Southwood Lutheran Church

A Thank You from Iraq

I received this email from a Southwood member, Dan Moss, who is deployed in Iraq. Dan recently received a Military Care Packages prepared and sent by a team of Southwood members. Dan's message is below. If you have a message of encouragement for Dan and our other deployed service members, share it in a comment to this post. I will make sure they get your messages.

Pastor Ryan,

Thanks to you and the members of Southwood that sent the cookies, magazines and newspaper. We are still living in a tent so we really do have everything we need. But the reminders from home are great to see. I couldn't tell you the last time I read a newspaper. We are on the list to move into more permanent housing, but no move-in dates yet.

Our camp is pretty small, but busy. The mission is important, so visitors and media are common. We have a gym and a tent to watch movies, play ping pong and pool and play X-box, but that's pretty much the extent
of it. Thankfully, I guess, we work long days so there isn't a lot of free time. The weather is starting to heat up some. Got up to 107-108 earlier in the week. We still have about 20-30 degrees to go once summer hits us. Thankfully, I work at night so I get to miss the heat of the day.

Thank you again for the care package, and more importantly, for all of the thoughts and prayers that go out to me and all service members abroad.

1LT Daniel Moss
530th MP BN

USE it on Friday.

This week we're thinking about our work and how God's purpose for our lives may or may not be lived out in our work.  If you missed Sunday's sermon click here, for other blog entries click here and here.

Today I encourage you to spend some time in prayer. Talk to God about both your challenges and your joys in your work.  Ask God to lead you in your work.  Pray that you would be a compassionate and generous example for your co-workers.

I stumbled upon this prayer website today. 

Check out Dear God.  There are lots of different people writing in their prayers, and lots of other people praying for and with them.  Its mostly anonymous - but its like a big huge internet prayer chain.  Check out this link with prayer requests specifically about work.

We know there are all kinds of people out there and all kinds of work situations - those who love their jobs, those who hate their jobs, those who are on the job search, those who've lost their jobs, those who feel stuck in their jobs, and those whose families wish they'd spend less time at their jobs.  Whatever your situation is - whatever your prayers are - please be sure to keep all workers in your prayers.

Pastor Sara

Sleeping on the Lord’s Prayer

Lord’s Prayer class for 1st graders

Last Sunday in the Faith Stepping Stones class for 1st graders and their parents, Pastor Michael and Luther helped the 1st graders look at the Lord’s Prayer petition by petition, drawing pictures for each petition and then translating them into a word and picture representation of the Lord’s Prayer on a pillow case.

Sleeping on the Lord’s Prayer probably won’t embed it in their memory, but reading it every night before they go to sleep might! Click on PRAYER to see kids and parents making the pillow cases.

Faye Koehn
Children & Family Ministry

Three Thoughts on Prayer

As we come to the end of our Small Group study on prayer I hope that you have been able to grow in the ways that you communicate with God. Certainly, if we've learned anything, we know that this is an ongoing process. Perhaps more questions have been raised for you than answered - hopefully you will continue to seek God's wisdom in these areas.

Here are three quotes on prayer I've come across in the last couple of days. I think they say some very true things about God and the mystery of prayer:

Phillip Yancey
I pray in astonished belief that God desires an ongoing relationship. I pray in trust that the act of prayer is God's designated way of closing the vast gulf between infinity and me. I pray in order to put myself in the stream of God's healing work on earth. I pray as I breathe - because I can't help it. Prayer is hardly a perfect form of communication, for I, and imperfect, material being who lives on an imperfect, material planet am reaching out for a perfect, spiritual Being. Some prayers go unanswered, a sense of God's presence ebbs and flows, and often I sense more mystery than resolution. Nevertheless I keep at it, believing with Paul that "now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known." (From Prayer, Does it Make any Difference?.)

Brother Lawrence
We must continually work hard so that each of our actions is a way of carrying on little conversations with God, not in any carefully prepared way but as it comes from the purity and simplicity of the heart.
(From The Practice of the Presence of God.)

Richard Foster
To pray is to change. Prayer is the central avenue God uses to transform us. (From Celebration of Discipline)

Pray With Purpose - Week 6

Pray for Prayer and Care Ministries.
Spend time this week praying for Southwood's ministry of Prayer and Care.

Pray for:

Pastors, Stephen Ministers, Small Group Leaders as they offer care to all those in need.

For “the least of these” that they would have the basic needs for an abundant life in this world.

All those in need that have encouragement and support. That all people would find prayer a way to nurture their own personal relationship with God.

Those that struggle with prayer that they would find a new way to connect and communicate with God.

Pray about how God would use you to care for those in need.

What are your prayers for prayer and care ministries? How is God calling you in this ministry? Post a comment.

Pray With Purpose - Week 5

Pray for Worship and Music Ministries.
Spend time this week praying for Southwood's ministry in Worship and Music.

Pray for:

The worship life of Southwood Lutheran Church that people would come to worship hungry for God’s word and ready to enter into worship that honor’s God.

The pastors as they preach the Word of God. Pray that they would be inspired to share the Gospel in a way that many would hear and be transformed by it.

All of our Sunday morning volunteers that they would be welcoming presence for all those they encounter.

The choir and all involved in music ministry. Thank God for their gifts of music and pray that others with such gifts might be inspired to praise God with them.

For those who have yet to discover their gifts can be used to praise God.

Pray about how God would use you in faithful worship.

What are your prayers for Worship and Music at Southwood? How is God calling you in this ministry? Post a comment.

Pray With Purpose - Week 4

Pray for Global Missions.
Spend time this week praying for Ministries in Honduras, Tanzania, and around the World.

Pray for:

Our sister parishes in La Ceibita, Honduras and the Uswaa Parish in Tanzania that they would be empowered to share the Gospel with all people.

For Heart to Honduras and for the Northern Diocese of the Lutheran Church in Tanzania that they would be encouraged and equipped as they strengthen leaders for new churches.

For the People in Honduras, Tanzania and throughout our world that they would be able to be who God created them to be.

All those who will go on a mission trip that their faith might be renewed.

Those who might someday go on a trip, that barriers to such a trip would be removed and they might feel confident in a journey of service and faith.

Pray about how God would use you in Global Mission.

What are your prayers for Gloobal Mission in our World? How is God calling you in this ministry? Post a comment.

I Pray for You

This is today's Faith at Work devotion (you can subscribe here). It expresses exactly how I feel about the people of Southwood -- much more eloquently than I can do myself. And the scripture really is my prayer for you today.

Kim

"When I think of the wisdom and scope of God's plan, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will give you mighty inner strength through his Holy Spirit. And I pray that Christ will be more and more at home in your hearts as you trust in him. May your roots go down deep into the soil of God's marvelous love. And may you have the power to understand, as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love really is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is so great you will never fully understand it. Then you will be filled with the fullness of life and power that comes from God. Now glory be to God! By his mighty power at work within us, he is able to accomplish infinitely more than we would ever dare to ask or hope. May he be given glory in the church and in Christ Jesus forever and ever through endless ages. Amen." - Ephesians 3:14-21 (NLT)

My friends, Read this. Read it again, read it slowly again. Yes, really! Know that this is my prayer for you, - not only for today, but for everyday. That as you are obedient to God's call, as you participate in his mission in this world, you will know in the very depths of your soul the depth of God's love and marvelous plan for you.

Never doubt that God has prepared you to make a difference in the world today. He has equipped you with gifts and talents, he has given you a sphere of influence which grows all the time. And he has placed in you a heart that is compassionate and caring and filled with his light and life.

Never doubtthe adequacy of his preparation, never doubt his power to follow through on his call, to lift you up when you are sinking down, and use you to shine a beacon of light and life in this dark world.

Give glory to God today, because there are people all over who thank God daily for you – for your heart – for your willingness to be sent – for your mission - your purpose, and most of all, – for you.

Simply bask in the love of your Savior, dwell in the house of your God and let your soul do back flips all day because he has chosen you. He is using you to change this world.

May he be the one who's given the glory by your life of obedience and achievements!

Bringing It Home:
1. Read it all again. Let it seep into your soul.
2. Believe it! And live what you believe!

Prayer:
Today, Lord, today may I live in the truth of these words! May my life reflect the beauty of your love! May my words, my actions be a reflection of your compassion. Fill me with joy. Fill me with grace. May I bring glory to you today. In your name I pray. Amen.

Jane Jebsen, Adult Discipleship Minister
Joy! Lutheran Church / Gurnee, Illinois
www.joylutheran.org

Should I eat the Chocolate Cookie?

I absolutely love these. The Reese's peanut butter egg candies that come out just before Easter. (They also have hearts on valentines day and pumpkins at Halloween, of which I have equal affection for.) I love them. I put a bag in my freezer and then I can just grab out a little snack when I need one.

Yesterday as I finished off a bag (a whole bag) of these that I had just purchased the week before - I decided that it was time for me to take a break from all that sugar for awhile. So I packed up the other bag (the one that by some miracle of willpower remained unopened in my freezer) and sent it off to my brother for his birthday. When the package was in the mail I said to myself: "That's it, I am going to cut back on sugar for the next week."

Since then here's what I've had:

1. A bowl of Ice Cream as a snack before bed last night.
2. A candy bar as a midmorning snack.
3. An Eileen's Sugar Cookie as a dessert after lunch.

And, there are some chocolate cookies sitting in the office here that I am seriously considering partaking in before the end of the day. Is that cutting back? NO!

And its not just about the sugar either. It just got me to thinking about how quickly I lose focus. How quickly I forget to do the things that I really want to do. How quickly I can catch myself doing that which I vowed not to do.

In Romans 5 Paul says:

"For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do."

Those Reese's are really just a metaphor for how pervasive sin is in my life. I can't not sin. I will always do the thing that I do not want to do.

Thank goodness for Jesus. Paul goes on to say in Romans 8:

"Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs to deep for words. And God who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God."

What a great way to define prayer and God's power to work in our lives. We're not always going to get it right. But God's power is so much greater than the power of sin. Thanks be to God, whose Spirit moves on our behalf.

I guess I'll forgo the chocolate cookie...

...until tomorrow.

Pastor Sara

Not so Random Thoughts

Yesterday I was driving to my small group meeting. On the way there I decided to turn off the radio and before I knew it a song popped into my head and I was singing away. The song? A random choice, or so I thought. It was a song I sang in church when I was a 6th grader. Here's the words (at least the ones I can remember):

Like as a father, filled with compassion.
So the Lord has mercy on those who fear him.

It was a pretty simple song in some ways. Although there were about four different parts that we sang. It was such a great song. The thing I was thinking to myself as I drove was - why in the world is this particular song in my head at this particular moment.

I figured it out during small group.

We are continuing our study of prayer. Yesterday one of the things that stuck out to me was when one person shared that she knows when random things or people (or in my case songs?) pop into her head she's supposed to pray about them. At first the skeptical side of me said: "that is just a coincidence!"

But then as our study guide led us into a time of group prayer. Our prayer started with a few verses from Psalm 103. Can you guess what the words of Psalm 103 were? I know, I know - the suspense is killing you! Check this out:

As a father has compassion on his children,
so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him.

The skeptical side of me is tempted to call it a random coincidence. But the part of me that is trying to grow in relationship to this compassion father is telling me its not so random after all.

So this week my prayer is that I will pay attention to the subtle (or not so subtle) ways that God is communicating with me. Wow! Thanks be to God.