Dear Friends and Members of Shepherd of the Hills,

This world is beautiful and glorious, full of joy and delight.  This world is dark and grotesque, full of hate and suffering.  How can both these statements be true?  I believe that both these statements are true and it’s not just a matter of perspective.  This is a belief we hold as faithful Christian people. Both of these realities are true simultaneously.  

The joys and wonders of our world come to us because of God’s creative goodness.  He is the author of all of creation and some of that creation you and I experience still bear the reflection of that goodness.  Yet, we live in a fallen world, a world marked by sin and chaos.  Therefore creation also simultaneously reveals this fallenness.

People in our world can be kind and compassionate, sharing in the joy and delights of this creation.  Faithful Christians and non-Christians, from a very human perspective, contribute to the good in our world. Faithful Christians and non-Christians also contribute to the hate and suffering we experience in this life.  

From a very human perspective we hold both realities to be true about our world.  But this does not bring hope.  If this alone was true, the best we could do is resign ourselves to ‘fate’ and work to make this life as joyous as possible and try to minimize the suffering.  YUCK!

As faithful Christian people we are given a much more concrete hope.  A hope for a redeemed creation and a redeemed humanity.  The focus of that hope is the Resurrection of Jesus.  Now the joy and delight we experience with creation and one another is just a foretaste of the feast that is to come.  These moments become for us a chance to reflect and give thanks to God for the blessings in life we receive, but also not putting our hope in these moments or blessings.  We see them for what they are…a gift.  

This also means that the dark, grotesque, hatefulness and suffering of the world is not only to be expected, because this is why Jesus came to live, suffer, die and rise, but is also temporary.  Hurt, heartache, pain, illness, suffering and death are all terrible.  God is good.  Jesus is fixing it. Jesus has risen from the dead and has defeated all sin, death and the devil.  His resurrection means a time is coming when darkness will be no more for those who trust in him.  

The world being beautiful and dark simultaneously are realities that we describe, not fates we are tied to.  The Lord, through his salvation story remembered and celebrated this Easter season, has given us a greater hope.  We, by faith, are certain that all things will be made new and until then the very real presence of the Lord Jesus abides with us until his return or our call home.  May the Lord sustain you in this life with the faith to trust such things.  

In His Love and Service,

Pastor Rust

Dear Friends and Members of Shepherd of the Hills,

Here we are.  We are in Holy Week.  This is the most sacred week of our church year.  We don’t just celebrate the Resurrection of our Lord, but also is suffering and death.  Our God is a God of love, but his is also a God of perfect justice.  Perfect justice is something we don’t get in our fallen world.  We get little glimpses of justice, but never perfect justice.  

This letter is a continuation of the previous two letters highlighting the special services of Holy Week.  This time we are examining the beauty of Good Friday.  This is the day perfect justice was carried out.  This is the day our accuser, the devil, is silenced.  This is the day death is undone by death.  This is the day our sin, our own most grievous sin, is paid for perfectly.  It is not paid for with our life, but with this life of the Lord of Life.  This is the day when Jesus, fully man and fully God, chooses to die.  He dies perfectly innocent having no sin of his own, but taking the sin of a fallen creation upon himself.  So how is this monumental event reflected in our service of Tenebrae, the service of darkness?

Good Friday continues the sacred Triduum, the three-day observance of Christ’s Passion.  It is not observed as a funeral for Christ.  It is a day of repentance over sin and restrained joy and praise for the redemption Christ accomplished for us on the cross.  The altar is bare of its usual adornments and in their place a black cloth and 7 candles are visible.  The service consists of the extinguishing of the candles and the dimming of the sanctuary lights.  This reflects the darkness that creation experienced when the Lord of life and light gives up his life for us.  

In our service we extinguish one candle after a reading of each of Jesus’ last seven words.  This is a compilation of readings across all 4 gospels.  A brief litany of response from the congregation is given and we use the song “O Lord Hear Our Prayer” as a refrain to reflect our participation in these events through our own sinful actions.  This helps us stay in this repentant posture through the service.  We are not mere observers of the passion but acknowledge our own sin and the confidence we have that indeed the Lord hears our prayers and grants us the fruits of his divine justice in the death of his son.  

Justice is completed on this night.  Perfect justice is completed on this night.  The sin of humanity is paid for.  Our sin is paid for.  Now we wait.  We spend Saturday in anticipation of the Service of the Resurrection on Sunday.  Very early on the first day of the week, Sunday, we gather to celebrate that death could not hold Jesus and that in the waters of our baptism, we receive the fullness of the resurrection as well.  

I love celebrating Holy Week with you all.  May our faith grow stronger and more bold as we gather to receive these blessed gifts Jesus has won for us. I encourage you to prioritize the time to join me in these special services: Maundy Thursday—March 28 at 6:30; Good Friday—March 29 at 6:30; Services of the Resurrection—Sunday March 31. Sunrise service at 7:15 and Divine Service at 10:30.  I look forward to sharing the Gospel with you in these special ways.  

In His Love and Service,

Pastor Rust

Dear Friends and Members of Shepherd of the Hills,

This letter is the first of a series of three highlighting the different special services of Holy Week.   We will cover Palm/Passion Sunday, Maundy Thursday and Good Friday.  Each of these services are unique in our church year as is appropriate for the special nature of Jesus’ passion.   This week our focus is on Palm/Passion Sunday. 

There are two elements that make Palm/Passion Sunday a unique service.  It starts off with a procession with palms (or other branches) and hosannas to commemorate our Lord’s entry into Jerusalem.  Versicles, responses, a prayer and the Gospel account are part of this special start to the service.  The traditional hymn we sing is “All Glory Laud and Honor.”  This all adds to a very festival like flare to the service and is a public statement of our Lord’s kingship.  It is a time for us to remember and receive the comfort that even in Holy Week with the suffering and death of Jesus, he is Lord over all.  He does not enter Jerusalem as a victim or martyr, but as one who is determined to do the work for which he came into our world for!

The service continues as normal with the service of the Word and the service of the Sacrament.  Then the second element that makes this service unique comes at the end.  The festive mood changes as we pivot to the reading of the entire passion account as presented in Matthew, Mark or Luke.  John’s account of the passion is reserved for Good Friday.  The mood is more reflective and somber as we look ahead to walking with Jesus through his passion on Thursday and Friday.  

During the reading of the passion we pause in silence following the sentence describing Jesus’ death.  It is a long reading and gives us plenty of time for reflection and absorbing the significance of Jesus, who is fully God and fully man, suffering and dying for us, his beloved creation.  This ultimate act of love is the very center of our faith.  

As you continue your lenten journey with Jesus this week make sure as you plan you schedule for the weeks to come that you prioritize the time to join me in these special services:  Palm Sunday—March 24 at 10:30; Maundy Thursday—March 28 at 6:30; Good Friday—March 29 at 6:30.  I look forward to sharing the Gospel with you in these special ways. 

In His Love and Service,

Pastor Rust

Dear Friends and Members of Shepherd of the Hills,

I love Lent, but I love Lent because of its contrast to the power and majesty of the Easter and Pentecost seasons.  Life is not always a mountain top experience (unless you literally live on a mountain).  Life, like faith, has its mountains and its valleys.  Lent is a season to spend some time in the valley of our faith. 

The reality is, on this side of heaven, we will always struggle with sin.  We will always struggle with our poor choices.  We will always struggle with the desires and temptations of our hearts.  We will always struggle with the hurts cause to us by others. Lent is a penitential season for us to focus on some of these realities.  The good news of Lent is, in the midst of these tough realities, we still celebrate our standing with God because of what Jesus has done.  

As I reflect on our mission, to share the love of the Good Shepherd in word and deed, I am reminded that sharing this love means being honest with the struggles we endure.  Often our temptation is to present the best possible image of ourselves as we share life with those the Lord has put in our midst.  This Lenten season I challenge each of us to be more transparent with the struggles we bear in our walk of life and faith.  We do it for this reason: it is in the midst of these struggles that the power of God becomes most evident. 

“But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” (Paul, 2 Corinthians 12: 9-10)

We have been given a great gift.  The Spirit of Christ dwells in us.  It is that Spirit that struggles with us against making those poor choices, acting on temptation, living in foolish desires and bearing grudges against those who sin against us. It is in this power of the Spirit that we speak with the Lord.  It is this power of the Spirit that is made perfect in our weaknesses. 

“Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” (Paul, Romans 8:26-28)

Sharing the love of the Good Shepherd means sharing what He has done for you.  We can’t share that if we aren’t open with the ways that we are weak.  Blessings to you this Lenten season as we reflect on our weakness, and in so doing, give great glory for the perfect strength of God.  

In His Love and Peace,

Pastor Rust

Dear Friends and Members of Shepherd of the Hills,

It is an awesome feeling.  After hiking all day, there it is, the summit.  Once you get there, the views are spectacular.  On a good clear day you can see for miles and miles.  

We are reaching a summit this weekend.  It is the time that Peter, James and John witness our Lord, Jesus Christ, in all his glory.  The view is so spectacular, it is frightening.  Yet, it is Jesus who has the most spectacular view.  

You see, from this summit he can see the cross, the very reason he came into our flesh.  From this summit he is ready to descend into that time and space that is his passion week, and he headed there for you.  

February 14th, we will be celebrating Ash Wednesday as we begin the Lenten season.  I pray that you will join me on Wednesday evening for our 6:30 service.  Here we will reflect once again on our own mortality, and Christ victory over death.  Here we will rejoice in that victory as “ashes to ashes and dust to dust” is not the end of the story.  

We will kick off our Lenten worship series as we reflect on our life in the light of Christ’s descent to the cross.  Nothing has been the same since and nothing will ever be the same.  Life lived in its fullness is life in light of the cross.  

God’s blessings to all of you and may our Lent together be one of celebration. 

In His Love and Service,

Pastor Rust

Dear Friends and Members of Shepherd of the Hills,

I invite you to study the Psalms with me this season of Epiphany.  I’m excited to dive into the Psalm readings appointed for this season.  Luther says this about the Psalms:

“The Psalter should be precious to us if only because it most clearly promises the death and resurrection of Christ, and describes his kingdom, and the nature and standing of all Christian people. It could well be entitled a “Little Bible” since everything contained in the entire Bible is beautifully and briefly comprehended, and compacted into…a Manual. It seems to me as if the Holy Ghost had been please to take on himself the trouble of putting together a short Bible…touching the whole of Christianity…in order that they who are unable to read the whole Bible may nevertheless find almost the whole sum comprehended in one little book…the Psalter is the very paragon of books.”

Additionally, the Psalms are beautiful because they are simultaneously God’s Word to us and our words back to God.  They encompass the fullness of being human and our human experiences.  In the Psalms we see the poets, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, speak to those in sickness and health, those with families and those single, the poor and the rich, the spiritually secure and those in doubt, those who are new to the faith and those who are mature, those young and old.  

Study the Psalms with me.  Our Christian faith we share is expressed in all its fullness in these beautiful words.  All the emotions we feel are part of our Christian faith.  Come see how God’s Word speaks at all times and all seasons.  

This week at Bible Study we will dive into Psalm 62.  “For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence for my hope is from him (v.5).”  Join me at 9AM on Sunday morning, either in person or on Zoom.  See you then. 

In His Love and Service,

Pastor Rust

Dear Friends and Members of Shepherd of the Hills,

It is the New Year and with this, a couple of thoughts from your pastor to add to all the other New Year’s advice you are being inundated with. 

First, celebrate the passage of time. Like we talked about with the in the New Year’s Eve sermon, it is in the passage of time that the Lord works.  Another year has passed with all its joys and tragedies and the Lord was present and at work the whole time.

Second, the Lord gives us the rhythm of days, weeks, months, seasons and years for a reason.  The start of this new rhythm of a year is a reminder that starting fresh is a gift we have because of Jesus’ redemptive work for us.  May you live in the rhythms the Lord has set for us and find satisfaction in work and rest.

Third, if you are going to add a new habit to the new year, may I encourage a regular reading of Luther’s catechism.  It is a wonderful summary of God’s Word.  It is the basic things we should know as Christians.  We are never to old to learn from the catechism.  

I look forward to this year of our Lord 2024 and walking with you all as a congregation.  Blessed New Year to you all. 

In His Love and Service,

Pastor Rust