March 2024 Newsletters
I have stared at dozens, probably hundreds of teacher names in the last month. I’ve read the credentials of more people than I can remember. I’ve thought to myself, “This person would be perfect!” I’ve read stories and life experiences, and misread them as well. I’ve asked people about their interests who I should have realized would have no interest or even ability based on life circumstances to serve our school. I’ve searched and keep on searching for the people that God desires to serve as teachers at our school. But that’s not all I do, and that’s where you come in. While you aren’t directly tasked with finding teachers for our school, there is one thing both of us have in common amidst this process: PRAYER!
When the apostle Paul says to “pray without ceasing,” in 1 Thessalonians 5:17 there are a few times of life that come to mind quite like those of need. Prayer takes all shapes and forms. It’s not just the wrote formal sounding prayers on the back of the bulletin on Sunday morning. Nor is prayer just the memorized Lord’s Prayer or 23rd Psalm. Rather, prayer is whatever you make it, and happens wherever you pray it. Prayer is everything we need it to be and more. It’s audible, or silent. It’s planned and impromptu. But the one thing prayer always is, is necessary. As God’s people we pray because we need it.
God knows our hearts, our desires, our needs, and our wants. He gives us a great many of those things even without our prayer. Yet like a loving Father, He desires to hear from us, longs for our conversation as response to His creation, His Word, our lives and experiences. The more we speak with Him about all of this as coming from His bounteous hand, the more our wills conform to the words of Luther in the 4th petition of the Lord’s Prayer about daily bread, that we would “receive it with thanksgiving.” Knowing that everything we have and receive comes either from God’s gracious abundance or his fatherly allowance means that we are able to face all things contentedly trusting in God’s almighty will amidst both joy and sorrow, plenty and want as the apostle Paul then pens those mighty words: “I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.” Even when God allows us to undergo difficulty, or hardship, or sorrow or want, He does so to strengthen us by His divine grace and mercy out of love for us!
But back to the call process and you: PRAY. “Pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest that He will send workers into His vineyard,” specifically here at St. John. Pray for our school board and for me as we continue this process. Pray along with people you will never meet who regretfully tell me they won’t be able to serve us here because of a myriad of reasons, but that we will be in their prayers. Even as God has promised in Ephesians 4, He has called some to be apostles and evangelists, and pastors and teachers, so pray that He directs our efforts in seeking the individuals He wills for us will be found, brought to our attention and prayerfully considered. Pray that God gives us all the willingness and zeal to run the course that He has set before us with joy, knowing that we serve a good and gracious God and master.
In His service,
Pastor Nick