Christmas is over (the 12 days are up on Epiphany, January 6 as the wise men come to visit Jesus) and the lights have come down in our neighborhoods and houses.

But the light continues to shine even when the twinkling of Christmas lights fades or disappears.  We hope you will worship with us as we reflect the light of Christ for a world of darkness in the coming days and weeks.

Worship – Sundays at 10:30 AM.

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If you were in worship Sunday, October 30, 2011, you heard 25 theses/ideas/notions of how church should be.  These theses are up for public debate and are submitted below.  Write your comments here, email them to the pastor (pastor@hopeclinton.org), talk about them, and wrestle with how we shall be a community of faith and Hope.

25 Theses on the Power and Efficacy of the Church
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Hope Lutheran Church – Clinton, MD

Out of love and concern for the body of Christ, I, Kate Davidson, servant of Christ, humbly submit to you the following for public discussion and action.

1. Jesus said, everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin (John 8:34). We sin, therefore we are slaves to sin.  All of us.
2. As slaves, we have very little control over certain aspects of our lives.  Sin has the power to dictate what we do at particular times and places.
3. We are slaves all the time, even while we worship God.
4. Therefore we shall not expect this place, this community, to be perfect or anything less than real.
5. This congregation shall not be a sterile community where people are expected to pray the “right way,” say the “right things,” or even believe the “right things.”
6. Instead this will be a congregation of slaves who question the system and have a place to let their frustration/anger/impatience with a flawed, broken life show.
7. This community of faith, while allowing space for the slaves to vent their frustration, will also plot and scheme to be subversive, choosing love and hope over sin and anxiety.
8. This community will be a place in a world dominated by slavery to sin where the slaves can and will have a taste of freedom.
9. But this freedom, this subversion of love and hope will not tolerate an anything goes attitude.  Slaves who are a part of this community or wish to be a part of this community will be able to be vulnerable because the community will resolve to hold each other accountable to love, letting them know when they have crossed a line or their action or inaction has been hurtful.
10. This will not be a community of consumers or observers – for that is not community.  Instead this will be a place where some sort of participation and growth in faith is mandatory.
11. We are slaves to sin – and we know our slavery intimately because we are enslaved to ourselves.  Our selfish desires, our anxiety, our own system.
12. Even enslaved to the false idea that we can ultimately free ourselves.
13. Visiting or being a part of this community will not be one more thing on a checklist of moral choices we’ve made that will earn our passage through the pearly gates of heaven.
14. Nor will participation in this community be a refuge against all the change in the world.  But instead it shall be a place where we learn to live as change agents, working for the good of the world.
15. Because we have been caught up in the beauty of the kingdom of God, made to be members of the body of Christ – a body that is here, active in the world.
16. Because we recognize that while the slave does not have a permanent place in the household, the son has a place there forever and the son has chosen to set us free.
17. We are slaves who have been set free – free to be changed, never giving into the fear and anxiety the unknown brings.
18. Free to enter into the pain and suffering of our lives and in doing so finding new life.
19. Free to sacrifice everything so that we may enjoy the splendor of the kingdom of God.
20. Free to live outside of the system that binds us and holds us captive.
21. Free to love those the world says are unlovable.
22. Free to be subversive and push the status quo.
23. Free to be loved for who we are and free to learn and grow.
24. Free to be the body of Christ.
25. Free only because God has set us free.

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I know some people who wish winter would just die.  That it would pass away and leave us without its harsh wind, bitter cold, and sometimes towering snow.  These are the people who seek to escape winter by traveling to a tropical destination once the temperatures fall below 50.

But winter won’t die – instead the kind of death winter brings, one that saps the life from the trees and most other plant life, is instrumental in bringing about the new life we see with the warmer temperatures of spring.  Seeds that fall to the ground in the fall must die and break in order for the promise of a new plant to take root in the soil.  Death is not only inevitable, but needed.

So I’ve begun to wonder about this with regard to our faith. Why is it we shy away from talking about death?  Death of a loved one, our own inevitable death, or the death of our hopes, dreams, and expectations?  It is only in entering into death that we begin to find new life – rooted in the promise of a God who has already entered into death and still resides there.  A God who walks with us in the midst of the pain and the suffering, who knows exactly how we feel.  A God who reminds us there is more after death.

So as the darkness and cold of winter descend around us – may the God of life be with you in this holy, needed time.

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