Our activities in the preschool and our Sunday Bible class for the
youth centered on the Ascension of our Lord, which we celebrated on
Sunday, May 21, and Pentecost, May 28. Pentecost brings us to the
midpoint of the church calendar. From here on, the emphasis of our
Scripture readings shifts from the earthly ministry of Jesus to the
mission of the church to continue what “Jesus began to do and
teach” (Acts 1:1) to the end of earthly history when “this same
Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will so come in like
manner as you saw Him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11).
Ascension.
St. Luke tells the
story of the Ascension twice. According to the closing verses of his
Gospel (Luke 24:50-53), after witnessing the Lord carried up into
heaven, the 11 remaining apostles returned to Jerusalem “and were
continually in the Temple praising and blessing God.” This is
important to bear in mind when reading the opening chapters of the
Acts of the Apostles. There we read that upon returning to Jerusalem,
the apostles met regularly in an upper room for prayer and
supplication.
Pentecost.
This was different from the week following the
crucifixion when the risen Christ appeared to them as they were
cowering behind closed doors (Luke 24:33-43; John 20:19-29). The Lord
had appeared to many other witnesses during the 40 days between His
resurrection and ascension, the Roman and Jewish authorities were
having trouble explaining away the empty tomb, and the apostles were
not afraid to thank God for all of this in public. But the growth of
the church, the new royal priesthood, did not begin until the visible
and audible outpouring of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, not just on
the apostles, who now named Mathias as one of them, but all the
believers who were gathered with them (Acts 2:1). These included,
according to Acts 1:12-15, “the women, and Mary, the mother of
Jesus, and with His brothers...altogether the number of names was
about a hundred and twenty”. The women certainly were those that
had ministered to the Lord, even in Galilee, and later had made the
journey to Jerusalem to be present under the cross and became the
first to see Him resurrected on the third day.
Perfect score for Reinner Ortega.
As St. Peter told
the gathered crowd, the manifestation of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost
was the fulfillment of the prophecy of Joel 2:28-32, in which the
Spirit would be poured out on all the faithful, regardless of sex,
age or social status. And with that, the marks of the church appear,
for after Peter’s preaching, 3,000 were baptized and those baptized
“continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship,
in the breaking of bread and prayers” (Acts 2:42). It is this water
baptism, in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, that is the
baptism of the Holy Spirit which Jesus promises in Acts 1:3, not the
outward signs that established the presence and action of the Holy
Spirit for that time and place. It is this same baptism which
empowers Christians today to carry on the Lord’s mission and be His
witnesses to the uttermost ends of the earth (Acts 1:8).
Update on
teacher’s strike
A visit by primary education students.
Well, it’s not
quite over. Our schools are not completely shut down, but since their
salary demands were not met, most public schoolteachers are only
working two to three days per week. Thanks to your support and the
dedication of our preschool teachers, we have been able to keep the
preschool open four days per week.
Happy birthday, Wilker Flores!
There is a cloud on
our horizon for which we would ask your prayers. Every morning we
have the preschool children form two lines, boys on one side and
girls on the other, to sing the national anthem, say the Lord’s
Prayer and listen to a Bible reading. Our teaching reflects the truth
that “male and female He created them” (Genesis 1:27) and
institute marriage as the lifelong union of one man and one woman for
mutual companionship and the nurturing of any children with which God
may bless their home. So far, by God’s grace, we have not had to
deal directly with la ideología de género or gender ideology, as it
is known here. In 2021, the Roman Catholic bishops of Venezuela
issued a
Happy birthday, Nelson Rodriguez!
statement
of concern over growing pressure to legalize abortion, euthanasia
and gender ideology in the country.
However, we have
heard of “experimental” program in a neighboring state in which
preschool children are taught that there are not just two, but many
genders and corresponding pronouns for them. We hope this program
does not serve as a model for something that will be made mandatory,
and, if it does, that God may grant us the courage and wisdom to
stand up for His order of creation.
Fiber-optic is
the fashion
When I arrived in
Venezuela 20 years ago, most people in Venezuela had access to the
Internet only through cybercafes with row upon row of networked PCs.
Internet service in the home was limited to a 56k dialup modem
connected to standard landline. Wifi and mobile Internet access were
unknown. Times have changed.
Installation of fiber-optic line.
As of the first
month of 2023, according to Statista,
overall Internet home Internet access in Latin America stood at 74.63
percent of the total population. Venezuela
stands near the low end with 61.6 percent. The region of Latin
America and the Caribbean has seen continuous increase in the
proportion of the
population using mobile internet, with more than half of the
population connected in 2019, according to GSMA.
According to the Venezuelan Observatory of Public Services (OVSP),
only
38.1
percent of people had access to fixed-line connections at home as
of October 2021. Although 80.4 percent of people owned smartphones
with which they could access the internet, around half of respondents
reported daily failures in cellular data service. As of August 2022,
according to Ookla’s Speedtest Global Index, median mobile speeds
in Venezuela were the third slowest globally, with Venezuela ranking
138th of 140 countries reviewed.
For several years,
we have had entirely wireless Internet access at the mission through
a cellphone network, but this has not been the ideal solution, as the
above statistic indicates. Now a local company that has provided
basic cable television service to our community since 2007 offers
fiber-optic Intenet access. We have had this installed and have
experienced a marked improvement as this
chart would suggest. This is important to us because of increased
use of videoconferencing in distance learning.
Giving thanks for
those who gave us life
Mother's Day cake.
Mother’s Day fell
on May 14, so giving thanks for mothers was on the top of our prayer
list for the sixth Sunday of Easter. However, also on that morning we
remembered in prayer Aurora Torrealba and her family, recipients of
medicine shipped by GLO, upon the loss of her husband, Manuel Rojas.
This was our prayer
for Mother’s Day:
Honoring mothers.
Kind Heavenly
Father, you formed us in our mother's womb and sent your Son to be
born of a woman to live and be tempted like us. On this day we give
you thanks for the gift of life that you gave us through our mothers.
We thank you for providing them to love us, care for us, and share
your Word with us. Bless mothers everywhere with love, patience,
wisdom, understanding, and strength so they can raise their children
to love and honor you. Grant that in our homes reflect the joy of
Easter. Let the good news of the resurrection reach all nations, so
that men may behold the glory of Christ and find abundant life in the
fruits of his victory over death. Amen.
On Pentecost Sunday,
May 21, 2020, seven-month-old Reiber Santiago Pirela Parra, received
the gift of new life in Christ through holy baptism. We also
celebrated the Eucharist for the first time since “national
quarantine” was declared about two months ago.
In my last
communication, I expressed hope that the quarantine would be lifted
by Pentecost and we would be able to resume offering the Lord’s
Supper every Sunday. Of course, immediately after I wrote those
words, the quarantine was extended to June 12. But the rules have
since been “relaxed”. What does that mean? Well, the 2019/2020
school year’s a wash. Schools, including our preschool, will not
reopen until the new school year begins in September. Students are
supposed to complete their studies on-line (something of a challenge,
as I will explain) and we have opened the preschool every morning to
distribute food and homework assignments to families in our
community. Although the availablity of public transportation has been
greatly reduced, we have been able to obtain the food through use of
the car that your donations enabled to purchase.
The Lord's Supper.
In addition to
closing of schools, most businesses are allowed to operate for a
strictly limited number of hours per day, although the “relaxation”
means some businesses are able to stay open longer now. No one is
supposed to walk the streets and public areas without a facemask and
maintaining about a meter of distance from other persons. In order to
enter a place of business, you must have your hands sprayed with
disinfectant. However, as far as I know, there are no rules
specifically pertaining to place of worship. Since our chapel is not
on public property, we have continued to hold Sunday morning
services, although we will not celebrate the Lord’s Supper again
until after June 12. Those who attend our Sunday morning worship are
a small group of people that we see every day anyway. Nobody in our
vicinity has shown signs of COVID-19 infection so far, so praise be
to God for that as well.
Facemasks are in fashion.
Two thousand years
of experience and scientific
study have shown the
likelihood of contagious disease being passed through the sharing
of the communion chalice is very low. If your immune system is that
compromised, you really should not leave your house anyway. Of
course, we tell our communicants that they are not obligated to
receive communion every time it’s offered, and if there is any
indication that that they might be infected with COVID-19, they
should stay home. While we certainly do not believe or teach that the
Lord has promised the faithful immunity to pestilence whether we take
precautions or not, we do believe that He will watch over us as we do
the work that He has commanded His church to do.
Reiber Santiago’s
parents, Ronelbys and Maria José, told me nearly seven months ago
that they wanted their baby baptized in our chapel. But they wanted
her sister in Caracas to be godmother. After waiting for her to able
to travel from Caracas, they finally decided that this was not going
to happen any time soon. They wanted Reiber Santiago
baptized, so that if he did get sick and die, he would have the promise of heaven. So it was done on perhaps the best of days for a baptism,
Pentecost.
Learning English.
In addition to
continuing Sunday services, we have begun a new confirmation class
and lessons in English for interested students. Everyone likes it
when I sing the
Mickey Mouse song. “M-I-C-K-E-Y M-O-U-S-E! Mickey Mouse! Mickey
Mouse!” Watch for my Appalachian gospel/Memphis blues fusion
version on iTunes.
To everything
there is a season
As the writer of
Ecclesiastes says, “To everything there is a season, a time for
every purpose under heaven”, and sometimes the time for everything
is all at once. We have entered Venezuela’s
rainy season, the period from May to November in which total
rainfall may add up to 78 inches. Just in time, too, because the
water level in our well was getting very low. However, now we have
the problem of heavy cloud cover reducing the efficiency of our
solar-powered electrical backup system, combined with longer and
longer power outages almost every day. There have been a few times
the system has not been able to keep the lights on all night, because
of lack of time for the batteries to recharge. We have had to become
more conservative in our consumption of electricity in order to
compensate. However, a somewhat more pressing concern is that our
cellphone/Internet service used to last six hours after the public
power went down, but now it only lasts two to three hours. This means
that after a particularly long blackout, we will be without
electricity, telephone, television and Internet service. This stymies
the children trying to complete their studies on-line, but of course
the situation is potentially more troublesome than that as we are
completely cut off from the outside world.
Lit by solar lamps.
Sun-dried meat.
And we had a power
outage that lasted three days in the week before Pentecost! The cause
apparently was a powerful storm taking down power lines, but as far
as we knew it could have been a much worse crisis. Furthermore, our
auxiliary system does not keep the refrigerators in our home or the
preschool going. Luz Maria was able to save the meat that we had
stored by drying it in the sun, a technique that she learned in her
childhood. The dried meat must be simmered in vegetable broth before
being eaten, but it is quite tasty in the end.
Prayers for the
Twin Cities!
There has been a
wave of violence across the United States, evidently sparked by the
tragic case of George
Floyd. But the Twin Cities have been the epicenter and I was
particularly struck by this Facebook plea from St. Michael’sLutheran Church of Bloomington, Minnesota, on May 29. St. Michael’s
sent me to Venezuela as a lay volunteer in 2003 and has continued to
support our mission in La Caramuca to the present day. So on Sunday
we prayed for St. Michael’s and all the churches and communities
affected by the rioting and looting, and also asked for better
understanding and harmony between people of all races, especially
through the peace found in Christ which passes all understanding.
Thank you, St. Michael's.
This is a call for
prayer for the greater Minneapolis community. Areas of Minneapolis
have been devastated by violent protests. The protests are reportedly
coming to Bloomington and the suburbs tonight. Please take time to
stop and pray now for peace.
Lord Jesus Christ we
come to you our shelter in the present storm and we ask that you
bring peace.
- For those who
affected by the violence both physically and emotionally, especially
for those who knew and loved George Floyd, bring your peace.
- For the protesters
in the streets allow them to be people of peace.
- For the police who
are called on to protect people and property allow them to respond in
peace.
- For those who are
afraid to leave their homes because of nearby violence reign your
peace upon them.
Lord Jesus Christ
you are the Prince of Peace and the Lord of lords. We trust you and
seek your peace today, tomorrow and eternally. Amen.
Did you know the
word quarantine
means 40 days? It is derived from the Latin word for forty,
quadraginta. So is its Spanish equivalent, cuarentena, and so is the
Spanish word for Lent, Cuaresma. We spent most of the 40 days of
Cuaresma under national cuarentena, which has been extended to May
15 at least. But here’s a thought; the Feast of the Ascension is
May 21, forty days after Easter. And, if we cannot celebrate the
lifting of the national quarantine on the final day of our Lord’s
exaltation, there’s Pentecost on Sunday, May 31.
Our new confirmation class.
In that light, it is
good to reflect on our Gospel reading for this fourth Sunday of
Easter, John 16:16-23. In this chapter, Jesus tells His disciples
that after His resurrection, they will see Him again for a time, but
then He must return to the Father that the church might receive the
outpouring of the Holy Spirit’s power on Pentecost. After the
Ascension, He will not be with them in visible form until He returns
in glory. But He makes this promise: “Truly, truly, I say to you,
you will weep and lament, but the world will rejoice. You will be
sorrowful, but your sorrow will turn into joy. When a woman is
giving birth, she has sorrow because her hour has come, but when she
has delivered the baby, she no longer remembers the anguish, for joy
that a human being has been born into the world. So also you have
sorrow now, but I will see you again and your hearts will rejoice,
and no one will take your joy from you.” Times of trial and
suffering which turn to joy in the end wll not only be the pattern of
the church’s story until the Lord’s return, but also our lives on
this earth until we are called home to heaven.
We also are
conscious of what the Apostle Peter writes in Sunday’s epistle (1
Peter 2:11-20. “Be subject for the Lord's sake to every human
institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme, or to governors
as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do
good. For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put
to silence the ignorance of foolish people. Live as people who are
free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as
servants of God.”
The current
situation in Venezuela is hard to assess. There are many who think
the official coronavirus count is much too good to be true.
Nevertheless, no one in our immediate vicinity seems to be affected
by the virus itself. All of us are dealing with the consequences of
the plan to control its spread. No one is supposed to go out on the
street without a facemask and must stay at least a meter apart in
public places. Certain businesses may open for a few hours during the
day.
As far as I know,
there are no specific rules in regard to religious activities. Luz
Maria and I, of course, can enter the chapel without going out into
the street. If it came down to it, just the two of us could worship
together (Matthew 18:20). But if we leave the doors open and people
enter, the same people who come to us every day for food and water,
shall we turn them away?
However, to show
that we do respect the government’s efforts to control COVID-19, we
are not offering weekly communion for the time being. Rather we
follow the order of morning prayer. We did celebrate the Eucharist on
Easter Sunday, and, God willing, we may do so again on Ascenscion
Sunday or Pentecost. Please pray that Venezuela might be spared the
worst of the pandemic as we pray for the whole world on Sunday and
every day.
Requests for
medicine are coordinated through the Lutheran Church of Venezuela.
Recipients can choose from a list of 25 common medications (up to
three medications per patient). Each of those 25 medicines are
available in Chile without a prescription. With money raised by
Global Lutheran Outreach, medicines are purchased in Chile with the
cooperation of a local pharmacy. Members of the Confessional Lutheran
Church of Chile collate the orders and prepare each congregation’s
shipment. Medicine is shipped using a globally known shipping
company, and then is unpacked and sorted for distribution to the
beneficiaries. After arriving in Venezuela, the medicines are sorted
and packed for distribution to each beneficiary. In the first three
months of 2018, Global Lutheran Outreach shipped a month’s supply
of medicine to over 440 patients. The average cost per patient for a
month’s supply is about $15 (including shipping).
Global Lutheran
Outreach began its Venezuela
Relief Project by sending funds to help people purchase food.
Although food shortages are an acute problem for many Venezuelans,
the lack of medicines is even more grave in a number of ways. Without
adequate medicines, medical equipment or sanitary supplies, diseases
that had virtually disappeared from Venezuela, such as malaria,
diptheria and tuberculosis are spreading once again. Medical
conditions that once were considered minor problems have become
life-threatening. People who need medication to deal with such conditions
as epilepsy and schizophrenia are in dire straits. And this is the
situation everywhere.
To put things in
perspective: During the last half of the 20th Century, there was
rapid population growth in Venezuela’s urban centers without
corresponding investment in infrastructure (roads, railways, water
systems, electrical generating capacity, etc.). With the collapse of
Venezuela’s economy, it’s the people who live in once prosperous
cities like Caracas or Maracaibo who suffer most from shortages of
food and drinking water. It has been noted that, ironically, the
remote, rural areas that never fully benefitted from the
post-WWII prosperity are now coping better with food shortages. The
people in these areas either can grow their own food or barter goods
and services with agricultural producers. However, even being able to
grow medicinal plants in your backyard is not a substitute for
vaccines and other modern forms of treatment.
School supplies
from LeadaChild
Also in this past
month, we have received school supplies – notebooks, pencil
sharpeners, construction paper, glue and the like – from
LeadaChild,
a mission society based in Olathe, Kansas. A Recognized Service
Organization of The Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod and a
501(c)(3) nonprofit charity, incorporated in the state of Kansas, and
a charter member of the Association of Lutheran Mission Agencies
(ALMA), LeadaChild has supported educational projects in Venezuela
since the 1990s and Epiphany Lutheran Mission since 2006.
We presented some of
the school supplies and Bible storybooks from the Lutheran
Heritage Foundation to Luz Maria’s afterschool students who
next month will graduate from sixth grade to begin high school in
September.
Completing
coursework
On June 11, we
received a visit from Pastor Eliezer Mendoza, director of the Juan de
Frias Theological Institute, and Pastor Miguelangel Perez, president
of the Lutheran Church of Venezuela. Much of our discussion centered
on the fact that I am close to completing my coursework with the
Formación Pastoral Hispanoamerica program.
Perhaps I should
explain a few terms. There has never been a residential Lutheran
seminary in Venezuela. The Juan de Frias Theological Institute was
organized in the 1970s around the Theological Education by Extension
(TEE) model pioneered by Ralph D. Winter, a former Presbyterian
missionary to Guatemala, in the 1960s. TEE was the precursor for
modern day theological distance education programs. The idea behind
TEE was to make it easier for local church leaders to learn and be
ordained as ministers without relocating them and their families for
years to the capital city to attend seminary. These students could
continue their ministry while studying at extension campuses near
their town or village. Then, once a month, they would go to the
seminary in the capital city to study.
When I came to
Venezuela in 2003, I started taking extension courses from the Juan
de Frias Institute (it is named for a Augustinian friar from Caracas
who was burned at stake for teaching Lutheran doctrine in the 17th
Century). Eventually I was invited by the national church to enroll
in an intensive program to train pastors that required weekly
attendance of classes in Caracas throughout 2007. In 2008, I
continued to attend Juan de Frias seminars periodically until my
ordination in December 2008.
Unfortunately, this
program depended heavily on visiting professors from Concordia
Seminary, St. Louis; Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne,
Indiana; and Seminario Concordia, Buenos Aires, Argentina. Given
current circumstances, it no longer is possible for professors from
these seminaries to safely travel to Venezuela, nor is it as safe to
travel every week to Caracas. There also are not enough qualified
Juan de Frias instructors living in Venezuela to travel to all parts
of the country as in previous decades.
But there is
distance learning via the Internet, and for the past four years I
have been taking on-line courses as a student in the Formación
Pastoral Hispanoamerica (FHP) program, which is part of the LCMS
Specific Ministry Program (SMP). The SMP is a means to provide
ordained men to serve in ministry situations for which a
residentially trained pastor cannot be supported.
SMP–Español/English (SMP–EsE), headquartered at Concordia Fort
Wayne, addresses the growing need for pastors in the LCMS who speak
Spanish and are equipped to serve in bilingual congregations. FHP is
an extension to the SMP-EsE distance education program to Latin
America, with its base at the newly established Seminario
Concordia El Reformador in the Dominican Republic. Dr. Arthur A.
Just, Jr., who now serves on the faculties of the seminaries in both
Fort Wayne and the Dominican Republic is director of the FPH program.
God willing, I will
finish the program this year and next year receive a diploma from
Seminario Concordia El Reformador. The value of this is that I then
will be qualified to serve with the Juan de Frias Institute in
training future pastors, deacons and deaconesses in Venezuela. This
is consistent with our long-term goal of making Epiphany Lutheran
Mission a center for such training in southwestern Venezuela.
Our days are
numbered
We have completed
the so-called “festival half” of the church year with the
celebration of Trinity Sunday. The major festivals, which include
Christmas, Easter, Ascension and Pentecost, all occur during the
first half of the ecclesiastical calendar, which begins in November
with the first Sunday in Advent. The latter half sometimes is called,
in a very boring manner, “the non-festival half”, but I prefer
the term, “Ordinary Time”, which does not mean ordinary in the
sense of common, but ordered or enumerated. Thus the Sundays are in
order, first, second, third, etc., Sunday after Trinity/Pentecost
(depending on which lectionary that you use) until the last Sunday of
the church year, Christ the King Sunday. This represents the idea
that the days are numbered until the Second Coming of the Lord in
glory.
“Just as it was in
the days of Noah, so will it be in the days of the Son of Man. They
were eating and drinking and marrying and being given in marriage,
until the day when Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and
destroyed them all. Likewise, just as it was in the days of Lot—they
were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building,
but on the day when Lot went out from Sodom, fire and sulfur rained
from heaven and destroyed them all—so will it be on the day when
the Son of Man is revealed.” (Lucas 17:26-30)
The mission of the
church during these ordered days is to proclaim the whole Word of
God, Law and Gospel. The good news of salvation in Jesus is to be
understood in the context of the imminent outpouring of God’s
wrath, when there will be no more grace and mercy, but only judgment
upon the wicked.
“For as often as
you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death
until he comes.” 1 Corinthians 11:26
As for those who
have received the Lord’s grace in baptism, we will not be taken
unaware by the day of judgment, whenever we celebrate the Eucharist
we proclaim not only His atoning death, but also His return in glory.
Amen.
We began the Sunday service by singing
“Castillo Fuerte” (“A Mighty Fortress”). Then I explained why
I was wearing a red stole and pectoral cross, and why the altar
paraments were red.
First, because the Holy Spirit appeared
as fire on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:3), and also the Scriptures
say, “he shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit, and with fire”
(Mateo 3:11, Luke 3:16); and “our God is a consuming fire”
(Hebrews 12:29). So the color of fire symbolizes the force and energy
of the Holy Spirit, active among us through the preaching of the pure
Word and the administration of the sacraments as our Lord commanded.
Since no one can confess Jesus as Lord except by the Holy Spirit (1
Corinthians 12:3), on Reformation Sunday we recognize the continuing
work of the Holy Spirit in the public confession of the blessed
Martin Luther, who stood before the powers of the world and declared
his consciences was captive to the Word of God. Thus began the
Reformation, which we accept as proof that the Spirit still guides
the Church and keeps it in the true doctrine, not by new revelation,
but rather by reaffirmation of the faith once delivered to the
saints.
Second, red is the color of blood. For
us especially, it symbolizes the blood of the holy martyrs, those who
confessed Christ at the cost of their own lives. While God does not
lay this destiny on all of us, He does demand that all of us offer
ourselves as living sacrifices. That is to say, we are to be in every
aspect of our lives, witnesses to Christ. The word “martyr” means
“witness”, and so, with the martyrs as our examples, we
understand every act of public confession to imply the promise that
we formally make in the rite of confirmation, to remain faithful to
the teachings of Christ to the point of death.
I preached on the appointed Old
Testament lesson, 1 Samuel 3:19-21), explaining that in the context
of this chapter, Samuel was a small boy, dedicated by his parents to
the service of the Lord's temple in Shiloh where he lived and worked
as the servant of the high priest, Eli. But Eli and his sons, the
priests of Israel, were worldly and corrupt, and there were no true
men of God to preach the Word of God to the people, and the people
lost sight of God's will and drifted into unbelief.
But the Lord called audibly to Samuel
while he slept, and the boy, thinking it was the high priest calling
him, interrupted his master's sleep. Understandably irritated, Eli
said that he had no called and told the boy to go back to bed. This
happened three more times before Eli figured out that perhaps
something unusual was taking place, and told Samuel the next time to
answer the voice directly and immediately. This Samuel did, and
received the first prophetic message that he was to deliver in the
name of the Lord: To pronounce a judgment of death against Eli and
his sons.
Of course, Samuel was afraid to do
this, but since he realized he could not change the Word of the Lord
and dare not disobey God's command, he did so anyway. Eli did not
punish the boy, but, because of the remnant of faith left in his
heart, recognized God s judgment as just and accepted it. The Lord
continued to bless Samuel and as he mature, made him into a mighty
and faithful prophet.
The application for us today is that as
Christ has won for us salvation and eternal life through His death
and resurrection, we must live by this truth and confess it publicly,
even if it does not win us any popularity contests and even it means
risking the loss of our lives. For we must love and obey God rather
than men. “Also I say unto you, Whosoever shall confess me before
men, him shall the Son of man also confess before the angels of God:
But he that denies me before men shall be denied before the angels of
God” (Lucas 12:8-9).
This story of the boy Samuel was
especially appropriate as the sermon text, because following the
sermon, Luz Maria's granddaughter, Oriana Montoya, came forward for
confirmation. At nine years of age, she is the youngest person who
has been confirmed as a member of our mission congregation.
Oriana was born and baptized a few
months before I arrived in Venezuela in 2003. I suppose that I can
say that I have known her all of her life, and that she cannot
remember a time when I was not a part of her life and her
grandmother's life.
There was no rite of confirmation apart
from the sacrament of baptism in the early church. Unlike baptism,
confession and absolution of sins, and the sacrament of the altar,
“confirmation” was not instituted or commanded by Christ. It
emerged as a separate ceremony and eventually was declared a
“sacrament” in itself by the western Latin-speaking Church. In
Eastern Orthodox churches to this day, both
infant children and
adult converts are baptized, anointed with the laying on of hands
(“chrismation”), and communed on the same occasion, in unbroken
succession.
The Lutheran Reformers decided to
retain the rite of confirmation, while denying that it was a divinely
appointed means of grace, and against infant communion. This is
because while the Scriptures place no reservations on who may receive
the blessings of baptism, there are stern warnings against receiving
the sacrament of the Lord's Supper “unworthily.” In order to
participate in the sacrament of the altar, one must be able to
examine his or her conscience and repent of sin (1 Corinthians
11:28), and discern the presence of Christ's body and blood in the
sacrament (1 Corinthians 10:16; 1 Corinthians 11:29). The Reformers
accept the western tradition of age 7 as the minimum age at which
this level of understanding was possible, and 16th Century Lutheran
church orders specify ages 7 to 12 as the optimum range for preparing
children for first communion.
Later, in the 17th Century, under the
growing influences of Calvinism and rationalism, the typical age of
Lutheran confirmation was raised to 14 to 16 years, as confirmation
came to be viewed more as a rite of passage into adulthood and the
“completion” of a process begun with baptism.
Theologically speaking, however,
baptism is the point of entry into the communion of the saints, and
it isin baptism that one is covered with the righteousness of Christ,
adopted as a child of God and receives the full promise of eternal
life. There is no need to “complete” this process. On the other
hand, it always has been the Lutheran understanding that catechesis,
or instruction in the faith, is something that is a necessary part of
sanctification (the Holy Spirit's work of molding us into the people
God wants us to be), a process which is not complete until death.
Therefore, catechesis should not stop at age 9, 12 or 16, but rather
continue throughout adult life.
Therefore, having instructed and
examined Oriana, and knowing of her desire to receive first communion
with all of her friends and family as witnesses, I welcomed her into
communicant membership in our mission.
As we prayed for Oriana and all those
who had been baptized and confirmed at La Caramuca Lutheran Mission,
I thought of another girl that I had known from birth through
confirmation: my niece, Ashley Baltazar. I had stood up as a sponsor
at her baptism, but at that moment I was particularly reminded of her
confirmation at Zion Lutheran Church in Matteson, Illinois.
It was a congregation of mixed ethnic
background in a similarly mixed community, and Ashley was confirmed
along with young people of Caucasian, African and Latin American
ancestry. Since Ashley's father, Mark, comes from a family that is
Portuguese, Irish and Filipino, but mostly Filipino, the confirmation
dinner consisted of traditional Filipino food. For me, mixed with the
joy of Ashley's confirmation was a vision of what could be, a
foreshadowing of Revelation 7, with a great multitude of all nations,
all tribes and all races gathered around the throne of the Lamb. And
it got me to thinking about the overseas mission field.
So at that moment I prayed for Oriana,
for Ashley and for all who had made their vows of faith, that the
Lord might keep them always in the true faith, strengthen them and
call them back if they might stray. Amen.
