The Journey of Grief

According to Webster’s Dictionary, grief is defined as (a.) a deep and poignant distress caused by or as if by bereavement or (b.) a cause of such suffering.  To me grief is more than just these definitions, it is complex and life changing.  Grief is something everyone will experience at some time in their lifetime.  We may be able to say what caused our grief and when it started, but we cannot predict when or if it will end.  I would argue that grief does not end, but that our grief changes over time.  We are changed by grief.  Ann Hood writes, “Grief in not linear.  People kept telling me that once this happened or that passed, everything would be better…But it is not linear…It is a jumble.  It is hours that are all right, and weeks that aren’t.  Or it is good days and bad days.  Or it is the weight of sadness making you look different to others and nothing helps.”

Grief is different for each of us.  Our journeys may be similar, but it is not identical.  No one can predict how you will react or how it will change you.  Grief will hit you when you least expect it.  Jan Warner writes, “Grief is complex.  It is ever changing and may come to us differently on any given day.  Yet, it is possible to build a bridge that spans from the acute pain of loss to a life in which peace, and even gratitude, can coexist with our grief.”  There is no set timeline to when one will get to peace or gratitude, however I pray that each one of us who grieve will be able to get to a place of peace with grief. 

Grief can be a lonely place, where one feels isolated.  You don’t have to grieve alone.  Starting on October 10^th, 2024 at 5:00 pm, St. Mark will start a grief support group.  We will meet once a month in the Adult Ministries Room.  This will be a safe space to share our grief with one another.  This is a place where we will support one another and share our stories.  We will pray together, laugh together, and cry together. Whatever you are grieving and where ever you are in your journey of grief, you are welcome to join the grief support group.  If you are interested in joining the grief support group, please contact Jill Daniels via text at 847-224-4751 or Pastor Katrina at prkatrina@stmarklc.com or 815-988-1215.

Yours in Christ, 

Pastor Katrina Steingraeber

Shifting Our Language

A few weeks ago, scientists from Southern Methodist University revealed they had discovered fossilized footprints left by dinosaurs some 120 million years ago. Such a story doesn’t typically make headlines; however, the matching prints were found an ocean apart in Brazil and Cameroon, back before the Atlantic Ocean had pushed its way between them. To those dinosaurs, South America and Africa were always connected by a land bridge. To us, the two continents are thousands of miles apart. The earth’s tectonic plates move slowly, but they are always shifting.

A lot of things seem to be immovable and timeless, but in reality everything changes. It’s just that most of the time, we barely take notice. Then one day you might open up a photo album and cringe at the fashion choices you made in your youth. Or, you sit down to watch an old episode of a beloved show, only to be appalled by jokes made at the expense of women and minority populations. 

During the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther took an incredible leap by translating the Bible into a language the people could understand. He also translated the words used in worship from Latin to German. A little while later, protestants in England did the same thing, producing the King James Bible of 1611 and the Book of Common Prayer. For the next 300 or so years, those were the primary sources people used in English-speaking churches, even as their own language shifted into something new. But after a few centuries, walking into church was like opening a photo album and glimpsing into the past.

When the Lutheran Book of Worship was published in 1978, much of the language was updated to reflect the way people actually spoke in the 20th century. In the companion book, Manual on the Liturgy, the authors made a case for the change: “Protestantism, which had begun protesting the use of an archaic and largely unknown language, Latin, in the Roman Catholic Church, now found itself in the position of using an increasingly obscure language. It was time, more and more people admitted, to use contemporary expression.”

Nobody uses words like “thy” or “thine” in everyday conversation. We structure our sentences more plainly than folks did in the renaissance. And so, it made sense to update our worship language some 45 years ago. And yet, many Lutherans— and I’m including St. Mark here— have still clung to one last antique of language in the way we say the Lord’s Prayer. 

Our students in Sunday School and Confirmation are going to focus on the Lord’s Prayer quite a bit this coming year. In order to help them understand the meaning of this prayer that Jesus teaches us, we will help them memorize it in language they understand. Because of that, we have begun to use the 1975 translation of the Lord’s Prayer in worship. It may take some adjusting for all of us, but I pray that this shift will allow us all to take in the full meaning of this most precious prayer that we say each and every time we gather together.

Peace,

Pastor Chad McKenna