Blessed to Be a Blessing

Prone as we are to trivialize life,
to measure it by nameless scatter'd things,
I long for moments with more permanence.
One such was offered me just last Sunday
when Salem's choir accompanied by
a soloist and instrumentalists
peformed Bradley Ellingboe's Requiem.

The stage was set for me to receive it
by a single phrase in the opening hymn,
Robert Baxter's "O Holy Angels Bright."
Souls at rest and saints who now serve below
were urged in time and space to sing God's praise
"with angels bright who wait at God's right hand,"
each "taking our part with a well-tuned heart."

And what was the phrase that moved my spirit?
"Take what he gives and praise...through good and ill."
How better prepare one's mind and spirit
to enter wholly into what followed?
Requiem--life and death merged in the Light
of divine creation and end-time hope,
what God has prepared for those who love him.

People went away diff'rent than they came.
The Spirit had led us to deeper realms
both within ourselves and outside ourselves.
Our God who was and is and is to be
moved through his Spirit to sanctify us,
blessing our Requiem worship of him
and preparing us to be a blessing.

Open Our Eyes, Lord

Abounding Grace

Flowers are,
like the snow
and the rain,
reminders
of divine
love and grace:

Always there
to be seen
and enjoyed
if one gives
time and space
to notice.

Multiform
in shape and
colored hues
they amaze
one’s senses,
even soul.

Capture them
in your heart
and feed on
them in mind,
that God be
glorified.

There are no
places void
of divine
influence.
God’s grace is
ev’rywhere.


JRH
4/16/10

Happy Birthday, Don Frisk!

Professor Donald C. Frisk celebrates his 99th birthday today. I was reminded of that when I received this picture of him yesterday with his three grandchildren and five great-grandchildren, taken where he now lives at The Holmstad, a Covenant Retirement Community in Batavia, Illinois.

Few individuals in the 125 year history of the Covenant Church have influenced our common life and thought more than he has through life-long preaching, teaching, and writing. His earlier New Life in Christ was especially helpful among the many that could be mentioned. And hie book on Covenant Affirmations amplifying earlier tract and booklet publications on the same themes is a classic exposition of Covenant life and thought.

Clarity of mind and precision in language have always marked his work. So has his disciplined focus on the things that remain in the classic Christian tradition our forebears received from the Protestant Reformation, the later advent of Pietism, and the revival movements that swept them up together in the joys of believing and belonging.

Thirty-eight entrees are listed under his name in Glad Hearts, coming either from his pen alone or in cooperative ventures deeply influenced by him. “There is only one ministry,” he used to tell us in seminary, “and that is the ministry of Jesus Christ." The implications for us were clear. Ours is simply given to enter into Christ's ministry, no matter how or where we serve.” I invite you to re-visit today whatever you may have of his writing. It will both challenge you to think theologically and inspire in you Christ's call to personal, communal, and missional action.

Listen, in tribute, to but one entry addressing church life today and the often neglected power of the Holy Spirit available to us:

 Often one hears the complaint that the Christian church lacks power. But in the Holy Spirit unlimited power is available–power which is released through prayer and through action. Power, however, is a precious gift which God does not bestow indiscriminately. He gives as much as is needed for a specific task. Too often we lack power because we do not accept tasks and responsibilities big enough to merit such strengthening from above. The mediocre lives which multitudes of Christians love do not require great strengthening and hence there is little evidence of its presence, but let a Christian seriously attempt the demands of the Lord in the church and community and strength would be given in proportion to the task. What world-shaking things the church could accomplish if we prayerfully accepted the full responsibilities that now confront us!
                                                          What Christians Believe (1951), pp. 19,20.

Happy Birthday, Don! Pray for us that we may remain as faithful to Christ and each other as you have proven yourself to be--a companion, like your forebears, of all those who fear God and love his appearing.

Thank God for My Brother Efrem!

What richness has come into the life of the Covenant Church in recent years through those of different ethnic backgrounds who have become such an integral part of its common life and ministry.

Let this interview of Efrem Smith, well-known nationally as founding pastor of Sanctuary Covenant Church in Minneapolis and soon to become superintendent of the Pacific Southwest Conference, serve as but one example of that richness.

What could possibly have pleased our forebears more that listening to Efrem's life story and witness, his passion for being a churchman in ministry, and his manifest desire to be what they first set out to be--"a companion of all those who fear God" (Psalm 119:63).

O the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways.... For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be the glory forever. Amen  (Romans 11:3-36).


Efrem Smith from rooted wings on Vimeo.