All Earth is Hopeful...

By the Rev. Tim Hart-Andersen, taken from his "Dear Friends" letter in the December 16 issue of the Westminster News. Read the entire issue here.

Ever since Sunday, December 4, when the youth of the church presented Las Posadas—the Mexican folk tradition of Mary and Joseph going from inn to inn to find a place to stay—the refrain we sang as they moved around the sanctuary has been ringing in my ear and resounding in my heart… All earth is hopeful.

This is the season when hope is born anew. The birth in Bethlehem signals that a new era has dawned. God has chosen to come among us to fulfill the longing of all the earth. The desert will bloom, the lion will dwell with the lamb, the rough places will be made plain.

All earth is hopeful…

As Westminster moves toward the close of 2011, I am filled with hope for what lies ahead. We are ending the year in strength. Our stewardship program is showing the best results we've seen in years. (If you haven’t done so already, please turn in your pledge online here or through the mail.) Worship attendance has shown a slight upswing. Membership continues to grow incrementally. Our mission outreach is as deep and wide as it’s ever been.

The search for a leader for the new Uptown ministry in partnership with Grace-Trinity Church is moving along well. We have interviewed several candidates and should reach a decision soon. There is growing excitement about this new start-up in one of the most vibrant neighborhoods of the city.

All earth is hopeful…

A year ago at this time, the downtown interfaith congregations joined with the business community in an innovative program to help residents in the Currie Avenue shelters move into supportive housing. With a state-funded program, over 150 individuals have now moved from being homeless to living in apartments. The downtown clergy have just been invited again to join the business community, this time to focus on helping homeless youth and young adults living at the Currie Avenue shelters. We will respond in early 2012. Westminster finds itself at a unique confluence in its life as a congregation. We are an historic community, yet we find ourselves with many new opportunities to serve and reach out in the name of the one whose birth we celebrate.

And so we sing… All earth is hopeful…

Grace and peace to you and yours. See you in church this Christmas Eve.
Family worship and pageant at 4:00pm.
Candlelight worship at both 8:00 and 10:00pm.
Read more about these and other upcoming worship services.

Blessings After the Fire

by the Rev. Tim Hart-Andersen

I cannot think of a stewardship theme that strikes home more deeply for me than this year’s: Counting Our Blessings.

As many of you know, we had a fire at our home on Friday morning, November 4. It started in the kitchen. The toaster—plugged in but not in use—seems to have been the origin of the blaze. We’ve learned the hard way: keep small appliances unplugged!

Our alarms performed well. The three family members asleep in the house were able to get outside; they had to crawl through the house under heavy smoke. Another few minutes and it could have been devastating. I was not home at the time; I am profoundly grateful they all made it to safety.

Talk about Counting Our Blessings! This experience has reminded me of what a profound blessing my family is to me. I cannot imagine life without them. I give thanks for them every day—but doubly so after the fire.

The kitchen is destroyed and will have to be completely gutted and rebuilt. The rest of the house suffered severe smoke damage. We are living in a hotel for the time being. Our insurance company is working to find temporary housing in the neighborhood that can accommodate us for several months. As of this writing, the prospect of locating a suitable home to rent nearby looks positive.

The outpouring of support and love from the congregation has been overwhelming—more blessings to count! We have received expressions of concern and offers of assistance from so many of you. Thank you! It is a little hard to keep up with it all, so please be patient with us.

The circle of care for us has extended to friends across the church and around the country. Through the Internet, people have found out what has happened and are responding with prayers and words of encouragement. Still more blessings to count!

For decades I have preached on the theme of gratitude during stewardship season. I feel my own gratitude like never before this year. In the aftermath of the fire and the response we have received there is little left to say other than, thanks be to God.

Pledge Sunday is November 20. All of us have blessings to count—and from there it’s a short step to a response in gratitude.

See you at the All-Church Festival this Sunday, November 13, and Pledge Sunday on November 20!

A Rolling Blessing

by the Rev. Tim Hart-Andersen

Among the many blessings of living in this beautiful city is its "bikeability!"

A few years ago I began riding my bike to Westminster. It is good exercise and I find that I can make it to church from our home in 23 minutes. On some days it takes almost as long in a car.

At first I wondered about how I would get around if I needed to make a hospital call or go to meeting elsewhere in the city. I discovered that people didn't mind being visited in the hospital by a minister in bike clothes!

People often ask if there's a shower for me to use at the church. Actually, there is a shower at Westminster, but it was converted long ago to a storage closet. So, I clean up in my office restroom, and change clothes there. (I keep a full wardrobe at church).

I have had my share of close calls while biking on the street. As a result, I wear the most garish reflective safety vest possible (a construction vest left over from a church building project). In three years of regularly biking to and from Westminster, I've only had one incident: late one wet night a man stepped out from between parked cars just as I passed and I knocked into him. Neither of us was injured.

I love to ride early in the morning. Often in the spring or fall there are patches of fog in low-lying areas. The scents and sounds of nature accompany me as I glide quietly down the streets. Every patch of cool air I feel. I often am riding when the warm light of the sun first reaches across the city from the east.

For some reason I seem to ride fastest at night. Maybe it's because I'm homeward bound!

My ride to Westminster serves as a kind of rolling blessing. It's a two-wheeled retreat in the midst of the city. I get to enjoy the wonder of God's creation and the changing seasons. The ride allows me time to collect my thoughts and plan for the day, without having to fight traffic. It gives me the joy of silence; unless cars are around, the streets are remarkably hushed when you're on a bike. The ride centers me as I prepare to go to work – and that's a wonderful blessing!

I do stop riding when there's ice on the streets. I don't mind the cold… think of all the things we do outside in the Minnesota winter! But it's simply too dangerous to ride over ice. I took a spill on the ice once – and that was enough to convince me that riding the city bus or driving the car (or carpooling, as I often do in winter) can be blessing, too!

See you in church -- and on the streets of Minneapolis. I'll be the guy in the bright vest!

Morning Spiritual Workout

by the Rev. Tim Hart-Andersen

Counting our Blessings… That’s not the kind of language I typically use when talking about my faith. When our Stewardship 2012 team came up with that theme for this year’s stewardship program, I admit that it made me a bit uncomfortable.

After all, isn’t it a bit prideful to count one’s blessings? It can easily slip into boasting about all one has.

On the other hand, that’s the theme the committee chose, and I had to live with it! I have since made peace with it; in fact, in this time when instability abounds and things can seem so ephemeral, I find it reassuring to pause and remember the many ways I have been blessed. Frankly, it compels my gratitude – and that’s a good thing in stewardship season, because our giving is first and foremost an expression of gratitude.

Each morning I begin the day on the floor. That is, I go through a workout, doing crunches, stretches, push-ups, and anything else I can do to get the old body up and running. I conclude my physical workout with spiritual exercises. I pray my way into the day.

In my morning spiritual workout I begin with an expression of praise to God for the gift of another day. I use the psalms: “This is the day the Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it… From the rising of the sun to the going down of the same, the name of the Lord is to be praised.”

From there I move on to ask forgiveness for the ways I fall short of God’s hope for me. Then my prayer turns to gratitude. I now realize that what I do in my prayer each day is… count my blessings. I begin with giving thanks for what Beth and I call “our five family” – the two of us and our three children. What a blessing they are to me!

I then find myself cycling through others in my life, thanking God for each of them… parents, siblings, friends, colleagues.

My daily prayer always includes deep gratitude for the blessing of being called to serve Westminster church. In my prayer I imagine myself looking out at the congregation, at each face there, at each life. The pastor is always counting; I hadn’t thought of it in this way before, but I now see myself not merely counting attendance on a Sunday morning – I‘m counting my blessings!

Through this stewardship season at Westminster we’ll hear from church leaders and staff members. We’ll invite them to “count their blessings” and share them with us – in text or photos or poetry or in whatever creative way they choose. Stay tuned; this blog itself will be a blessing to all of us!

How do you count your blessings?