Two of our Indiana District congregations in Louisville, Kentucky, recently reached the difficult decision to close. Peace Lutheran Church had its Closing Service on Sunday the 27th of July, and Resurrection Lutheran Church had its Closing Service this past Sunday, the 31st of August. I was regrettably unable to attend the Closing Service at Peace, due to prior obligations, but I did have the privilege of preaching for the Closing Service at Resurrection. Such occasions are poignant.
We are thankful for the future prospects in view for the members and the properties in each case. Efforts have been underway and will continue to make sure that all of the members of both Peace and Resurrection have ongoing pastoral care and new church homes. The property where Peace was located has been purchased by Cedar Lake Lodge for the expansion of its services, whereas some exciting plans and possibilities are being explored for the Resurrection location. Please keep all of this in your prayers and intercessions in the days and weeks ahead.
For all that, grappling with the emotions involved in the closing of a beloved congregation can be a challenge, not only for the members but for the church at large. It can easily lead to lots of second-guessing of ourselves (and others), wondering where or how we “failed,” whether there was something else we could or should have done, or whether we did something wrong. There is also the temptation to suppose that the Lord has somehow failed us, His people, and His Church in such a case, though such thoughts are clearly leading us in the wrong direction. The Lord our God is faithful in all things, and He has us in His care and keeping at all times and in all places.
Rather than succumbing to faithless despair, even in our sorrow we give thanks to the Lord for His tender mercies and steadfast loving-kindness in establishing His Church and preserving it in any given place for any amount of time, there providing His divine, eternal gifts of the Gospel. A congregation would not prosper or persevere for even a single day without His providential care. So, for all the years that Peace and Resurrection (and Pilgrim Lutheran preceding it) existed as congregations of the Lord’s Church on earth, Christ be praised! Thus and there He has caused His Word to be preached unto repentance and faith in His forgiveness of sins, He has brought sinners to the washing of water with His Word, and He has fed His saints with His holy Body and precious Blood. And thus He has accomplished His purposes with and for His Church and His people – all according to His good and gracious Will, and not according to our intentions.
The closing of a congregation is also an opportune time to consider the theology of the Cross, which is how we Lutherans have often described the way our Lord works, reveals Himself, and accomplishes His purposes through the very opposite of what the world and our own fallen flesh would ever expect or anticipate. For God has manifested His glory and accomplished His great salvation through His own suffering and death upon the Cross. In like manner, He calls us to bear the Cross after Him, and He thereby conforms us to His own Image and Likeness. Though we often chafe under this discipline, it is the Lord’s own good work in us, that we should be like Him in heart, mind, body, soul, and spirit. Therefore, let us not lose heart! “Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison” (2 Corinthians 4:16-17).
In commemorating the Matriarch Hannah on Tuesday of this week (2 September) we have had a chance to recall her inspired canticle (1 Samuel 2:1-10), which no doubt served as an inspiration and model for St. Mary’s Magnificat (St. Luke 1:46-55) many generations later. By the grace of the Holy Spirit, both women sing of the “great reversal” that God brings about through His Son:
“The Lord kills and brings to life; He brings down to Sheol and raises up. The Lord makes poor and makes rich; He brings low and he exalts” (1 Samuel 2:6-7). The Lord “has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate; He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich He has sent away empty” (St. Luke 1:52-53).
The Lord wounds in order to heal, He kills and makes alive (Deuteronomy 32:39). He tears down and builds up. He razes mountains into dust, and He raises those whom He has humbled from the dust of the earth to life again in the Body of His Anointed, the incarnate Son, Christ Jesus. Thus by His Cross does He bring us through death and the grave into the Resurrection of the body and the Life everlasting of body and soul in and with Him.
Out of the wreckage of all our best efforts, hopes and dreams and aspirations, the Lord exalts the humble and establishes His people at His right hand in the heavenly places (Colossians 3:1-4). It remains to be seen what the Lord will do with the Word that He caused to be sown and planted at Peace and Resurrection over these past many years. Indeed, it is likely that we will never know or be aware of all the moving parts and pieces that have contributed to the final harvest of the Lord, since He governs all things in heaven and on earth for the good of those who love Him, who are called according to His purposes to be glorified in the beloved Son. For our part, we do not cling to the passing things of this perishing world, but to His sure and certain promises. And “we know that when He appears we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who thus hopes in Him purifies himself as He is pure” (1 John 3:2-3).