Yesterday, we all got in the car and went over the mountain to Faith Lutheran: my spouse, my Florida pastor, my good friend who is married to my Florida pastor. Then we came back, had lunch at Rocky's Hot Chicken, and then did the initial Music Week events of orientation and worship.
I didn't get pictures of every event, but I did think to take a picture of my spouse and friend getting ready to sing "Dona Nobis Pacem" for the offertory:
As they rehearsed, I thought about my sermon and hoped it would be O.K. I reminded myself that these people have heard me preach before, but this sermon would introduce the idea that God needs us and our radical hope, the way a battery needs a charger. Too radical, this idea that we are the ones that give God juice? I went with it, and no one has brought me up on charges of heresy yet. In fact, I got a soft amen at the end, which is enough affirmation for me. I posted the sermon in this blog post, if you want to see for yourself.
Here we are just before worship:
And here I am, outside of Faith Lutheran, the small church in Bristol, Tennessee, where I serve as Synod Appointed Minister:
It was lovely to end the day with Holden Evening Prayer, which everyone around me at Music Week seems to know by heart. I've only heard bits and pieces of it, and I'm still not sure I've ever done the whole liturgy as it was intended to be sung.
We left the chapel and headed down the hill to home, as the mist rolled in and the final light drained from the sky. Some of us were asleep not too many minutes later.
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