Our daughter in Michigan does not like Daylight Saving Time. No wonder. Sturgis, Michigan, is about as far west as you can go and still be in the Eastern Time Zone. This coming Sunday when we spring ahead (even though it is not yet spring – sort of like March Madness spilling in to April), the sun will rise in Sturgis at 7:56 a.m., 43 minutes after we’ve seen the sun in Langhorne. It makes for some very dark March mornings. By mid-June, Sturgis sunset will be around 9:30 p.m. Try putting your two-year old and four-year old to bed at a decent hour when dusky light lasts until 10:00.

When you live in Sturgis, Michigan, you wish they’d just leave well enough alone.

Nine years ago when Daylight Saving Time was extended to nearly eight months, the golf and barbecue industries were the big spenders in lobbying for a mid-March start to DST and the candy companies pushed hard for an early-November end; you sell more candy when trick-or-treaters troll the street when its still light. Read the story here. Continue reading →

We have the routine down, but there is nothing routine about what we are doing. On Sunday we will ordain and/or install into church office a group of fellow LPC members. Some will become elders, others deacons, and still others trustees. Elders and deacons are ecclesial or church officers, and trustees are corporate officers. They are our leaders.

The routine of the process is pretty well known. In the fall our Nominating Committee begins to seek persons to fill upcoming vacancies or our three boards – typically four elders and trustees and five deacons. This year there were some unexpired terms, so they were seeking five elders and seven deacons.

By January the Nominating Committee has prepared a slate of officer nominees, all the vacancies ready to be filled. At our congregational meeting in February we elect them all in an election whose outcome seems as predictable as the outcome of a North Korean election. Continue reading →

I shared Concepcion’s story with those in worship this past Sunday and share it again with some reluctance. It is a privilege and a burden even to know the story. The privilege came a week ago yesterday in a little village in Guatemala, the burden is to be borne for a long time.

The pastor of the church hosting our mission team medical clinic in the village had told us just the sketchy outline of the story and then an hour or so later he arranged for Dr. Dave Schaebler and I to meet Concepcion and her family.

A somber stillness filled the room. Concepcion, fifteen years old and stoic. With her were her three sisters, ages one, four and eleven, her aunt, Francisca, and her grandmother, Concepcion, whose name she bears. Continue reading →

Our Guatemala Mission Away Team heads south tomorrow. Pray for us. As you use the prayer guide, you will find that our team members have offered a variety of prayer requests. We have asked that you pray for our safety and protection, for health, and, yes, for a smooth trip through Guatemalan customs. But mostly you will notice team members asking that God’s will be done and that we be open to God’s will and ready to obey as he calls and sends. We have asked that you pray for the success of the trip.

But what metrics define success? Continue reading →

This year’s early Easter, March 27 – the first Sunday after the first full moon after the vernal equinox, makes for an early Ash Wednesday. This coming Wednesday, February 10, right between the Super Bowl and Valentines Day

Ash Wednesday, preceded by Shrove Tuesday, is the first day of Lent, that 40-day (with the exception of Sundays) period that will take us past Presidents Day, Super Tuesday, and Saint Patrick’s Day through Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Holy Saturday. And then Easter, also the day of the Elite Eight round in this year’s NCAA Basketball Tournament. The East Regionals will be hosted at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia

At best Lent seems like an anachronism in a world Super Bowls and Super Tuesdays, Valentines, Shamrocks, and March Madness. Why bother? Why learn this odd vocabulary – Shrove Tuesday, Lent, Ash Wednesday, Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday? Continue reading →