New Website -- New blog

As of August, 2019, further blog posts can be found at:

https://www.discoveralc.com/blog/categories/pastor-scott

See you there!!!

Welcoming the world

Click here to see our 2019 Confirmation students: Devlin Frost, Kendall Kostialik, Jennifer Patten, Jamie Scott, Javin Udo

“All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need.  Day by day, as they spent much time together in the temple, they broke bread at home and ate their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having the goodwill of the people.  And day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.”                                                --Acts 2:44-47

            We get a lot of visitors at Atonement.  Some just want to check us out and see what Lutherans look like.  Some are vacationers or spring breakers.  Some are snowbirds looking for a “church down south.”  Some are family members visiting for the week.  Some are people new to the community or looking for a new church.  Some are people who have had a crisis in their life in the last month and need desperately to re-connect with God.  The list goes on and on.

            As our community grows, we have worked hard to make Atonement a safe and trustworthy “landing pad” for people to come and observe a Christian community at work.  Every worship service is an open door, a new possible entry point for visitors.  We now have 4 different entry points (until summer starts) ready to receive new people: Sunday services at 8:30am, 10am, and 11:30am, as well as our Saturday “godify” service at 5pm.  We have looked outward at our growing community and tried to create a schedule that will accommodate those who will be joining us in the future. 

            When I write to a visitor, I tell them “I hope you were warmly welcomed and felt the presence of God.”  That could mean different things to different people, but to me it means that somebody spoke to them, smiled at them, shook their hand and introduced themselves.  To me a warm welcome means you leave having made some new friends.  Your smile and welcome can make a difference in the way a visitor sees Atonement, and in the way someone views Christians in general.  You are an important part of our “hospitality team.”

            In Acts chapter 2, Luke describes the early church as a growing movement of people who are so close, they share their possessions with one another.  This is more than lending someone a bag of sugar, but actually pooling resources to take care of all who are in need.  This really happens here, in the ways we help travelers who have spent their last paycheck, in the way we feed families on Wednesdays, in the way we take up special collections for families that have lost their homes, in the way we give to hunger causes around the world. 

            The early church was not just a social welfare society.  They spent time together because God’s love had made them brothers and sisters to one another.  They encouraged and supported and prayed for each other, worshiping together in church (the temple) and at home (gratefully breaking bread).  We know it wasn’t all perfect, but this picture of the early church is given to us as an ideal to look towards, a pattern to follow. 

            They were also a part of their community.  Before there were persecutions, Luke tells us that the first Christians “had the goodwill of the people.”  We know that being a vital church means knowing the community around you, and being an integral part of the life of that community.  It means serving, but also being present and having a voice in that community.  The question is often asked of churches: “If your congregation closed down, would it make a difference?  Would anyone outside your church know the difference?”  We want to be a church that makes a difference.  I was delighted this Easter to hear reports that people in the new Wawa station down the street were overheard talking about our Easter vigil at the outdoor “tomb.”  We keep looking for new ways to proclaim to all that Jesus is Lord.

            We also want to do our best to make Atonement a place that welcomes all and is safe for all.  To that end, we are developing new policies and procedures regarding safety and security at the church.  We will be focusing on individual security and keeping the congregation safe in case of a disaster.  We have implemented a new policy regarding sexual harassment, copies of which are available in the entryway.   New guidelines for ushers are an attempt to help make the congregation safer as well as to give a warmer welcome to our newcomers. 

            We are also developing a new website, which we hope to have on-line in June.  This new website will present our congregation attractively for people checking us out on the web.  More and more of our visitors tell me that they found us online.  We will include an easy to navigate home page with our location and service times easy to find.  Feature pages will describe our ministries and a church blog will have running updates of things that are happening.  This website will include all essential information about our church and take the place of the pile of paperwork that we now give newcomers who attend our orientation.

            The website will also be replacing the current “Discovering God’s Love” newsletter.  We have published the newsletter regularly for many years, filling people in on what’s new and different around Atonement.  Now, it makes more sense to go online where people can share and access information 24/7.  I want to thank Ruby Agnir for her wonderful work in keeping the newsletter going.  Going forward, look for news and information on the blog and ministry pages of the new website. 

            We are a growing and changing church.  This is both a blessing and a challenge.  It is a blessing to see new faces, start new ministries, and help more people than ever before.  It is a challenge to reach those new people and learn new skills and technologies that are needed as we grow.  As in the early church when “day by day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved,” we find the Lord alongside us, giving us the strength and guidance to be His church in this new day and age.

Peace,

Pastor Scott

Let's pray for each other

Dear Friends and Neighbors,

            “It’s malignant.”  My heart jumped when my wife Susan said it after her doctor’s appointment last month.  We’d been keeping an eye on the lump in her breast for years, and up till now there had been no changes.  Now, suddenly it was growing and had even broken through the skin.  Knowing what we knew, we should have been ready to hear those words.  Still, it shocked us...cancer had entered our lives.

            As people of faith, we believe – no, we know – that God is good all the time.  But faith does not shield us from struggle.  God’s blessings do not include immunity to adversity or an inability to feel pain.  Yet in these last few weeks, God has sent us good doctors and we can see Him working through them on our behalf.  They are optimistic that we will beat this.  We are optimistic that God will. 

            I have prayed with many cancer patients throughout my years as a pastor, in living rooms and hospital rooms, at bedsides and at the altar…but it’s an altogether different feeling when it’s my living room, and when the eyes I’m looking into are my wife’s.  I know I can’t fix this, but I can stand beside her.  I can’t stop the pain, but I can offer comfort.  I can’t heal her, but I can pray to the One who can. 

She has had her first treatment and so far has faced each appointment and test with calm confidence.  Family, friends and church have gathered around us with prayer and encouragement, and we’d love to have your prayers as well.  As 1 Peter 5:7 tells us to “cast all your anxiety on God because he cares for you,” I pray that you can do that too through whatever struggles you are facing.  Please feel free to share your prayer concerns with us…call our church office or come by Fridays between 11:30am and 1:30pm for Drive-Through Prayer.  God loves us and wants us all to be whole, therefore, let’s “pray for one another, so that we may be healed” (James 5:17).

Peace,

Pastor Scott

Hearing Voices

“…Pilate said to them, ‘Why, what evil has he done?  I have found in him no grounds for the sentence of death; I will therefore have him flogged and then release him.’  But they kept urgently demanding with loud shouts that he should be crucified; and their voices prevailed.”

                                                                        --- Luke 23:22-23

            Whose voices prevail?  Growing up in America, I have always been taught and have always believed that democracy is the best form of government.  Even if that means it’s also the worst--except for all the others.  The voices of the majority are supposed to prevail, so we get what we asked for…supposedly.

But we know even better how it works in a family.  We can see the pitfalls of majority rule if we applied it to our family.  In a family, whose voices prevail?  Hopefully, the voices of the parents prevail because they know what’s best for the children.  If the children’s voices prevail, we’ll have a mess (at least if the children are anything like I was when I was a child). This doesn’t mean the children don’t have a voice and don’t get a say, it’s just that they don’t get to make the final decisions.  Their voices don’t prevail.

            We also know what happens to the masses when they are swayed by high emotions, manipulated by false facts, turned from the “better angels of our nature” into a mob that reacts with fear and violence.  One day’s bombshell dropped in the headlines, and your previously admiring public turns against you.  In the eyes of the world, you go from “winning” to “sinning” in an instant.  Whose voices prevail?

            As Jesus rode into Jerusalem positive that he wouldn’t make it out alive, it was the voices of the crowd prevailing.  They lauded and applauded his humble entrance, singing songs of blessing and celebrating with waving palm branches and a king’s welcome.  They were hoping he would be the one to defeat their enemies, rout the Romans, build them a new kingdom and help them dominate the world.  Their hopes were high when he entered the temple and drove out the merchants.  At last their voices were being heard.  At last they would be the ones on top. 

            But the enthusiasm fades fast…  He is seized, beaten, judged, and hurried to an execution, and when the crowds had a chance to redeem him from death, they prefer saving a terrorist.  Jesus, Son of God and Savior of the people is crucified, sentenced by the majority.  Their voices prevail.

            This month we will hear their voices ring out again as we walk together through Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday (the “night He was betrayed”), and Good Friday.  We will remember how those voices drowned out the voices of hope and faith and reflect on how our own voices still mingle with that crowd.  We will also hear his cries of agony and forgiveness from the cross, hear the shutting of his tomb, hear the silent finality of death.  But our journey does not end there.  On Easter Sunday we will walk together out of the dark and into the sunrise, and hear the one voice that matters most of all: the voice of God.  After it was clear that humanity deserved no part in what he came to bring, God brought it anyway: a new chance at hope, life, and love. 

We are blessed to live in a world where Jesus lives, and where in the end, God’s voice prevails.

OUR EASTER SERVICES THIS YEAR INCLUDE:

            Sunday Services on Palm Sunday: 8:30am, 10am, 11:30am

            Maundy Thursday service with First Communion: 7pm

            Good Friday service: 7pm,
                                                    followed by all-night vigil at the tomb

            Easter Sunday Services: 6:45am (outdoor sanctuary),
                                                                8am with 9am breakfast, 10am

            Each year we relive the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, and his journey from life to death and back to life.  One of our confirmation students observed that passion is what makes an athlete persevere to the finish of a race, a fight, or a hard-fought game.  Passion is what we have when we have invested body and soul in something or someone we love.  It makes us willing to sacrifice and willing to give our all for another.

            We hear a lot of voices in our world.  They want to tell us who is and is not worthwhile.  They want us to see the world from one angle and forget that there are many perspectives.  They want to mesmerize and distract us from God’s message of love and hope.  Come join us this Easter, as we listen to the one voice that calls out to us all…the one voice that prevails in the end, the voice that says we all are loved.  Come hear our God say, “Rejoice, for He is risen indeed…Alleluia.”

Peace,

Pastor Scott

Set Apart and Sent Out

"While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, 'Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.'  Then after fasting and praying they laid their hands on them and sent them off."       -- Acts 13:2-3

            My wife and I were having a discussion last week, and somehow we got to talking about “church language,” the words we Christians throw around that you don’t hear so much in the secular world.  Words like “sacrament” and “atonement,” “consecration” and “discipleship.”  We know what we mean by these terms (don’t we?), but often using fancy technical language creates barriers we don’t intend.  “Take the word ‘disciple’,” my wife said.  “Why would someone want to be a disciple?”

            That kind of stumped me.  “Why wouldn’t you?”

            “It sounds like you are going to be disciplined, punished.  It sounds like you’re a member of a cult.”

            “Oh,” I said.  “Like a minion.”  “Yeah,” she said.

            We have had discussions like this about the word “atonement.”  A beautiful word to those who have their soteriological Christology down pat (how’s that for some fancy words).  That just means that if you understand that atonement is about the salvation offered to us through the sacrifice Jesus made for us on the cross, then it’s a great, positive and attractive word.  A fine name for a church.

            However, if you look at the word “atonement” through the eyes of someone who is unchurched -- someone unfamiliar with the Christian message (in other words, the people we are supposed to be attracting) – then it is a barrier.  I’ve run into many people who have no idea what it means.  Even for those who do, it’s not a word people use in everyday conversation, doesn’t come up often in secular media, and for many it means something negative.  Like the disciple/discipline connection, for many people the word atonement brings up the image of being punished, atoning for your own sins, making up for your faults through suffering.  Maybe not the best name for a church.

            But here we come into the season of Lent, that time on the church calendar that brings together these 2 esoteric themes of discipleship (and, yes, discipline is part of that), and atonement.  To be a disciple, or student, of Christ is not a transformation into a mindless minion.  Rather, it is a commissioning which we receive when we are baptized.  A commissioning is a moment when you are set apart for some special task.  The commission we received at baptism means we are all part of the “school” of Jesus, each of us learning, growing, and serving every day in the ways that He teaches us.  It means we all have the responsibility to share what others have shared with us.

The eternal challenge of sharing the message of God’s love is to tell God’s story in ways that help people hear, understand, and respond to his call to become disciples.  That is the mission of all Christians – to be disciples who make other disciples (Matthew 28).  It happens in the way Christian parents raise their children, teaching them to pray, worship and live out God’s commandments.  It happens in the way Christians treat their neighbors, relatives, co-workers, and people they meet on the street every day.  It happens in the way we tell our stories of what God has done for us and encourage others to find the same grace and peace that we hold in our own hearts.  These are some ways we live out the mission of Christ and the commission of our baptisms. 

In Lent we get back to the heart of that mission and return to the grace that started it all – the cross of Jesus Christ.  Jesus re-commissions us all by offering us the sign of his grace…the cross, marked with ashes on our foreheads on Ash Wednesday.  That cross is our badge of belonging to the “school” of Jesus’ disciples, pledged to deepen our faith and broaden our love.  In the time of Lent, urged forward by our discipleship we approach the cross of Jesus and the mystery of atonement.  The cross on our foreheads remind us of our destination.

This year, Ash Wednesday will be March 6.  You can come get ashes at 2:30 in the afternoon, or at the 7pm communion service.  The remaining Wednesdays of Lent will feature services at 7pm.  Our theme this year is “Lasting Hope,” with messages drawn from the psalms.  100 Lasting Hope devotionals are available one to a family on a first come/first served basis starting March 3.  They may also be ordered online for $3.00 each from Augsburg Fortress ($6.00 for large print). 

On Sundays of Lent, we are looking at our commissioning as disciples by demonstrating ways God’s people serve.  First off, we are celebrating a wonderful anniversary this Lent of a remarkable service ministry of Atonement.  This March 9 will mark the 10^th anniversary of the start of our Helping Hands Food Pantry.  To help us celebrate that amazing ministry, we are inviting you to participate by “doing the can-can” and bringing in 2 canned goods each week…

The first Sunday (March 10) we spotlight world hunger and the 30 hour famine that Atonement youth will be undertaking March 15-16.  If this sounds like our youth will be going without food for 30 hours, you’re right!  They will be doing activities and raising funds for people throughout the world for whom food is scarce.  The third Sunday (March 24) we will be highlighting the work of Lutheran Disaster Response, and the fifth Sunday of Lent (April 7) we will be looking at the ministry of ELCA World Hunger.  Opportunities to donate to these worthy causes will be given at each service.

The alternate Sundays in Lent, we will be celebrating special commissionings in our midst.  On March 17, we will commission 3 new Stephen Ministers to do special ministries of caregiving in our congregation: Detlev Aeppel, Laurie Chiaramonte, and Kirsten Westbrook.    These people have completed 50 hours of training and are committing to 2 years of one to one Christian caring for people in crisis and transition.  On March 31, our bishop’s assistant Khader Al-Yateem will join us to commission our 2 new Synod Parish Deacons: Esthel Kane and Rebecca Parker.  These people have completed 2 years of supervised training and discipleship under my guidance and have been approved by the Synod to be Parish Deacons here at Atonement. 

These commissionings are just specialized instances of the commissioning we have all received through our baptisms into Christ – to study and practice the ways of Christ, to follow him in the path of the cross, to be set apart and sent out for the good of all the world.  From the ashes of Lent to the glory of Easter, we follow Jesus, the apostles, and the saints of every age – we walk alongside all believers and hopers and dreamers and martyrs and missionaries and healers and teachers and preachers…everyone who believes that the world needs love and that God’s love is here for them and for us, for me and for you.  Come and join us on the journey of hope. Lent is here, and school is in session.

Peace,

Pastor Scott

Doctor's orders

“Be on guard so that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day does not catch you unexpectedly, like a trap.  For it will come upon all who live on the face of the whole earth.”

                                                                                    -- Luke 21:34-35

            Officer Sven turned on his lights and the car he was following, doing 75 in a 55 zone, pulled to the side of the road.  He walked over and peered into the driver side window, and lo and behold – it was Ole and Lena!  “Ole, y’know how fast you was goin’ back derr?,” he asked.  Ole said, “I was only goin’ 55, officer…”

            Just den Lena piped up, “Oh, Ole, you know you was doin’ well over 80 miles an hour.”  Ole gives ’er a mean lookin’ scowl.

            Officer Sven says, “An’ I’m givin’ ya a ticket fer dat broken tail light ya got.”  Ole replied, “Geez, officer, I didn’t know about no broken tail light.”

            Lena says, “Come on, Ole, I been tellin’ ya about dat light fer da last two weeks.”  Ole looks over at Lena again and gives ‘er da nasty stare again.

            Officer Sven looks down at Ole, shakin’ his head.  “I’m also givin’ ya a citation fer not wearin’ your seatbelt,” he says.  Ole protests, “But I jus’ took it off as you was walkin’ up to da car here.”

            Lena shakes her head, “Now, Ole.  You know you never wear dat seatbelt.  I been tellin’ ya how dangerous dat is.”  Ole turns to Lena and yells, “Woman, can’t ya ever keep shut dat big hole in your face, derr?”

            “Lena, does he always talk to ya like dat?” asked the policeman.

            “No, officer,” says Lena.  “Only venn he’s drunk.”

            Doctor Luke has some very clear points to make by the way he tells the story of Jesus.  This year we’ve been reading out of Luke’s Gospel on Sundays, tracing the way Jesus travels from his unique and amazing birth, through his years of ministry, his death on the cross and finally his new and risen life.  The story will continue in Luke’s sequel to the gospel, the Book of Acts, where it is the disciples who carry on the ministry in the power of the Spirit, acting as Christ’s body resurrected into the world.

            But Luke was a physician before he became a writer of a best-selling gospel.  His was always a ministry of healing.  He never quite put away the black bag and stethoscope.  As he tells the Jesus story, he highlights the way the words and wonders of Christ make people whole, restore them to health, and affect their lives in wholistic ways.  Luke shows us Jesus concerned with the body, mind, and soul of each person he encounters.

            Jesus tells his followers (including us) to be watchful.  Doctors typically have us watch all kinds of things – our weight, what we eat, how much we exercise we get.  Someone recently showed me their fitbit watch, which keeps track of just how much and how well they sleep.  These days we can watch our social media feeds, watch the weather forecast, watch the news, watch our front porches with the new doorbell cameras.  These days, life can be so full and overwhelming that we’re not always sure what we should be watching.

            Luke remembers that Jesus cautioned us to beware of “dissipation, drunkenness, and the worries of this life.”  We “get” drunkenness and worry, but what does he mean by dissipation?  The dictionary tells us that dissipation can mean, “wasteful squandering, frittering away, draining and depletion by wild or extravagant spending.”  Being overwhelmed by worry or immersion in worldly concerns can leave us inebriated and groggy.  Staring at screens all day, hours of close reading or desk work, fretting and fuming about things you can’t change… these kinds of things can leave us feeling spiritually disconnected, unbalanced and detached from God.    Like poor Ole, we can feel like we’re missing all kinds of things, like we’re just falling apart and ready to blame whoever is pointing that out. 

            Jesus himself modeled a persistent life of prayer.  He followed a regular discipline where, withdrawn from the public eye, he would re-center and re-connect with his heavenly Father every day.  Martin Luther was once asked if he had time for prayer now that his schedule was so incredibly busy.  He said, “In fact, I have so much to do, I need to spend even more time in prayer.”  Far from being a waste of time or effort, or something that gets in the way, he realized that prayer can restore power and direction to your day. 

            Find a place and a time to be alone with God today.  Close the door and let the accumulation of life’s worries wait outside.  Luke recalls how Jesus told about one sheep that was worth searching out while the other 99 waited; or one coin that filled the woman with joy when she found it, despite the other 9 she had in her purse; or the son who returned from his messy and messed up life into the arms of his waiting father.  Your heart, your soul, your faith is worth the time you set aside for it.  Your God is eager to lift you up in his loving arms, to hold you to his bosom, to replenish you with grace and peace.  For the sake of your own spiritual, emotional, and mental health, make room for him every day -- Doctor’s orders.

Peace,

Pastor Scott

Feel Free

“About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them.  Suddenly, there was an earthquake, so violent that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone’s chains fell off.”

 – Acts 16:25-26

Dear Friends of Atonement,

          A red haired Wisconsin teen is kidnapped, her parents shot dead.  The 911 call leads police to the house, but less than a minute too late.  She is gone, with no major clues as to who took her or where.  First neighbors and relatives are shocked, then it’s our turn as we follow the newscasts day after day until our hearts give in to the growing likelihood that little Jayme Closs was dead.  And then one day, there she is.  A sudden opportunity, and she’s running through the cold and the snow into the arms of freedom.

            Jayme’s story hit us so powerfully because it shows us that God can set us free even when we have almost lost hope.  Deep down we know that all things are possible for God.  And yet we often live our daily lives with a dim, flickering lightbulb of faith when it should be as bright as the Florida sun.  

            Paul and Silas had such a bright hope burning that night in the jail cell singing their first century equivalents to “Amazing Grace” and “Shine, Jesus, Shine.”  Arrested for healing a young slave girl whose owners were exploiting her disease, Paul and Silas had been grabbed, stripped, beaten, and thrown into the darkest cell in the local prison, their feet locked in stocks.  They had no idea whether or not their captors would execute them in the morning, but there they were, singing.  Somehow they were just as free after they walked into that cell as they were before.  Goes to show, the world can’t take away what God puts into your heart.

            Could this be what Paul was driving at when he wrote that in Christ we are called to freedom, and “for freedom Christ has set us free” (Galatians 5:1).  The world wants to take us captive and put us in chains.  It wants to tell us that even after God gives us all things, we still need the world’s stuff.  We need to keep acquiring things, to get the latest this or that, to buy into this plan and get that paid subscription, to make sure we have insurance for everything and access to anything.  The world would have us stay too busy to rest, too fearful to love, and too worried to think.  The world wants us investing in the world rather than the kingdom of God.  But then, along comes Jesus.

            Jesus lived a life of pure freedom.  Yes, he was obedient to his Father God, going down in the Jordan and up on the cross.  But in everything he did he was free, freely choosing God, choosing love, choosing you.  When that earthquake hit and Paul and Simon had their chains shaken off, their cell door came off its hinges and fell to the floor.  They were free.  But instead of walking out, they chose, of their own free will, to stay in that jail cell so they’d be there in the morning.  They knew the jail keeper would be punished if they escaped.  By freely choosing to stay, they saved more lives than their own that night.

            Giving your offering is like that.  You are free to give or not to give.  You could choose to spend all your money on worldly things, eating out more, and buying extra clothes, taking extra vacations, or slipping more into your 401(k).  But you also know that it would only be investing more in a kingdom which is already passing away.  Christ has made us God’s people and citizens of heaven.  Because of him, we feel free to invest in His eternal kingdom, and to freely live our thankfulness for all God has done for us. 

            Giving to God is an act of faith, a protest against the false voices that tell us that our worldly worries are more real than our salvation.  Being generous stands in opposition to the mindset that we need to worry about tomorrow, about what we wear, about keeping up with the neighbors.  Each dollar in the offering plate refutes the idea that having lots of things makes us secure, and that we can’t be happy without the newest, shiniest stuff.

            In Christ, your chains are gone.  Your bills and debts do not define who you are or what you can do.  Yes, you should pay your bills and manage your debts, but also live reflecting the life of Jesus, who lived simply, loved deeply, and gave generously.  Thank you for sharing your offerings with Atonement, for having the courage to give as your heart longs to, and as your faith calls you.  And if you’re not quite there yet, remember that you are a chosen and beloved child of God, no matter what.  The door is open and your chains are gone.  Feel free!

Peace,

Pastor Scott