the end of the journey. Yet, the end will not come until a place has been prepared for each of us.

Holy Week (Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, and Good Friday) helps to push our tired feet farther on the journey. When we enter into the gates of Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, we walk with our heads held high as our Savior is hailed as king and palm branches rise and fall in joyful praise of Jesus. Maundy Thursday brings us to an upper room away from the rest of the world, where we will eat with close friends, have our feet washed by our Savior, and go to pray with Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane. Good Friday will take us to the highest levels of government as Pontius Pilate debates with Jesus and finally hands Jesus over to be crucified. We will stand at the cross, in darkness, and feel the tears on our face and hear the hammers as they pound the nails into the flesh of Jesus. We will stand in the shadows and feel helpless. We will wait, with the whole creation, for Jesus to breathe his last so that we can carry him to the tomb and prepare his body for burial ourselves. And we will wait and pray and hope for something miraculous to happen.

So do not look for the end of the journey, rather find joy in the journey. Find your joy in Jesus Christ, and, all of a sudden, the joy of the journey will be complete and the end of the journey will come too soon.

With prayers for your journey ~ Pastor Chris Marien