By Robert Hasselblad

For many years, I taught Sunday School and attempted to explain the nature of God as one who calls us.  In our modern sophisticated era, God’s voice is silent.  Maybe because we no longer know how to listen, or maybe because the noise of our manufactured lives drowns God out.  As a teacher, I tried to get youth to see that God’s power over us and interest in us were not necessarily muted by that silence.

This poem is an attempt to recapture the flavor of those Sunday School lessons.  Lessons we have all learned and carry within us as an insight into God’s call.

WHEN GOD CALLS

In Sunday School we learned

God shouts and folks obey.

Noah, gather gopher wood and build you an ark.

For I’m bringing a flood of waters

To cover the earth, to destroy all life.

With you though, I will have a new covenant.

Now start building before the clouds get too dark.

In Genesis God’s throat opened.

Words clear, everything outlined.

Abram, Haran’s got nothing for you anymore.

There’s a place I found down south, where I will

plant you like a seed.  I will make of you

a great nation.  Leave country and kindred

and together we will define the future.

God liked dramatics too,

a bush aflame and a deep baritone.

Moses! The cries of my people Israel

are a terrible noise.  So you must

speak with Pharaoh.  Together we’ll break

the chain of their slavery.  I’ll reveal

my power to you along the way.

The prophets never had a chance,

they were drafted before birth.

Jeremiah, before you were born I knew

In the womb I shaped you for a prophet.

You never had a choice, for your voice

must ring out with my condemnations.

Let the nations know that I don’t retreat.

The gospels ran the same way.

Angels on hand, God pronounced.

Oh Mary, you’ve found favor with God.

That will be written into the account.

Soon enough you will bear God’s son

And you will name him Jesus.

You can name your others whatever you want.

Jesus had his twelve, each invited

with an assumption they’d be glad to sign up.

Levi, leave your counting table; that’s Rome’s game.

Judas, abandon the rat-pack of zealots.

Boys, drop the nets and let the fish catch themselves.

Sons and husbands, leave your homes.

I’ve got multitudes to feed and storms to tame.

Even risen, Christ was not done calling.

Bright light and loud voice, Saul went down.

Why Saul do you menace me?  I am Jesus!

Now that you’re blind I’ll let you see

what I have in mind for you.

You’ll speak to the world, your words

will live forever when you preach for me.

It is never easy, simple or sure.

When God calls, everything is on the line.

Tacoma letter writing group supports causes such as micro-finance and disease control.

by Judith Rucker

About six years ago, my good friend encouraged me to attend a meeting in Tacoma for RESULTS. I had never heard of RESULTS prior to this, but my friend explained to me that it was a “political action group” that writes letters to local political leaders in the House of Representatives and the Congress. That is why and how I got to my first meeting.

I was very nervous at this meeting and I did not know if I would fit in. I soon discovered I had nothing to worry about, as everyone was supportive of me although my first letters were not very good. They just said that it takes time and practice to get this letter writing thing down because each person needs to find his or her own voice.

Where do the causes we write about come from? They come directly from paid RESULTS staff in DC. The staff there keeps track of what is coming up for vote that concerns the issues supported by RESULTS, such as micro-finance or disease control. This means that we are always on-track and up-to-the minute on the causes that really matter.

Politicians do take notice when several people from their districts write on the same topic and urge the same actions. All politicians, regardless of party affiliation, want to stay in office. So they respond, usually with reply letters, to their constituents requests. RESULTS members also write Letters to the Editor in their local newspapers. RESULTS has clout!

You do not have to be a Christian to support RESULTS but if you do not have faith in a Higher Being it is almost impossible to stick it.  Why is this so?  Because there is no immediate visible indication of success.  That’s where my faith comes in and that is why I continue writing letters and attending meetings.  I am willing to wait the weeks, months or even years it takes to succeed.

Please see www.RESULTS.org for more information or to donate.

by Lauren Balerud

I absolutely loved the ELCA youth gathering in new Orleans this year. I wanted to go to New Orleans for this so that I could learn more about the Lord while in a different setting than I am usually exposed to.

While I was there, I had an incredible time. A highlight of the trip was when Ruth Young, Jenna Comstock, and I all donated 8 inches of hair to Children With Hair Loss. The theme of the ELCA is “God’s work, our hands” so we felt this was one way we could use ourselves to give to a bigger cause.

Another highlight was worshiping every day with 32,000 other people in the room– words cannot describe how amazing that felt. You would think you could not connect with that many people, but walking around the streets of New Orleans high-fiving all the other Lutherans from around the country made you feel like you were united with them.

While big worship was great, I also enjoyed when we had a service with just the people from our synod. Now that I’m back home and have gone on with “regular life” I feel that I have a deeper connection with the Lord on an average day, which is a result from the stories I heard from speakers and my own experiences in New Orleans.

St. Louis Cathedral at Jackson Square, New Orleans, LA. Youth Director, Ingelaurie Lisher and Saint Mark's Youth, Jenna Comstock, Lauren Balerud (the author!), and Ruth Young.

by Sally Anne McLean

Before I retired, I would treat myself a few times a year to a session with a licensed muscle therapist. Even though she always saw me on time, I would arrive early. In her anteroom, instead of a rack full of outdated magazines, there was a card table set up with an unfinished, 500-piece picture puzzle scattered on its top.

Once, when I arrived, I found that the puzzle’s four outside edges had been completely framed and the interior of the picture was about half finished. The cover of the puzzle’s box, propped up on the table, showed a picture of Virginia’s Governor’s Mansion and, of course, was meant to be a guide in the completion of the puzzle. Alas, the sky was cloudless and evenly blue, the elm trees were dressed in the same shade of green, even the architectural features of the mansion (the plain brown roof, the uniformity of the red brick façade, the white shutters at every window) offered few clues as to which particular piece went where.

I would not have had to work on the puzzle at all; I could have just closed my eyes and rested for a few minutes. But the invitation to further the completion of the puzzle was silently before me, and so that is what I chose to do. I pulled up a chair, but was able to place only four pieces before the therapist appeared and gave me the happy news that the massage room was now ready for me.

I hadn’t been working on the puzzle long enough to have become frustrated. I knew that the completion of the puzzle was not expected of me; it would be enough that I would make a contribution. The next person who pulled up a chair to work at that puzzle would be grateful I had been able to place those four pieces; by reducing the number of the yet-to-be-placed puzzle pieces, I had increased the probability that he would be able to place the remaining ones.

Bringing others to Christ is somewhat like putting together a large picture puzzle. The Bible has given us an idea of what the finished product should look like. One could easily feel overwhelmed, inadequate to the task — there are so many pieces to the puzzle; there is so much to do! Teach Sunday school. Sing in the choir. Feed the homeless. Arrange the altar flowers. Serve on the council.

Here is some happy news for you — none of us is expected to do it all. When each of us takes a few minutes here and there to make whatever contribution we are able, the next person who comes along is able to build on our efforts, and — at the appointed time — the picture will be revealed. So consider yourself invited. Pull up a chair, and see which pieces of the puzzle you can put in place.

Read more of Sally Anne McLean’s work in her book,  At Faith Value: Seeing His Hand at Work in the Ordinary. It’s available on Amazon… go through the link on our Just Shopping page and a piece of your purchase will go to St. Marks!

by Roger Iverson

Mother, God rest her soul, was a bald faced liar. If she stubbed her toe she could also scream a chain of foul words blue enough to shame a sailor, but that’s not part of this story.

Mother was a liar and that’s where this story begins, when I was small. I can still see her face, thin for a Dane, framed in a blond halo of hair, over me, her fingers lightly tickling me, saying, and these were her exact words, she told me: “God made the apple trees blossom the day you were born. You are a special little boy, my special little boy.” She told me wonderful things would happen to me and I had better be prepared for miracles. She said I was destined.

And I believed Her!

So when the poor grades started coming home, in September of first grade, she said, “Don’t worry. God works wonders!” And when it was obvious I wasn’t reading, Mother said, “Be patient, Special One.” And when I couldn’t calculate or spell or write or stay in the lines, I remember she soothed, “It will come. God made the apple trees blossom the day you were born.” And I believed her.

But many apple crops ripened and rotted. Mother’s language became lies. School was a nightmare of embarrassment. Many times, alone and unable to rise to Her stories, I wanted to throw it all away, to quit, stop. My lowest was Special Ed. class, waiting for the middle school halls to clear so I could slip into the gray room to endure the gray teacher. The Heavens didn’t open and The BASSO PROFUNDO didn’t sing to my soul. I hated school. I hated me.

It wasn’t until high school when I first found success. This lead to that and those begat more until I graduated from there and graduated from here and graduated three times more.

While I grew, Mother began to teach. She invited me into her Special Ed. classroom. I wasn’t met with the gloomy, drooly faces I knew but by bright, inquisitive little humans, each one an expert in some small flake of learning, each one a star in Mother’s constellation. She coaxed me and coached me and sent me to more rooms and schools until I relinquished my visions of failure. And only I knew why Mother chose the Special class to teach.

Today, I bring my decade of disillusions into my own elementary class. When I see a small soul about to dissolve, I kneel down, eye to eye and whisper, “I have a secret: I knew a boy who was sadder than sad. And guess who that boy is today!” We two become a team, intent upon success. I protect my Dear Darling Ones from the failure I endured. That is my miracle I see a hundred times a day.

Mother has been gone these many years but I still see her face, thin for a Dane, framed in a blond halo of hair. She calls to me: “Son, you are special to Jonté and Samath and Uqnitaqua and Samnang and all the rest of your little ducklings in your little corner classroom.” Mother tells me I am exactly where I am supposed to be, making their fractured lives whole, working my service to the Lord. I see her smile knowingly as if to say, “See the wonders? Didn’t I tell you?”

…And I believe her.