Worship Schedule:
10:00am in the Sanctuary and on YouTube
Due to the pandemic the need for food is increasing daily. In addition, the annual Letter Carriers Food Drive (Stamp Out Hunger) which normally produces more than 50,000 lbs. of donated food has been canceled which makes the need even greater.
AFAC needs canned vegetables, cereal (low sugar), canned tuna, canned tomato products (stewed, diced, paste), and peanut butter (in plastic jars).
Contributions can be dropped off in the Narthex.
Since we cannot assemble weekly in person for a full range of experiences of Christian community, I am endeavoring in the first weeks of my pastorate at Resurrection Church to offer weekly spiritual reflections in addition to my Sunday sermon videos. I see these mid-week written reflections as an exercise of my teaching ministry as a pastor, especially during this time of global pandemic and necessary sheltering at home and social distancing. Resurrection Church has a rich tradition of substantive adult Christian Education. These weekly reflections seek to fill, in some measure, the void created by the absence of our Sunday morning adult educational experiences. I long for the return of those Sunday morning offerings in person which feature the substantial gifts of our own members, but for now, I give you what I can in these weekly reflections. These messages also serve to nurture a sense of our Christian community during this time when we are apart.
May God in Christ bless your engagement with these pastoral offerings in the power of the Holy Spirit for your ongoing Christian formation for your journey of faith for such a time as this.
Dear Christian Friends:
On the ancient day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit dramatically appeared, Acts reports that the apostles “were all together in one place.” Centuries later, at long last on the Day of Pentecost in 2021, a significant number of the members of Resurrection Lutheran Church were all together in one place in our outdoor worship space to receive the gift once again of the fullness of our worship life together – all of the lectionary readings, the communal singing of hymns, prayers of intercession for the world, the Peace of Christ, the Eucharist, and on Saturday evening at the Vigil of Pentecost, the sacrament of baptism when Axel Norwood Hedberg was made a child of God by water, word, and Spirit. Thanks be to God.
I have engaged the Acts account of the coming of the Spirit at Pentecost innumerable times in my life as a preacher and student of Christian spirituality. And the report that they “were all together in one place” is a phrase that is easily glossed over and taken for granted. Not this year when we’ve been scattered from place to place, individually and in our familial pods, but not together in the fullness of Christian practice in person, in one place. For me as pastor, and I trust for you as members of our congregation who were present, it was an immensely moving time to be back together to engage again what we routinely do as church.
And what a place it is, our outdoor space for liturgy! When the features that comprise the church and parsonage yards were planned and constructed, no one envisioned this area as a place for liturgical worship. But the parsonage deck as chancel, and new brick patio as choir loft, and fence as altar rail, and the church yard as nave, the place of assembly – all of this configured to work well for the flow of the service, as we were gathered by the Spirit, to hear and engage the word proclaimed, to share in the holy supper, and to be sent back into the world in loving Christian service.
Then there were the particular, curious coincidences of our worshipful day outdoors. On that first Christian Pentecost, the Spirit made “a sound like the rush of a violent wind.” For us, on Pentecost 2021, it was the fascinating cacophony of the once-every-seventeen-years cicadas. And also, a lovely breeze, indicative of the Spirit as wind, as breath, was moving among us. It was fun for me to watch you as members of the worshiping assembly situate yourselves in the shady areas of the lawn as the sun cast its hot rays on our place of worship, calling to mind the brilliant, divine light of Christ that can at times seem dazzlingly overwhelming. Our gathering hymn was “Like the Murmur of the Dove’s Song” which we sang in the great outdoors where spring birds were making their vigorous song earlier in the morning as I was readying the area for worship. The concluding doxology of the prayer of thanksgiving at the table offered these words: “With your holy ones of all times and places, with the earth and all its creatures, with sun and moon and stars, we praise you, O God, blessed and holy Trinity, now and forever. Amen.” How lovely it was to thank God outdoors in the more direct, palpable company of, if not to say, communion with the whole earth and its creatures and sun and moon and stars.
Speaking personally as your pastor, it was deeply meaningful for me to move about in your midst, sprinkling the water for baptismal remembrance and thanksgiving which marked the beginning of our worship – which connected me with the memory of standing at the baptismal font in the nave of our church to preside at the rite of confession and forgiveness on March 1, 2020, the day when you voted to call me as pastor. Who knew it would take a year and more to return to that ordinary, extraordinary Christian practice of gathering in close proximity to baptismal themes and realities? And also, to move among you to share the Peace of Christ with bows and waves in place of handshakes was another highlight moment. Most significantly perhaps was administering to you the bread of Communion, as my relationships with you deepen even during this time of pandemic social deprivation. For our interactions at last to be grounded in the sacramental administration of Christ’s bodily real presence was its own profound homecoming. There were points during the liturgy which were marked by the nearness of tears – of joy, of relief, of reconnection to our deepest identity as Christians, and for me as a pastor in Christ’s church whose identity is most profoundly rooted in the fullness of word and sacrament. Even after a year and more of fasting from central things, the return to these holy realities felt completely natural.
I hope and pray that my reflections on our time of return to feasting on the fullness of holy things inspires your own musings on our time together – if indeed you were present in person last Sunday. For those who for whatever reasons were not able to join us, I pray that this message will inspire longing for your own return to the worshiping assembly when your circumstances and station in life permit it.
Thanks be to God in Christ in the power of the Spirit for the Day of Pentecost 2021!
Pastor Jonathan Linman
At the annual congregational meeting in January, Pastor Linman presented his proposed statements of vision to guide ministry and mission at Resurrection Lutheran Church. Subsequently, the Congregation Council at its annual retreat engaged the vision statements and suggested editorial revisions such that the statements begin to articulate a shared vision for mission and ministry. Now the membership of the congregation beyond its elected leaders is invited to offer their input into these statements to nurture a still wider embrace of shared vision. Toward that end, members are invited to another occasion for conversation about these vision statements. This will take place via Zoom on Wednesday, May 19 at 7:00 pm. The Zoom meeting link will be distributed via Constant Contact. If you are not receiving our Constant Contact mailings, then please contact the church office.
A copy of the current version of the vision statement is available below:
Shared Visions for Strategic Ministry and Mission (March 2021)
Dear Christian Friends:
Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!
Last week, I offered a detailed narrative account of what you can expect, logistically speaking, when we return to the celebration of Holy Communion this week, outdoors, on the Day of Pentecost. Today, in anticipation of this celebratory return, I am drawn to offer reflections of a more biblical, theological, and spiritual nature and quality.
I believe that it is significant and fitting that our celebration of the Eucharist will resume on the Day of Pentecost. Pentecost, of course, is its own festival which marks the coming of the Holy Spirit recorded in Acts 2. But liturgically, Pentecost also serves as a culmination of the fifty days of Easter which feature engagement with biblical narratives that recount appearances of Jesus after the resurrection.
Please join us at 6:30 pm this coming Thursday, May 13 via Zoom for Evening Prayer on Ascension of Our Lord. The Zoom meeting information will be distributed via Constant Contact. If you do not receive our Constant Contact mailings, please contact the Church OFfice.
Evening Prayer, Ascension of Our Lord, May 13, 2021
Dear Christian Friends:
Throughout Eastertide, we continue to proclaim that Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!
And now we are also approaching the Day of Pentecost, Sunday, May 23, at which time and outdoors we will also resume the celebration of Holy Communion. Thanks be to God! This is an outcome for which so many have longed for many long months. The last time I presided at a liturgy of Holy Communion was March 1, 2020, the Sunday you voted to call me as pastor. Loving concern for those most vulnerable to the coronavirus motivated our fast from central things during the pandemic, not least of which has been the Eucharist.
However, given the extent of vaccinations in our region, the decreasing numbers of cases, serious illnesses and deaths in our area, along with official word from the CDC that there is a very low risk of infection from contact with surfaces, leaders at Resurrection Church among the Worship and Music Committee, the Reopening Planning Group, and the Congregation Council have determined that it is safe to return to the Eucharist, albeit outdoors.
Several members have enquired of me what to expect in terms of the particulars of celebrating Holy Communion outdoors in ways that are appropriate, safe, and faithful to Christian tradition.
First off, we will still need to wear our masks – even those fully vaccinated. Likewise, we will continue to observe physical distancing. Hard copy bulletins with everything you need for worship will be provided to outdoor worshipers. In addition to worship outdoors, the bulletin for worship at home will continue to be available on Sundays along with the weekly watch-through video and individual video clips. This we pledge to do to accommodate those who do not yet feel able to return in person at this time, even if it’s outdoors.
Secondly, the Congregation Council has determined that outdoor worship will begin at 9:30 am each Sunday, beginning on Pentecost, May 23. This earlier time, when it is cooler in summer, reflects the reality that in coming weeks, worship at noon will be in the full heat of the day. 9:30, I am told, is also a time in keeping with Resurrection’s history of summer worship.
You can also expect a liturgy that more fully resembles the complete Sunday service we are used to. That is, what we’ll begin doing on May 23 will be substantially longer than the fifteen-minute truncated service we’ve been doing outdoors for several months. Which is to say, we encourage you to bring your own lawn chairs or picnic blankets since you may not want to stand the whole time for a more lengthy worship service! We will also likely provide a limited number of folding chairs from the church for those who don’t have lawn chairs to bring.
Moreover, beginning on Pentecost, all Sunday worship outdoors will be held on the parsonage side of the church. We will no longer meet on alternating Sundays on the Potomac Street side. This way, you won’t have to wonder where we are assembling. However, collection of food items every other week, twice a month, will continue to take place, but on the parsonage side.
In order to preserve the integrity of the Revised Common Lectionary and the diversity of scriptural voices it expresses, we will hear all of the appointed readings for coming Sundays. Additionally, there will be communal singing of hymns and worship songs, punctuating important parts of the liturgy. While I don’t plan to offer a lengthy Sunday sermon, my homiletical response to the readings will be more than the brief reflections I have offered in our truncated outdoor prayer services. We will continue to pray the full prayers of intercession each Sunday.
Yes, we shall also return to the sharing of Christ’s Peace – but alas, no handshakes or hugs at this time, please. You may want to bow to your neighbors in Christ, or wave to them, or offer some other appropriate, faithful, but physically distanced gesture.
As for the offering, that detail has not yet been settled on, but we are not likely to pass offering plates among those assembled on the church lawn. A more likely scenario is that an offering basket will be available at the fence separating the parsonage and church yards where you can place your offering as you come forward for Communion.
During the time of offering, a table, the one that resides on the parsonage deck, will be set for Holy Communion. A choir or ensemble may offer music during this time from their place on the new, brick parsonage patio. The assisting minister and I, as presiding minister, will cleanse and sanitize our hands prior to handling the bread and wine. And as I have written previously, the fence separating the church and parsonage yards will serve as a communion rail.
Which is to say, what will be the particulars for receiving the Eucharist? We intend to offer Communion in both kinds, the baked bread that Resurrection has normally used in recent years, and also the wine. A piece of the blessed bread will be dropped into your hands, palms up – with no physical contact occurring between presiding minister and communicants. The blessed wine will be administered via a specially made stoneware chalice with a pouring lip. The assisting minister will pour the wine into a receptacle, which for safety purposes, you will need to bring from home. For ease of pouring, you are encouraged to place your receptacle, such as a small juice glass, on the top of the fence – there is ample room and a flat surface for that. If you do not wish to receive the wine, you need not. You will receive the fullness of Christ’s presence in, with, and under the bread only. Gluten free hosts will be available as usual for those who need that option.
Ushers will help you find your way to the fence/altar rail in ways that are appropriately physically distanced. Couples and families may commune together as a pod, but separate from other individuals, couples and families, lining up, standing, at the fence/altar rail. Those administering Communion will work their way down the line at the fence/altar rail. When you receive the bread and wine, you can make your way, physically distanced, back to your place on the lawn. After all have communed, the liturgy will conclude in the usual way.
What about inclement, rainy weather? Bring an umbrella!
So, this is what we propose, beginning on Pentecost, Sunday, May 23 at 9:30 am. As has been our experience with worship outdoors in recent months, I suspect that our routine will evolve in ways that help us fine-tune the details. While we are trying to anticipate and cover all details, there will be inevitable glitches. Kindly be patient with us as we live into this new reality of the greater fullness of worship outdoors.
But most significantly, and to reiterate, thanks be to God that Christ will once again soon gather us to himself in the fullness of Word and Sacrament!
With such thanks to God in Christ,
Pastor Jonathan Linman
Dear Christian Friends:
Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!
We recently celebrated Good Shepherd Sunday, which inspired some musing on my part on the current state of seeking to shepherd, as pastor, the flock that is Resurrection Lutheran Church.
A year ago this month I took up residence in the parsonage, making my move from Phoenix and New York. I recall wondering then if I could find a convincing, helpful parable about a shepherd for whom the whole flock is scattered. There are such biblical stories about scattered sheep, and then there’s the parable about the shepherd leaving the 99 to seek the one lost sheep. What about the flock that is fully scattered, quarantined as individuals and families in their own homes throughout the area? How can one seek to shepherd a congregation that does not congregate in person?
That was then, and this is now. Which is to say, while we are not yet worshiping indoors, we are in fact now congregating in person every Sunday outdoors for worship and conversation and to give expression to our social ministry with those in need in collecting from members food items twice a month for distribution through AFAC. Sunday in these respects and in limited measure has become Sunday again, that is, the Lord’s Day that features the worshipful assembling of God’s people in person, in our case currently outdoors. This warms a pastor’s heart. Thanks be to God!
And shepherding initiatives as pastor also include the weekly sermon (video and text) and these midweek messages and our Zoom Bible studies, Evening Prayer during Advent, Lent and on festivals also via Zoom, virtual administrative meetings, care-giving via phone calls, emails, visits in person, and more. All such activities and the conversations that happen amidst them constellate to make for the work of a shepherd, a pastor. Thanks be to God.
At this point in our life together, I have a sense that solid pastoral relationships are building with the core of active members of the congregation. This number seems to be around one-hundred people and some more. But our membership records suggest that Resurrection Church has more than four-hundred persons on the books. Which is to say, there are still many members of the flock who have not yet congregated again, and that is a matter of concern to me. I have listed about one hundred additional persons named in our directories who have not been present for any of our in-person or Zoom gatherings.
Being a pastor, a shepherd, is deeply part of my personal, spiritual, and vocational identity, and pastors long to engage the flock. Not being able to connect with the fullness of the flock that is Resurrection Church disquiets me, unsettles me. So it is that I have been seeking the “lost sheep.” This effort centers on and is organized by reaching out to members on the anniversaries of their baptisms. This initiative has been quite revealing, resulting in some good conversations that allow me to better know both individuals and families. But it has also been true that when I call some of the phone numbers available to me, not infrequently I find that the numbers are no longer in service. Likewise, many emails bounce back indicating that we don’t have the most recent contact information for many. Moreover, some phone messages and emails are met with no reply at all.
All of this leaves me wondering about the nature and extent of our congregational flock. Who really constitutes this fold at this point? How many of the people I don’t yet know will return once we are worshiping in person in doors again? How best can I and we go about reaching out to the folks whom we know but who have not yet been present at our various pandemic-restricted events in person and online?
Toward generating creative responses to these questions and concerns, the Outreach and Membership Support Committee and I are convening a group to brainstorm about how to proceed in identifying whom we know to be missing in our gatherings and seeking the most up to date and preferred contact information.
In the meantime, you also can greatly assist in this effort by letting me know now members you are wondering about who have not been present in one way or another since the pandemic began. Kindly reach out to me so that I can reach out to them!
Finally, and most significantly, may Christ, the Good Shepherd, lead and guide us in faithfully tending the flock entrusted to us for the sake of our mission in and for the world.
Prayerfully, under the shepherding care of Christ,
Pastor Jonathan Linman
Dear Christian Friends:
Eastertide continues as we continue to proclaim that Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!
Our Sunday morning worship outdoors in person has been an admittedly modest diet of what our usual orders of worship offer. For the sake of the safety of erring on the side of caution, we have limited our worship to an order for confession and forgiveness, the Prayer of the Day, a single reading from the lectionary, some brief homiletical comments on the reading, the prayers of intercession, Lord’s Prayer and final blessing. All of this takes place in about fifteen minutes’ time, about a quarter of what is a typical Sunday morning service.
Now that we have a solid track record with the safety of these outdoor gatherings and given that the weather is moderating to make being outdoors more pleasant and comfortable, it is now time for us, I believe, to begin to engage the greater fullness of our liturgical assemblies. My conversations with many of you reveal that you also concur with this view.
In coming weeks, therefore, watch for a further evolution of our orders for worship outdoors – the inclusion of the full set of lectionary texts, more congregational singing of hymns, a more involved homily, safe ways to share the Peace of Christ, and most notably, thanks be to God, safe ways to celebrate Holy Communion.
We have had a long suffering fast from the central things in Word and Sacrament. This we did motivated by love for our most vulnerable neighbors. We still honor these commitments, but now with the knowledge that we can, in fact, undertake the greater fullness of our liturgical life outdoors safely and appropriately.
In fact, we need this greater fullness for the sake of our individual and communal well-being in faith. Just as fasting from food in our diets should not be a long-term venture for the sake of our physical health, we likewise benefit spiritually from what God in Christ has to offer in the full range of the means of grace. Moreover, we are beckoned to be more fully fed so that we may feed others in Jesus’ name in the power of the Holy Spirit. For the sake of the world, and the divine mission entrusted to us, our days of leanness should begin to come to an end.
Indeed, Eastertide is a season of feasting. Therefore, let us begin to return to keeping the feast! Furthermore, the Day of Pentecost approaches, that festival day on which the Holy Spirit’s coming birthed the new order of life in the church, where “they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” (Acts 2:42) We do well to pursue the fullness of our ordered Christian lives.
In addition to pointing to the coming of our more complete liturgical celebrations outdoors and in person on Sundays, I also want to speak to the “fellowship” dimensions of our times together on Sunday mornings. Yes, it’s lovely to socialize and to connect with each other again. But please know that we engage each other not merely as a social club, but as the body of Christ, we who are members of and therefore integral to that body. We greet each other and converse with each other in Jesus’ name.
I know from my growing experience with you that many of our conversations with each other on Sundays become occasions of Mutual Conversation and Consolation among God’s family. Remember that Martin Luther included such holy conversations among the means of grace alongside preaching, baptism, Eucharist and confession and forgiveness. Thus, it is a holy thing indeed to be in blessed conversation with each other. These conversations are not ancillary but integral to Christian community. Let us not miss or overlook the holiness of our ordinary encounters with each other in Jesus’ name when we gather outdoors on Sundays.
As your pastor, I cannot emphasize enough how crucially important these conversations are to me, charged as I am to care for you, members of the flock that is Resurrection Church. These conversations are central to my work as a pastor. Especially as I am comparatively new to you, our Sunday morning conversations in person are among the principle means through which we are getting to know each other. What happens in person is far richer and more nuanced than what transpires in email exchanges, on Zoom, or even during phone conversations. It’s also true that our conversations outdoors contribute to our spiritual and emotional well-being, especially during these pandemic days of social isolation. So it is that I am available to you about an hour before the time for worship, and then for some time afterward.
So, join us on the parsonage side of the church this Sunday for worship, first and foremost, in our substituted outdoor place of Christian assembly – where the parsonage deck is our chancel, the patio serves as choir loft, the parsonage yard fence functions as an altar rail, and the wider yard becomes our nave. In Jesus’ name, for Christ’s sake, in the power of the Holy Spirit active in Word and Sacrament, this place is holy ground indeed!
Appreciatively in Christ with hopeful anticipation,
Pastor Jonathan Linman
Dear Christian Friends:
Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!
“Mi casa es tu casa” – “My house is your house.” This is a phrase that expresses welcome and hospitality. But in my case, as your pastor living in the church’s parsonage, my house literally is your house. Resurrection Church holds title to the property. I am simply the privileged long-term guest in this great gift of a house. But this house has been made to become my home, and there is a distinction between house as a thing and home as a more existential quality of being.
Thus, it’s been my privilege now on two occasions – Easter Sunday and yesterday, the Third Sunday of Easter – to welcome you to the features of my home outdoors, namely, the deck, a new brick patio, and the yard shared by parsonage and church, along with our garden, the “Plot Against Hunger,” which is now sprouting new growth thanks to the ministrations of our gardeners.
As our response to the pandemic continues to evolve, we are now worshiping outdoors each Sunday – twice a month on the Potomac Street side of the church in conjunction with the food collections for AFAC to benefit those in need in our community, and the other Sundays on the parsonage side of the church. Thanks be to God for occasions safely to worship in person each week.
It’s not a perfect parallel, nor should it be, but it strikes me that there are aspects of our outdoor arrangement that are evocative of typical church interiors. The elevated deck is not unlike a chancel, where the table there could become something of an altar table. The new brick patio twice has served as a choir loft. The fence separating the parsonage yard from the church yard could be viewed as a chancel rail. And then the wider expanse of the church yard, centered in the garden, has served as the nave for the gathering of the assembly. Those who have shared in the recent worship events there have found the arrangement salutary.
Members and friends who have gathered at the exterior threshold of the parsonage have helped us to begin to live into the vision that I hold dear, and that is that your parsonage, my home, will be a place of hospitality for the congregation and for those traveling to and through Arlington from wider worlds. Indeed, our gatherings for worship have included occasions for hospitable conversations among those congregating, a wonderful way to stay connected safely and masked in person during these pandemic days.
I look for the day with eager anticipation when those who gather on the deck and patio and yards can enter the indoors of the parsonage where you will also encounter a place of beauty and hospitality, the “hearth” of the kitchen and dining area and a little “chapel,” which is a dedicated place for prayer, study, and holy conversation.
These worshipful and social occasions outdoors are beginning to make our life together feel more normal as we gain a track record demonstrating the safety of these gatherings, thus making some tangible progress toward returning indoors in due course.
There are still a number of you in our congregation whom I have not yet had occasion to meet for meaningful conversation. Our Zoom “Meet and Greet the Pastor” events were helpful some many weeks and months ago, but that format just didn’t gain traction perhaps because of people’s understandable Zoom fatigue. When I reach out to members by phone on baptism anniversary days, more often than not I find only an answering machine on which to leave a message. Thus, to those I’ve not yet had occasion to meaningfully engage, I extend a heartfelt invitation to you to join me and other congregation members on the parsonage deck and patio, or on the other AFAC Sundays on the Potomac side, for conversation in advance of our regularly scheduled outdoor worship services. I am present at least an hour before the service time. It would be great to make the most of these times to get to know you better!
Moving forward together in Jesus’ name,
Pastor Jonathan Linman
Dear Christian Friends:
Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!
It may be some combination of pandemic fatigue, more people receiving their vaccinations, and a more palpable sense that we are seeing light at the end of this very long and dark tunnel of the pandemic, but I am aware of a greater extent of conversational energy in our congregation around the question, “When is Resurrection Church going to open up again for worship and other activities indoors?”
In this week’s message, I offer my own observations on this question, informed by deliberations among our congregational leaders to date. I pray that my thoughts contribute to the ongoing conversation and discernment that will lead to our coming decisions. I offer this pastorally and not prescriptively, for there are many conversation partners, and major decisions in our life together are made communally and not by an individual. As your pastor, I will be among the many leaders that will ultimately make the decision to return to indoor activities.
Which is to say, in terms of our organization and process, conversations about returning indoors have been focused in an ad hoc group formed last summer, the Reopening Planning Group, which now meets monthly to assess where we are in the discernment to reopen in relation to the many complex, moving parts and twists and turns of the pandemic. This group, in its informal capacity, does not make decisions, but offers recommendations to the Congregation Council for their further deliberation and decision-making. It is ultimately the Congregation Council that will make the decisions that will determine the date when we will return to activities indoors in the church.
Taking up now my reflections, it strikes me, first of all, that the word ‘reopening’ is something of a misnomer. Which is to say, our congregation has never been closed. We’ve simply redirected our activities elsewhere than inside the building – principally online and in person outdoors. It’s the building that will be reopened for indoor use, not the congregation!
Dear Christian Friends:
Christ is risen. Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!
While we would have preferred to be indoors for the fullness of our usual routines for Holy Week and Easter, we were not lacking for rich worshipful encounters with Christ at home and outdoors during the holy days of pandemic year 2021.
Excellent and beautifully crafted resources provided opportunities for worship at home on Palm and Passion Sunday, on each of the Three Days, and on Easter Day, Resurrection of Our Lord. If you engaged the fullness of these bulletins and their outlines and contents for worship, you had what you needed for faithful observances of these Holy Days. I very much hope and pray that you claimed opportunities to explore the riches of these materials. Thanks so very much to Gordon Lathrop and Gail Ramshaw for again providing these resources to the people of God at Resurrection Church, but also for making them available for use throughout the wider church.
Home worship videos also framed our experiences on Palm and Passion Sunday and on Easter Day. Thanks be to God for, and our sincere thanks to, our readers, prayer leaders, singers, other musicians, videographers, and all others who share in the teamwork of putting together these videos for our worshipful edification.
Moreover, we gathered numerous times in person outdoors for worship. Here are the numbers: 30 braved the wet weather for worship outdoors on Palm and Passion Sunday. The combined attendance for the two Maundy Thursday services was 42, even with a cold, blustery wind. 38 braved similar conditions for the two liturgies on Good Friday. 20 were present for our Easter Vigil. And 95 filled the church and parsonage yards on Easter Sunday after a continental Easter breakfast – with thanks to all those who baked and otherwise put together this breakfast offering. These attendance numbers are respectable and encouraging.
But it’s not about the numbers. Rather, it’s about being gathered by the Holy Spirit to plumb the depths in liturgy of the core realities of the Christian faith. Resurrection Church’s nave was bereft of people, in its own way sepulchral and sad. In contrast, our Memorial Garden, more typically a lonely place, was full of life, well-peopled, and served as centerstage, as it were, for the liturgical drama of The Three Days. On Maundy Thursday it was the Garden of Gethsemane, when those assembled, including an ensemble of choir members, gave voice under Barbara’s leadership to Psalm 88, a psalm of lament, recalling Jesus’ prayerful agony in the garden. On Good Friday, the Memorial Garden was Golgotha, where a roughhewn wooden cross was planted after the procession, and worshipers lined up to place votive candles at the foot of the cross, a gesture of adoration of our Lord Jesus who suffered there. During the Easter Vigil, in our mind’s eye, we could see the Memorial Garden as the place of Jesus’ tomb, a place of resurrection.
These liturgical acts had the effect of consecrating in new ways our Memorial Garden, the place of repose for the remains of many of our beloved church and family members. It was most poignant for me to consider the Memorial Garden as a place of resurrection for those who rest there, when Christ returns at the resurrection at the last day to consummate the fullness of the divine reign.
We often take for granted liturgical spaces. But the pandemic’s strictures of forcing us outdoors help us to take a new look at the places where we worship. Recall that in the Gospels’ reporting, much of Jesus’ ministry took place in settings outdoors where the weather inevitably had effects on the goings on. Our nave is warm in the winter, and cool in the summer, that is to say, always comfortable. Then there was the varied weather this past week for our worship outdoors. On the days of greatest solemnity, focused on Jesus’ Passion, the weather was appropriately and fittingly bracing with precipitation and the threat of rain (and even some snow on Maundy Thursday), along with stiff, cold winds. As the fulcrum shifted in the course of The Three Days, when we arrived at the first celebration of resurrection at the Easter Vigil, the weather, again fittingly, had moderated – clear skies, more comfortable temperatures, and the absence of a bracing wind. Thus, we could sense in our bodies climatic conditions that matched the mood of the narratives of Jesus’ final earthly days that we were remembering and liturgically re-enacting.
Additionally, during the solemn silences of The Three Days, worshipers noted the songs of birds and the sounds of wind chimes on neighbors’ porches, providing another kind of accompaniment to our liturgies.
Also of note, we dared to sing again – “All Glory, Laud, and Honor” on Palm and Passion Sunday, Psalm 88 on Maundy Thursday, some chanted portions of the liturgies on Good Friday and at the Easter Vigil, and then the robust singing of “Jesus Christ is Risen Today” on Easter Sunday morning. Indeed, how wonderful it was to give voice in song once again to gospel proclamation after a full year’s hiatus from this central Christian practice. Likewise, how wonderful to hear our choir again in person and live. As I have said, the videos of our choir which Barbara weaves together are quite fine. Choral music live, though, is such a more magnificent gift and aid to proclaiming the good news.
And then, on Easter Sunday, for the church and parsonage yards to be filled with the Resurrection faithful, enjoying coffee and goods baked by the loving hands of our members, was a sight for sore eyes. I’ve never before preached, nor led worship from a house’s outdoor deck, but that location made a fitting chancel for our day’s celebrations. Over the course of the days of Holy Week and Easter, we journeyed from the Memorial Garden on the Potomac Street side of the church to the ground on the Powhatan Street side that contains our “Plot Against Hunger,” our church’s vegetable garden, the donated produce of which benefits those in need in our community. Thus, with this shift in location, and in the joy of and thanksgiving for Christ’s resurrection, our attention was turned to the needs of the world which is our mission field in loving service to our neighbors.
The long and the short of it is that in my estimation, our worship outdoors was not lacking in aesthetic and spiritual poignancy and meaning. The outdoor contextualization in many ways allowed the familiar narratives we heard and re-enacted to speak with new, or at least nuanced meanings, meanings which may have remained hidden and obscure if we were indoors.
Here’s to the spiritual and liturgical silver linings in this year of pandemic deprivation!
In thanksgiving for these opportunities to give new expression to our proclamation that Christ is risen, Christ is risen indeed. Alleluia!
Pastor Jonathan Linman
The Three Days (April 1-3):
Three Days BulletinEaster Sunday (April 4):
Dear Friends in Christ:
In lieu of separate homilies for Holy Week, what follows is a set of suggestions for how you may worshipfully and devotionally engage features of the coming dramatic Three Days – Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and the Vigil of Easter. The Three Days are actually a seamless liturgical drama that occurs over the course of the holy days. Here we journey with Jesus Christ to the Upper Room, the cross, and ultimately the empty tomb. I pray that this guide will be of salutary use to you for deepening your holy encounters with God in Christ in your worship at home and perhaps also in person outdoors at the church.
A Zoom link for Wednesday's Midweek Lenten Worship and Presentation on Faith Informing Life's Work will be sent via Constant Contact. If you are not receiving our Constant Contact messages, please contact the church office.
Dear Friends in Christ:
As our second pandemic Lent soon draws to a close, we are on the brink of observing and celebrating among the holiest of days in the Christian calendar, namely, Palm and Passion Sunday, The Three Days – Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, the Vigil of Easter – and Resurrection of our Lord, Easter Day.
As usual, we will provide resources for worship at home for Sunday of the Passion, The Three Days, and Easter Sunday. Included will be worship videos for Passion Sunday and Easter Sunday. But there will also be occasion for those who desire and are able to worship in person outdoors on each of these occasions.
In whatever ways appropriate to your circumstances, I invite your robust participation in these Holy Days at home and in person, again if you are safely able. For what these days hold forth for us are the central mysteries of our faith centered on the cross and grounded in the empty tomb. The liturgies for Holy Week and Easter make for our personal and direct participation in the sacred drama of these days both at home and outdoors in person, albeit in truncated ways.
We won’t be able to do all of the things called for in our liturgical enactments. Current pandemic protocols preclude, for example, unabridged readings of the Passion stories outdoors, the laying on of hands for individual forgiveness and the washing of feet on Maundy Thursday. Likewise, the abbreviated and partial Easter Vigil outdoors will not feature the multiple readings, though the bulletin for worship at home will include a rather full complement of readings. Most strikingly will be the absence of the holy supper, the Eucharist, on the days we would normally celebrate it.
That said, there will still be plenty of holy liturgical features for our worshipful engagement outdoors – the blessing of palms and a procession with palms and the reading of the Passion from Mark’s Gospel on Passion Sunday; physically distanced individual absolution and the chanting of Psalm 88 at liturgy’s on Holy Thursday when otherwise we would strip the altar of its adornments; a reading of a portion of the Passion according to John, bidding prayers and procession with a wooden cross with opportunity to adore the wonder of this instrument of salvation on Good Friday; lighting of the new fire and Paschal Candle with Easter Proclamation, and Affirmation of Baptism at the Easter Vigil; a continental Easter Breakfast and worship outdoors along with an Easter Egg hunt for children on Easter Sunday. On each of these occasions, I will offer brief homiletical reflections on the readings and on the significance of each day. There may even be a small ensemble leading some singing on some of the occasions, all the while masked and physically distanced as is appropriate during these times.
For those worshiping at home, the worship resources provided for your domestic use will likewise contain as full a set of observances as possible for worshipful use at home. As usual, the Sunday Worship Videos will feature hymns and anthems led by our choir.
All of this, of course, does not add up to what we would do and celebrate in person in our beloved nave and elsewhere on our church property. But while abbreviated and incomplete, the coming holy days and their ritual enactments for our worship will be means through which the Holy Spirit will draw us more deeply into the holy mysteries, again centered in the death and resurrection of Christ. Our observances and celebrations at home and outdoors will be means through which the Holy Spirit will again generate, regenerate, and renew our faith, our trust in the Trinitarian God whom we see most intimately in the face of Jesus Christ whose last days of earthly ministry and mission are featured in the coming holy days.
May God in Christ bless our worshipful engagements in the power of the Holy Spirit for the sake of the world’s life and its healing,
Pastor Jonathan Linman
A Zoom link for Wednesday's Midweek Lenten Worship and Presentation on Faith Informing Life's Work will be sent via Constant Contact. If you are not receiving our Constant Contact messages, please contact the church office.
Dear Friends in Christ:
In these last few days of winter, Spring has sprung. Winter during the pandemic had its own unique rigors. One of the silver linings amidst the pandemic lock down were the occasions to go outside for walks to enjoy sunshine and fresh air, and that in season. As the pandemic spring entered into summer and progressed into autumn and finally winter with colder days of abbreviated sunlight, I found it more challenging to get outdoors. So, the lock down during winter felt in palpable ways more locked down. Add to that a winter season marked by cold and snowy-icy-slushy conditions, and it was all the more bleak.
Now, however, the days are again longer and brighter. Daylight Savings Time has returned. While it’s still officially winter for a few more days as I write, a change of seasons is quite evident. The rabbits have again appeared in the parsonage yard. The birds are more active. I notice again their song. A falcon has even been hanging out on occasion in the parsonage yard. Given the birds’ increased activity in the yard, I notice that my cats are engaging in their version of screen time, hanging out at the parsonage windows watching “Cat TV” by staring intently at the birds. That the birds are in the yard so much also reveals that the wealth of living things in the soil is springing to life. The birds are seeking out those living things for food. On the botanical side of things, one lone daffodil came into blossom in the parsonage yard earlier this week. Now it is joined by many others and some crocuses.
Living in the parsonage with its yard, I am much more keenly aware of the change in seasons, the rhythms of how the sunlight courses through the day and illuminates different parts of the yard according to season. During my years in New York City, one had to go looking for signs of seasonal change, especially in Spring. Here in Arlington, you cannot miss it.
And for all of this I am thankful, relieved, and given a renewed sense of hopefulness that the rigors of a pandemic winter will soon be behind us. This sense of hopefulness is made the greater by the increased pace and extent of vaccinations against Covid-19.
All of this coincides with Lent. In fact, the English word ‘Lent’ derives from an Old English word, ‘lencten’ which means “spring season.” As the Lenten season draws closer to Holy Week with its Three Days culminating in the festival of Resurrection, our gaze is drawn to the final days of Jesus’ earthly ministry with particular focus on the cross, Jesus’ death and the mystery of the resurrection. “Easter,” itself another word from Old English, also has naturalistic origins associated with the rising of the sun at dawn and connections to a goddess of fertility and spring.
But here’s the thing: as wonderful as extended sunlight, and new plant life and more active animals are, as wonderful as Spring is, all of this pales in comparison to the mysteries of the cross and empty tomb which confound, transcend and supersede systems of nature. The wonders of contemporary science that have given us effective vaccines in the space of a year’s time have their own miraculous feel. But what God has done in raising Jesus from the dead is so much more than modern science.
I am relishing and delighting in all of the signs of life about me in the parsonage and church yards. Don’t get me wrong, it’s all magnificent. But the message that is central to the Christian gospel is so much more. Spring is about life from life, renewal from a state of dormancy. The Christian message is about life from death. And that’s a whole different set of realities than natural cycles. In fact, the gospel breaks open these natural cycles to new promised realities. That’s the wonder of it, the mystery of it, the grace of it, inspiring and reawakening and renewing our trust in it.
Yes, Lent happens amidst Spring. Yes, popular secular and some religious observances of Easter employ symbols of renewed life – eggs and bunnies and flowers – in an effort to communicate the meaning of the season. But the Christian message of the Three Days is about Christ’s victory of resurrected life over death, of breaking and transcending natural cycles of sin and mortality.
Thus, may we be drawn to celebrate the magnificence of the Christian message even as we enjoy the delights of Spring. Yes, bask in the warmth of the sun, to be sure. But may God inspire us to bask ever more in the Son, whose rising knows no setting.
With hopefulness rooted in Jesus Christ, the one who died, and the one whom God raised,
Pastor Jonathan Linman
A Zoom link for Wednesday's Midweek Lenten Worship and Presentation on Faith Informing Life's Work will be sent via Constant Contact. If you are not receiving our Constant Contact messages, please contact the church office.
Dear Friends in Christ:
On Sunday afternoon, March 7, our newly constituted Congregation Council met via Zoom for our annual retreat, an occasion to look at the bigger pictures of our life together in ministry and mission. The focus of conversation was the set of vision statements that I shared and commented on at our Annual Congregational Meeting in January, and which I have begun elaborating on in some of these Midweek Messages.
The retreat conversation on Sunday began in earnest the movement from statements of vision which I have made as new pastor here to statements that we, our leaders, can embrace together.
The fruit of Sunday’s conversation is a revised set of vision statements that broadly address most facets of congregational life. These are revisions in language and word choice which reflect the sensibilities of this current configuration of Council members.
The Congregation Council will soon continue conversations about processes for how best to share these emerging communal statements of vision with our wider congregation membership, and this toward a fuller communal embrace of shared vision for ministry and for mission. Watch for invitations to participate in future conversations concerning these vision statements.
As the statements of vision are more widely known and embraced in the congregation, we will make plans to begin to live into the statements of vision practically and concretely. I would hope that these statements would guide how we craft Council meeting agendas, so that we do not lose sight of our vision amidst the details of our life together. I would also hope that the statements of vision will guide the work of our congregation committees and our other initiatives. Likewise, I would hope that the statements of vision would inform and focus how our staff members undertake their work. The statements of vision will certainly guide and focus my work as pastor. Moreover, assessment about how well and effectively and faithfully we are living into the statements of vision can serve as the criteria for which our life together can be evaluated.
None of these statements is written in stone. They are and should be subject to change and revision given likely changing circumstances in church and world. And certainly, how we might decide to live into the visions will change from month to month and year to year, again given our ever rapidly changing world.
But even in provisional form, the statements of vision promise to provide focus and grounding amidst what otherwise is the swirl of competing demands and needs and opportunities in the complex mission field that we are privileged now to engage.
The time for worship at our Council Retreat centered on the passage from the prophet Ezekiel where the prophet was given a vision of a valley of dry bones which were knit together again along with flesh and sinews and new life breathed into them by the prophetic word of the Lord. The vision birthed proclamation which resulted in new life and restoration for God’s people.
May it likewise be so for us in the community that is Resurrection Lutheran Church.
Respectfully in Jesus’ name,
Pastor Jonathan Linman
A Zoom link for Wednesday's Midweek Lenten Worship and Presentation on Faith Informing Life's Work will be sent via Constant Contact. If you are not receiving our Constant Contact messages, please contact the church office.
Dear Friends in Christ:
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Hebrews 12:1-2)
It’s been a whole year. On Sunday, March 1, 2020 you voted to call me as your Pastor. On that day, none us anticipated what would be before us. Though the coronavirus was making its way throughout the world, the pandemic had not yet been declared. But by the mid part of March, we all were in lock down. It’s almost been a full year of that unwanted series of events which turned the world upside down. Few at the time had awareness that this would go on for a year, and likely then some.
I’ve never run a marathon. Perhaps some of you have. The author of the letter to the Hebrews employs the image of the race to describe the journey of discipleship in Jesus’ name. Let us remember that we undertook this journey of pandemic deprivation in Jesus’ name. Yes, we were obedient to protocols established by government authorities, but we also began our fast from regular Christian assembly indoors, in person for Christ’s sake out of a commitment to love of neighbor, especially those most vulnerable among us in society, a central commitment of Lutheran social ethics.
Our fasting from central Christian things has been going on almost a year (I keep saying that, because it seems hard to believe). It’s been a marathon, a long race. Signs suggest that we may be entering the last phases of pandemic-related communal deprivation. The vaccination roll out is increasing in pace and extent. And that there are vaccines available at all this quickly is a wonder of contemporary medical science. But we still have a good bit of the race before us, with possible twists and turns and as yet unforeseen obstacles.
Again, I’ve never run a marathon, but I have some history with twenty-mile-long mountain hikes. I recall just how taxing and challenging it was during the last legs of these journeys when my body was on a kind of autopilot to reach the destination.
I need to confess to you that I am exhausted and often feel as though I am running on empty. The social isolation of pandemic discipline is taking its toll on my sense of well-being. Normal pleasures – like going out to dinner at restaurants with friends – are not consistently available. The richness of the DC area is closed off precisely when Nathan (when he visits) and I would love to go on adventures of discovery. Like many of you, working from home at the parsonage means there is little meaningful separation between personal and professional life. I am not at my best at this point in the season of pandemic. In short, I am running the race with quite the limp.
Perhaps you have your own tales of comparative woe at this point in the journey. I offer mine in honesty to invite your own honest, self-assessment of how you are doing.
That said, I also am drawn to offer words of encouragement. Responding to the exhortation of the author of the letter to the Hebrews, we look to Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. Therefore, as your Pastor, I invite you to set your eyes on Christ if they are not already fixed there, for such focus can draw us forward. Now is not the time to let up, but to persevere in our discipline, continuing on, limps and all. We persevere in the power of the Holy Spirit whose energies we know in our admittedly truncated but nonetheless real encounters with the means of grace – in the reading and proclamation of the word, in our varied times of worship at home, in person outdoors, via Zoom, in words of forgiveness, in our holy conversations with each other.
In this past Sunday’s gospel reading we heard again Jesus’ instruction, “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me.” (Mark 8:34) Most of us have to date lived pretty cushy and easy Christian lives in which cross-bearing specifically for Jesus’ sake and the sake of the gospel has not much been asked of us, we who are privileged members of what has been known as the mainline church. But I believe it is true that our decision to refrain from regular Christian assembly has in fact been a very real expression of denying ourselves to take up the cross to follow Jesus. This past year of deprivation from central Christian things has been cruciform indeed. Awareness of this heartens me and renews a sense of purpose and meaning in what otherwise has seemed to be a year often lacking in meaningful, life-giving experiences. I pray that naming our cross-bearing self-denial which began in Lent 2020 and now continues into Lent 2021 edifies you as well.
I thus conclude by returning to the author of Hebrews who also writes this for our encouragement, “Therefore lift your drooping hands and strengthen your weak knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed.” (Hebrews 12:12-13)
May it be so in Jesus’ name,
Pastor Jonathan Linman
A Zoom link for Wednesday's Midweek Lenten Worship and Presentation on Faith Informing Life's Work will be sent via Constant Contact. If you are not receiving our Constant Contact messages, please contact the church office.
Dear Friends in Christ:
This message continues the series elaborating on proposed statements of vision for mission and ministry in our life together as a congregation. This week’s focus: worship and music. Resurrection Church has a particularly strong foundation on which to build when it comes to its worship and music practices. This liturgical and musical legacy is one of the major reasons that I was attracted to serving as pastor of this congregation.
It is undeniably clear that inspiring worship and music are hallmarks of thriving, growing congregations. So, here’s the vision statement: I envision Resurrection as a congregation that builds on its legacy of faithful liturgy and musical excellence to offer inspiring worship and music that more fully expresses the global and diverse nature of the Church.
This particular vision has its source in my experience over many years of attending ELCA Churchwide Assemblies in various capacities – as voting member, volunteer, Church Council member, Synod staff member, and visitor. What I have observed over the years is what I a drawn to call the maturing of our church liturgically and musically. The Renewing Worship process, which resulted in the publication of Evangelical Lutheran Worship in 2006, ushered in a new era for us as a church liturgically and musically. Available to us is a wide array of liturgical resources that vary seasonally and support worship for the Sunday assembly as well as a number of different occasions, settings, and circumstances. These resources are not just in the ELW as a book, but are also available in the online platform, Sundays and Seasons, which Resurrection Church also uses.
Musically, recent years have featured tremendous growth in hymnody and other songs, particularly new texts, often wedded to familiar tunes, that express our church’s current theological commitments and sensibilities. Moreover, there is available to us an increasing number of hymns and songs from the wider global and ecumenical communities, from the many nations, that build on and expand beyond classical Lutheran foundations from European contexts.
These developments have been consistently evident at our ELCA Churchwide Assemblies where the liturgies, in my experience, are faithful to the church’s liturgical traditions and these liturgies are carried on music that reflects the global nature of the church with instrumentation that honors diverse practices of many nations and cultures – and it’s all been offered in recent years with excellence and vitality. This is what I envision also at Resurrection Church.
Because our congregation has such a strong foundation on which to build liturgically and musically, my vision for worship and music here does not in any way imply a “throw the baby out with the bathwater” dynamic. Not at all. Rather, I see a continuation of this congregation’s liturgical and musical practices enhanced by a still fuller embodiment and making use of the many resources available to us in the ELCA liturgically and musically.
The particular ways we live into this vision, of course, remain to be seen. However, much will center on the person we end up hiring as our regular Director of Music. Another concrete step toward living into the vision is the planned purchase of a new hymnal supplement from Augsburg Fortress, All Creation Sings, which contains still more liturgical and musical resources that again reflect our wider church’s commitments liturgically and musically.
Other possibilities I see include making still more use of the fullness of the resource that is Evangelical Lutheran Worship, finding occasions in our life together, for example, to pray Morning, and Evening, and Night Prayer, seeking creative ways to remember in worship and prayer those who are remembered in our church’s calendar of commemorations, looking for occasions to celebrate festivals during midweek, and more. We will discern how best to do this together.
This vision for worship and music relates importantly to the vision statement about spirituality and faith practices which I addressed in a previous midweek message. Lutheran spirituality and Lutheran faith practices are principally grounded in the church’s liturgy. When I make reference to inspiring worship and music in the statement of vision, I intentionally chose the word “inspire” with the Holy Spirit in mind (‘inspire’ has at its root the word for spirit), for the Holy Spirit uses the means of grace, Word and Sacrament, to generate and renew our faith for the sake of the world. The Spirit’s activity in the means of grace is cradled by our liturgies and in our music both on Sundays and in our various other gatherings during the week, including our administrative meetings. I also hope that this vision would extend into our homes, where we would not lose what we have experienced during the pandemic, namely, the practice of also worshiping at home, claiming Evangelical Lutheran Worship as a source for domestic devotion alongside our Bibles.
There is much more conversation to be had among our leaders and the whole congregation concerning our emerging shared vision for worship and music at Resurrection Lutheran Church. But I conclude this initial message with some reflection on the centrality of the global and diverse nature of the church, and why it is important for us at Resurrection Church to seek to embody global diversity. Christianity, from its inception, has always been a diverse tradition reflecting the cultures and languages of the many nations. So, our commitment to seeking to reflect in our worship and music this global diversity is not driven by ideological motives, but by seeking to be faithful to what Christianity has always been. Remember that a hallmark of the Pentecost event recorded in Acts 2 is when the Holy Spirit gave Jesus’ followers the gift of proclaiming the good news of Christ’s victory over death in the languages of the nations. Thus, faithful worship and music reflect the global and diverse nature of the whole Christian tradition throughout the centuries and into our present day as the Spirit continues to guide us into all truth (cf. John 16:30).
Respectfully in Jesus’ name,
Pastor Jonathan Linman
