The last two years have begun with unusual fireworks (although our dogs find even the ordinary kind distressing).
After our New Years Eve service on December 31, 2019, a ventilation fan was left running. Some time after midnight, it shortcircuited and exploded. Neighbors came running from their houses to tell us there was a fire in the church. And so there was, but it proved relatively easy to put out. Not so easy was cleaning a thick layer of ash deposited over everything and repainting the walls, but we get it done by the following Sunday. Other events in 2020 overshadowed this mishap.
On February 5, 2021, we heard another big bang. This time it was one of the four batteries in our solar backup system. Thanks be to God, there was no irreparable damage, although acid from the battery removed the finish from the polished concrete floor. Above all, nobody was in the room where the batteries are housed. When the sealed batteries were installed, we were assured that they were not dangerous. We are still waiting for the vendor to give us an explanation or replace the exploded battery.
Brent Friedrichs of Global Lutheran Outreach, gave me this advice: “ Although I have not had a solar battery explode – I (while 23 years in Africa) did have a couple of deep cycle batteries get so very hot that it bulged out the sides and completely ruined the battery. If a battery explodes/overheats it is sometimes due to the cap not ventilating enough ( or fast enough) and/or the level inside not being enough to cover the seps/plates wherein the battery then boils out from uncontrolled charging. If you are using a higher end charge controller/inverter (like Trace/Xantrex models) – you may want to consider temperature sensors. The sensor sticks to the side of the battery and its cable plugs directly into a socket on the front or side of the unit. The socket on controller/inverter sort of looks like a telephone socket. The charge controller may also be set too high (too fast of charge rate) for the battery (or batteries). Some charge controllers are adjustable.” We will take this into consideration.
Meanwhile, power outages remain an almost daily occurrence, although in recent weeks lasting no longer than three hours at a time, although the power may go down at any time with no indication for how long. Sometimes it’s for 10 to 15 minutes, sometimes longer. Once again, we appreciate the gift of a K-Tor pedal-powered generator, which I have put to use during one of our longer blackouts.
At this time of year, the temperature may dip to 70 degrees F by 5 a.m., so at least we do not have to deal with loss of electricity and freezing temperatures with violent wind and snow as have had many of you in the states. We continue to pray for the affected states as I remember well this type of situation from my youth in South Dakota, Nebraska and Kansas, and, in later years, Wisconsin and Minnesota. There were several people that died during the hard winter of 1967 in Yale, SD, but the story I remember best is that of Martin Ziegeldorf, a member of our church. One night as he was returning from work, the drifting snow engulfed his car. He walked about a mile across open fields in the snow and bitter cold. When he was only a few yards from the back door of his house, he fell down and died. That same year the electricity went down for the entire town. We only had electric heat in our house, but we were invited to stay with Claud Green, also a member of the church, who had LP gas heat at his house about two blocks away. Dad tried driving, but the car soon slipped into a drift. We walked the rest of the way. I held Dad's hand while he carried my brother, Dan. My sister, Dorcas, held Mom's hand, while Mom carried my other sister, Debbie. I could not see anything through the white-out, or hear anything over the roaring wind. But I could feel Dad's hand and I knew not to let go of that.
How about a Parler t-shirt?
Even more disturbing than the winter storm reports from the states has been the news of restrictions on freedom of speech over the social networks. I have never been in “Facebook jail”, but I had this curious experience.
I had heard that Facebook was banning posts of the Lord’s Prayer. That sounded dubious, but I decided to post the Lord’s Prayer, just to check out the story. Immediately, Facebook informed me that independent fact-checkers had determined that I was relaying false information. Plus, they attached an article saying that Facebook's censoring the Lord´s Prayer is a hoax.
To try to unpack this, it seems that perhaps the rumor of a ban on the Lord’s Prayer was a hoax, but Facebook made it a reality by setting its watchdogs to look for any posting of the Lord’s Prayer and issuing warnings to whoever posted it. So, in effect, Facebook proved that it is monitoring and attempting to control what you say on their “public platform”.
I also posted the Lord’s Prayer in Spanish and koine Greek, but did not receive a warning, so it seems the Facebook censors are linguistically challenged.
There seems to be a similar problem with Twitter and so many of our U.S. contacts have said that they have opened accounts on alternative social networks that we have, too. I had a Parler account until Parler was shut down by an extraordinary concerted action by Google, Apple and Amazon.
In case anyone thinks this is normal business competition, who remembers Google Plus? This was Google’s last attempt to overthrow Facebook as king of the social networks. The Google Plus network was launched in 2011 and shut down in 2019. Proving two things: Google had no compunction about trying to take away at least part of Facebook’s business and even with all of its resources, it failed to do so. So why would Google, much less Amazon or Apple, feel the need to protect Facebook from a startup with against-the-odds chances of success? Except for the politics, of course.
Anyway we now have accounts on Telegram, a text messaging service that I prefer to Twitter, and MeWe, which I find only so-so. You can send and receive messages from us at laepifania on Telegram.
Still, I think that I should have a “I had a Parler account” t-shirt and/or coffee mug.
Eighth shipment of medicine deliveredOn Septuagesima Sunday, January 31, 2021, we delivered the eighth shipment of medicine from Global Lutheran Outreach and the Confessional Lutheran Church of Chile. But we received this word from James Tino, executive director of Global Lutheran Outreach:
“The country of Venezuela - where we served as missionaries for 13 years - continues going from bad to worse. Wages are now two dollars per MONTH. For the past three years, we have been supporting our Venezuelan brothers and sisters by sending life-sustaining and (in some cases) life-saving medicine from Chile. A typical shipment serves about 1000 patients with a month or more supply of their medications. Medicines are distributed through the network of 21 Lutheran congregations in Venezuela. Since many of our members in Santiago are Venezuelan immigrants, this project is near and dear to our hearts. Unfortunately, this may have been our last shipment as funding for the project has been exhausted. Each shipment costs about $10,000, or about $10 per patient.”
Click below to donate to this project.
On-line deaconess formation continues This past week week Luz Maria and representatives of other regional divisions of the Lutheran Church of Venezuela presented reports on their use of the Small Catechism to an audience in four other Latin American countries (Guatemala, the Dominican Republic, Panama and Mexico).
Concordia the Reformer Seminary launched
the online deaconess program for 2021 on January 14, with an eight-week intensive course entitled “The Catechism – Disciples for Life: Instruction in the Christian Life from Martin Luther’s Small Catechism”. As a deaconess-mentor, Luz Maria supervises weekly reading, writing, and video assignments from 90-minute teaching/discussion sessions that include practical application of the lesson.
First steps on the journey of 40 days
From Ash Wednesday, February 17, until Easter Sunday, April 4, we will remember the suffering and death of Jesus Christ. We take this time, then, to examine our hearts, repent of our wrongdoing, and receive Christ's forgiveness.
In the season of Lent, the traditional ways of expressing repentance are fasting and the imposition of ashes. These practices are not meritorious acts to justify us before God. Martin Luther made these comments on Jonah 3: 1-10): “Notice that the people of Nineveh do some things that God does not command them. But Jonah relates them. For example, they fast and wear sackcloth. What does fasting matter to God and that they wear sackcloth? God wants the heart; He wants to see the whole life of a person transformed. Likewise, God did not require these things of them through Jonah; all He asked was that they stop their wickedness.” However, every level of Ninevite society responded to God's Word with visible signs of repentance. Their quick response was in contrast to the often hard hearts of the Israelite people. And God showed the Ninivites His mercy.
In Matthew 6: 1-6, 16-21, our Lord does not command his disciples to stop doing acts of piety such as fasting, but to ensure that they are done for the glory of God. Fasting was a very common practice in ancient times, especially before going to the sacrament, although today it has fallen into disuse. However, Jesus fasted in the desert prior to His temptation by the devil, as described in the Gospel reading for the first Sunday in Lent, Matthew 4:1-11.
The Holy Spirit had led Jesus into a desert where there was no food, but Jesus trusted the Father. It was a severe test, even from the point of view of the physical nature of Christ. The purpose of this retreat was not to provide the opportunity for blessed rest and joy, nor to offer an opportunity for deep contemplation, but to be tempted. of the devil. This fight against the devil was part of the trade and work for which he was sent by God and anointed with the Spirit. Just as the arch enemy of mankind had tempted and defeated the first Adam, thus plunging the entire human race into damnation, he now set out to defeat the second Adam by hindering the work of redemption.
"And the tempter came to Him and said: If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread." Jesus responds to Satan, with great humility, by quoting the Scriptures. With "it is written," Jesus marks Deuteronomy 8 as the Word of God. Deuteronomy 8: 3 describes Moses reminding Israel of God's tender care for his people during the forty-year journey through the wilderness. In particular, it shows how the Lord had fed them with manna, hitherto completely unknown to them and their parents, in order to teach them that "man does not live by bread alone, but by all that proceeds from the mouth of Jehovah man lives".
Jesus refers to himself as true man and also in a broader sense to every human being. This is true of all people, believe it or not. Food is produced by the creative power of God. Believers know this and believe also that beyond material bread, man needs the faith, joy and hope that the Word of God yields.
Lord, bring us close to your cross that we might know how you loved us and gave yourself for us. We would keep Lent, Lord, in a way that is pleasing to you. As we follow you from Gethesemane to Calvary, do not let us follow afar off, lest we deny you. Help us watch and pray with you that we may not fall into temptation. In your holy name we pray. Amen.
(Lutheran Book of Prayer, CPH, 1970.)
