Christmas blurbs

Hey all,

Christmas time blurbs,

Follow Santa at Norad.

My Friend Gloria's Internship church Gloria Dei created a free Music CD that is very good, a mix of devotional/worship music that can be listened to any time as well. It is called Hope for a Tree Cut Down. It can be found here.

I have two Christmas Eve Services that I am leading today, one at Faith Lutheran, and one at St. Luke. They are both candlelight services, I put together the Faith service myself, so hopefully it will go well.

My parents and sister are here for the week and then we will head up to my Grandparents for Christmas there. That will be fun, all the family except for two cousins will be there.

Laters, and Merry Christmas!

Erik

edit:fixed link to hope for a tree cut down

If we had some global warming

Christmas Program Part 1

Love Has Come: 2008 St. Luke Christmas Program

(Intern Erik, Joseph, and Mary come on Stage)

Intern Erik: This is how Jesus the Messiah was born. His mother, Mary, was engaged to be married to Joseph. But before the marriage took place, while she was still a virgin, she became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit. Joseph, her fiancé, was a good man.

Joseph: I do not want to disgrace her, I will quietly break off the engagement.

(Joseph lays down to go to sleep)
(Head Angel comes on stage)
Narrator 3 (Pulpit): As he considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream. "Joseph, son of David," the angel said, "do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. For the child within her was conceived by the Holy Spirit. And she will have a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." All of this occurred to fulfill the Lord's message through his prophet: "Look! The virgin will conceive a child! She will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel, which means 'God is with us.' "

(Joseph wakes up)

Joseph: A message from God, I will do as the dream said.

(Joseph walks off stage)

Narrator 2 (Lectern): The Angel Gabriel was sent by God to Nazareth, a village in Galilee, to a virgin named Mary. She was engaged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of King David. Gabriel appeared to her and said, Greetings, favored woman, the Lord is with you! Don’t be afraid Mary, for you have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be very great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David. And he will reign over Israel forever; his Kingdom will never end!" And Mary gave praise to God.

Mary: Oh, how my soul praises the Lord. How my spirit rejoices in God my Savior! For God made this promise to our ancestors, to Abraham and his children forever.

Intern Erik: Welcome to the 2008 St. Luke Christmas Program, Love has Come. We have now begun the Christmas story, join us as we celebrate the rest with a bit of humor, laughter, and joy.

(all enter to center stage)
Song: Love Has Come #292 (Youth sing first verse, congregation join in last 2)
(All leave except Narrator at lectern, Caesar Augustus stage right, Joseph and Mary stage left)

Narrator 1 (Lectern): At that time the Roman emperor, Augustus, decreed that a census should be taken throughout the Roman Empire. This was the first census taken when Quirinius (kwai-RIHN-e-us) was governor of Syria.

Augustus: I Decree!

(Augustus leaves, Mary and Joseph slowly walk to center stage as narrator speaks)

Narrator 1 (L): All returned to their own ancestral towns to register for this census. And because Joseph was a descendant of King David, he had to go to Bethlehem in Judea, David's ancient home. He traveled there from the village of Nazareth in Galilee. He took with him Mary, his fiancée, who was now obviously pregnant. And while they were there, the time came for her baby to be born.

Mary: Joseph, I feel that the baby is coming soon, we need to find a place to stay.

Joseph: Let us check that inn in Bethlehem. I figure that we will need suite with a king size bed.

(All come to center stage for song)
Song: O Little Town of Bethlehem #279
(All leave except Innkeeper who meets Mary and Joseph at center stage)

Narrator 2 (Pulpit): She gave birth to her first child, a son. She wrapped him snugly in strips of cloth and laid him in a manger, because there was no lodging available for them.

(Joseph and Innkeeper argue, Mary stands in the background holding stomach and does heavy breathing)

Joseph: Do you have a suite available?

Innkeeper: Nope

Mary: {heavy breathing} (Joseph and Innkeeper ignore Mary)

Joseph: Double-bed?

Innkeeper: Nope

Mary: {heavy breathing} (Joseph and Innkeeper ignore Mary)

Joseph: Single Bed?

Innkeeper: Nope,

Mary: JOSEPH!!!

Joseph: (astonished) What! (turning around quickly)

Mary: The baby is coming, it does not matter what room we get.

Joseph: Oh, yeah, sorry about that.

Innkeeper: I have a stall filled with animals that eat from a manger.

Joseph: We’ll take it!

Christmas Program Part 2

(All come to center stage for song)
Song: What Child is This #296
(All exit, Innkeeper guides Mary and Joseph to stage left and then exits)
(Shepherds enter to center stage)

(Mary and Joseph will remain stage left for the rest of the performance)

Narrator 3 (L): That night there were shepherds staying in the fields nearby, guarding their flocks of sheep. Suddenly, an angel of the Lord appeared among them, and the radiance of the Lord's glory surrounded them. They were terrified, but the angel reassured them.

Head Angel: Hello

Shepherds: (scared) AHHHHH!!!

Head Angel: Don’t be Afraid!

Shepherds: (calm) oh, ok

Head Angel: "I bring you good news that will bring great joy to all people. The Savior-- yes, the Messiah, the Lord-- has been born today in Bethlehem, the city of David! And you will recognize him by this sign: You will find a baby wrapped snugly in strips of cloth, lying in a manger."

Narrator 3 (L): Suddenly, the angel was joined by a vast host of others-- the armies of heaven-- praising God and saying,

(all angels come on stage saying “glory” as they walk)

All Angels: (Once all are center stage they say) "Glory to God in highest heaven, and peace on earth to those with whom God is pleased."

(All come to center stage for song)
Song: Angels We Have Heard on High #289 (youth first verse, cong. join in rest)
(all exit except Shepherds)

Narrator 2 (P): When the angels had returned to heaven, the shepherds said to each other,

Shepherds: "Let's go to Bethlehem! Let's see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about."

(Shepherds go to stage left with Mary and Joseph, except shepherd 1 and 2)

Shepherd one: I can’t wait to see this baby!

Shepherd two: I can’t wait to tell Frank what he missed by calling, I mean papyrusing (puh – pie – russing) in sick.

(Shepherd 1 and 2 join rest of Shepherds)

Narrator 2 (P): They hurried to the village and found Mary and Joseph. And there was the baby, lying in the manger. After seeing him, the shepherds told everyone what had happened and what the angel had said to them about this child.

(All come to center stage for song)
Song: The First Noel #300 (first verse only, youth only)
(all exit)

Narrator 4 (L): All who heard the shepherds' story were astonished, but Mary kept all these things in her heart and thought about them often.

Mary: (to Joseph) I’m going to remember this.

Joseph: Yeah, a multitude of angels, shepherds coming to see the child, giving birth to the Son of God. I am pretty sure we will be talking about this for quite some time.

Narrator 4 (L): The shepherds went back to their flocks, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen. It was just as the angel had told them.

(all gather at center stage for song)
Song: It Came upon the Midnight Clear #282 (Vs. 1,4)
(all exit)
(Little Lutherans enter to Center Stage)
Song: Away in a Manger
Song: Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star
(Little Lutherans exit)
(Herod center stage)

Christmas Program Part 3

Narrator 4 (P): About that time, some wise men from eastern lands arrived in Jerusalem looking for a star.

(the Wise men and Wise woman enter stage right)

Wise people: (as entering in a little song and dance number joining Herod at center stage) We’re the wise men, (and woman), we’re the wise men, (and woman), and we have gifts! (wise people do Jazz hands)

Wise man 1: “Where is the newborn king of the Jews? We saw his star as it rose, and we have come to worship him."

Herod: "Go to Bethlehem and search carefully for the child. And when you find him, come back and tell me so that I can go and worship him, too!"

Wise man 2: Are you really going to worship him and not try to kill him.

Herod: (looks around nervously) yes, I really want to worship him.

Wise woman: I don’t believe you.

Herod: I want to worship, I have no ambitions to power and do not feel threatened at all.

Wise Woman: ummmm, ok

Narrator 4 (P): After this, the wise men went their way. And the star they had seen in the east guided them to Bethlehem. It went ahead of them and stopped over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they were filled with joy!

Wise People: Joy!

(all enter to sing song)
Song: Joy to the World #267 (youth first verse, cong. join in rest)
(Wise people join Mary and Joseph stage left, Herod stage right)

Narrator 1 (L): They entered the house and saw the child with his mother, Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasure chests and gave him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

Wise Man 1: I have Frankincense, which is a sweet smelling incense used in temples showing that he will be a priest.

Wise Man 2: I have Myrrh, which is a perfume used to anoint loved ones upon their death showing that he will be loved but will suffer death.

Wise Woman: I have Gold, (short pause) which is Gold, showing that he will be a king. I wanted to give a bike though; he is going to have to walk a lot.

Mary: Thank you ever so much.

(Wise People go to center stage)

Wise Man 1: So how should we go home, that Herod guy (points at Herod stage right, Herod waves back) really wanted to know where the child was, should we tell him?

Wise Man 2: Well I had a dream about this and an angel told me to go another way home.

Wise Woman: I had a dream where there were dinosaurs and I could fly and had all the chocolate that I could eat and there was this dog named Kitty Kat who could talk and he told me about this flower that would grant you wishes and I wished for a bicycle and it was pink with bows and streamers and a basket and it had a bell that sounded like a siren, whoo whooo, and then…

(Wise Woman tales off as Wise men stare at her)
Wise Woman: I’ll tell you about it on the road.

Wise Men together: Please don’t.

(Wise People exit stage left, Herod waves at them trying to get them to come back to him, see they will not, stomps off stage)

Narrator 1 (L): When it was time to leave, they returned to their own country by another route, for God had warned them in a dream not to return to Herod. This is the story of Christmas and like the Angels, Shepherds, and Wise people we worship and praise this day.

(all enter for song)
Song: Love Has Come #292 (ALL)

Intern Erik: Thank you for joining us in this celebration of Christmas, I hope that you all had a good time. I want to thank all the youth who helped with this performance and hope that they found that it is not only toys that are fun about Christmas, but also the Christmas story. I want to thank all the parents and grandparents, who helped the youth learn lines, songs, and supported them.

Let us pray, Lord God we thank you for sending your son Jesus to us. We thank you for your love and mercy. Remember us in the joy that is now and the joy of this coming season, be with those who have hard times during this part of the year. Give them your strength. In the name of your son, Jesus Christ, Amen.


Song: Silent Night, Holy Night! #281 (ALL)

One of those moments

Have you ever had one of those moments? The time where some big event happens and you know that you will always remember where and when you were when you heard the news.

They are usually huge events in history, though some can be deeply personal events as well. People talk about the place they were when Kennedy was shot, when they pulled out of Vietnam, Nixon's impeachment, the Challenger explosion, the list goes on. Kent State, D-Day, Oklahoma City Bombing, Columbine ...

I have two that quickly come to mind for me. While I know of events and knew when they happened there are very few picture moments of where I was. I am too young to remember where I was when the Challenger blew up, I remember hearing and talking about it. The first picture for me is in 1991 at the beginning of the first Gulf War. My family and I were out to eat at Snuffy's Malt Shop in Roseville, MN. I remember it most because they announced over the radio in the Restaurant that the use of force to remove Iraq from Kuwait had been authorized. I see that the date is Jan. 12 and now am wondering if we were out to eat for my Birthday, Jan. 11.

The second is 9/11, I remember this better. I was standing in the middle of my dorm room at Iowa State, in Knapp Tower, my small 14 inch tv was on my dresser and I had turned it on as I got ready for class. I believe that it was right after or before the second plane hit, both towers were still standing. I saw what was happening and called my parents to tell them to turn on the TV. They already had it on. I don't know why I went to classes that day. I think only one actaully tried to do anything, the others were cancelled or we just watched the TV in the room. I remember trying to get every paper that I could and reading them while in the cafeteria, I think the papers are still stored somewhere at home. It is sort of an Ironic twist that the tower that I was in, Knapp, while I watched the twin towers fall was itself part of a series of 4 towers in sets of two. And about 3 years ago they imploded Knapp and its sister tower Vance.

The point of this post is not to bring up old feelings of memories of bad times, it seems like the majority of these picture moments are of times of great sadness or shock. The point is that I added one last night.

Sitting in my chair, watching the Daily Show/Colbert Report election speacial, while flipping to CNN or MSNBC, occasionally Fox or C-span, at 10:00 as California, Oregon and Washington closed, Jon Stewert, barely containing his own excitement announced that Barack Obama would be the next president of the United States. This is one of those moments, and a great one at that. The first Black President of the United States. This is one of those times where I am proud to be an American, we have not solved the race issue, but this is one step along the way.

Daily Show/Colbert Report "The Moment"



McCain's Concession Speech



Obama's Acceptance Speech

Vote for Change! Yes, We Can!

Yes We Can Video


We Are The One's - will.i.am


If you're out there -John Legend at DNC




hmmm, I wonder who I am voting for?




hint it rhymes with bobama.

Old Lady Thoughts

Found this blog post and thought I would share.

Harold isn't a Muslim either.


and for some fun,

TV Ads for the ELCA

I just finished watching the new TV ads made by the ELCA, I found them very interesting and thought provoking.

See the Ads here.

It is important to begin to use the avenue of television which has been so far dominated by mainly fundamentalist non-denominational groups that I feel are mainly concerned about personal growth and self satisfaction and tend to ignore helping those in need. Both of the ads speak to the two areas that are needed. Working with the needy of our nation and the needy of the world. Personal Growth is very important but the purpose of personal growth should be to then use that growth to help others, not just further help yourselves.

I would like to see further use of television within the ELCA. One random thought that I had once was would it be possible for the ELCA to work with other denominations to form a cable television channel. There are many non-denominational channels, and there is a Roman Catholic channel. I would find it interesting to create a channel across a broad range of main-stream Protestant denominations. Programming such as worship services from the different denominations, group discussions with theological leaders, and individual denominational programming.

In this increasing technological environment we need to begin to embrace and utilize this technology and this seems to be a good start.

VP Debate and Economy Stuff

Random clips and stuff about the election and the economic downturn.

VP Debate:

From Crooks and Liars: The nights most powerful moment.

Couric and Palin Interview:

Saturday Night Live:



Economy:

SNL:



Daily Show:

The Office

I love the TV show "The Office" Just got the 4th Season on DVD.

Here is a compelation of "That's what she said" jokes from the show, a huge running gag.

New Site and Sermons

Hello all,

I have started a secondary blog to contain sermons and any other long documents that I post. This allows me to keep the length of posts down on the main blog while still adding sermons and stuff.

Here are the links to the first two sermons.

August 10th

August 17th

you can still stay with this site as I will add brief posts to update when the other blog is updated.

Faith Lutheran

Pics of Faith Lutheran in Booneville, AR.

Faith Lutheran

St. Luke Lutheran

Here is the album of St. Luke.

St. Luke

Arkansas!!

Hey all,

I have now been in Arkansas about a two and a half weeks, whew. And I already have two sermons down (well three if you count giving one twice at both a Saturday and a Sunday service).

Here is a link to some pictures of my house.

New House

Hope all is well, pics of both churches will be up in the next couple posts.

Michael Phelps is Awesome

In a quote from a satirical article talking about how the gold medals being given out at the Olympics may have high quantities of lead in them.

"I am very, very concerned about my extensive contact with gold medals," Mr. Phelps told reporters. "But what am I supposed to do? Stop being so awesome?"

Codex Sinaiticus

Quick Post here.

They have started to put the Codex Sinaiticus online. This is one of the oldest copies of the Christian Bible in Greek including old and new. Most complete Greek versions of the New Testament used to translate into English are prepared from this codex.

http://www.codex-sinaiticus.net/en/

WYLS

What is WYLS?
I have mentioned WYLS a couple times in my last couple of posts. It stands for Wartburg Youth Leadership School. I worked on the staff for the school this summer as a counselor. There were two sessions the first with 16 youth and the second with 9. Both were great, but with different dynamics and personality.
During the school there were many different activities, but the ones where we worked the most closely with them was planning service ministry projects that the students complete when they get back from the school. We work with them to put together a plan of action and also to help brainstorm different obstacles that may arise and how they can identify the gifts they have to solve these obstacles.

I worked with two guys in the first session, both wanting to work with organizations helping people overseas. The first we came up with the idea to have a car wash and a walk-a-thon to raise money to give to an organization called Freedom Water they build wells in Africa. The second was working to either get a group of people together to make food packages or to get enough people to have the organization come to him in his home town. The organization is called Feed my Starving Children and works by creating food bundles that volunteers put together and then sending them to places in Africa that need food.

The second session I worked with one girl. She is planning a music festival that will be held in the parking lot of her church, the money raised by the festival she hopes to be able to send to orphanages in Siberia. This could be a problem as the news program that she first saw about these organizations said that the government was not allowing money to get to the orphanages. We are hopeful that some method can be found however. The festival itself will be a fun project, I encouraged her to contact other local churches, she is also from the Twin Cities area and attends a church close to my home church, and also Luther Seminary to find musicians and to get more people to come to the fest. We are hopeful that it could turn into an annual event.


All in all, it was a great experience, I met a bunch of great youth and got to know the other staff a lot better.

Doctor Who

K, over my break between WYLS Sessions (essentially the July 4th weekend) I was planning on reading, I however made the mistake of watching the last half of a Doctor Who episode on SciFi Channel and now am obsessed. Enjoy a YouTube video of good quotes and scenes from the show.

The GhostBusters line is the best.





Laters,
e

WYLS

It's been awhile.

I just got done with my first session of being a counselor at WYLS, Wartburg Youth Leadership School and have a week and a half off until the second session begins, and then I start packing for internship.

I wanted to share a clip that one of my professors used during the school.

INTERNSHIP SITE!!!!!

Hey all,

I will be interning in Fort Smith, ARKANSAS!!!

It should be a great time seeing a part of the country that I have not seen before.

Erik

dear flying hairy monkeys!!!!!

k, well it's been 8 months since I wrote anything, ummm yeah I should work on that,

it's getting late now but now I may remember to do this thing tomorrow,

e