Holy Trinity Sunday, American Falls

Posted on June 6, 2026 by megganmanlove

Honored to spend Holy Trinity Sunday with the Saints of St. John’s Lutheran in American Falls, Idaho. After worship, I had a wonderful conversation with council members and the call committee. I’m grateful for their patience and discernment during this long time of transition. I hope to someday experience their kids church on Wednesday nights. It was wonderful to be there for quilt blessing Sunday.

St. John’s, American Falls, May 31, 2026

Genesis 1:1-2:4a, 2 Cor. 13:11-13, Matt. 28:16-20

I appreciate, perhaps even need, order. Friends who have known me for a long time tell me that I am mellower now than I was in high school and college. Still, I prefer order. I read books in sequence. Watch television shows in order. When I visit my mom, she will tell me about starting something mid-series and I just roll my eyes. It is a running joke in our family that reading books or watching movies in sequence is simply not important to my mom.

That’s not to say that she does not love the creation story in Genesis Chapter 1.  Whereas I used to cling to the order of the story, my guess is that my mom loves the poetry, the imagery, the fact that even though there is an order to the days there is still mystery. And so, because my family talks about how each of us encounters scripture a bit differently, now I also appreciate the poetry and wonder of Genesis also.

In his classic series the Chronicles of Narnia, C.S. Lewis’ sixth book The Magician’s Nephew gets at the wonder of Genesis chapter 1 in a beautiful way. Here’s how Lewis describes the creation of Narnia. A small party of people find themselves in darkness. They feel doomed. Then, Lewis writes, “in the darkness something was happening at last. A voice had begun to sing. It was very far away” and it was hard to decide from what direction it was coming. “It’s lower notes were deep enough to be the voice of the earth herself.  There were no words. There was hardly even a tune. But it was, beyond comparison, the most beautiful noise they had ever heard.”  

Two wonders happen at the same moment–the voice was joined by other voices and the blackness overhead was blazing with stars. Then the sky on the horizon grew steadily paler. All the time the voice was singing. “The eastern sky changed from white to pink and from pink to gold. The Voice rose and rose, till all the air was shaking with it. And just as it swelled to the mightiest and most glorious sound it had yet produced, the sun arose…The Lion [Aslan] was pacing to and fro about that empty land and singing his new song…and as he walked and sang the valley grew green with grass. It spread out from the Lion like a pool.” On and on, Aslan sang all living creatures into being. Finally, the lion was silent. Then either from the sky or from the Lion itself, the deepest, wildest voice they had ever heard was saying: ‘Narnia, Narnia, awake. Love. Think. Speak. Be walking trees. Be talking beasts. Be divine waters” (98-116). 

The Genesis creation story is a song too, not a laundry list, but a holy song. We are quite sure the firstreaders and hearers of this story would have brought to the story a long rich, tumultuous history. That history included their ancestors’ escape out of Egypt, the tribal league they formed for mutual defense in the Promised Land, the establishment of the kingdom, its rocky years of domestic injustice and foreign threat, and finally the destruction of Jerusalem and exile in Babylon.  

Read with the turbulent memories of bondage in mind, it becomes more than an account of creation, as magnificent as that is. The opening of Genesis is a testimony to God’s original intention for creation and human life. As a people devastated by the failures of their past, the dissolution of their society, and their degradation at the hands of captors, it would be easy for the Israelites to lose all sense of human worth and value.

Those priests who gathered in exile in Babylon in the midst of a defeated and demoralized people, were reflecting on God in such a way that brought life to their community. They were doing what we are always doing–something big–reflecting and listening to God who reveals God’s self to us in our lives and in our time.  And the God revealed at the beginning of time is the same God we praise today. 

The Creator was there in the beginning, and it was the Spirit, the wind that swept over the water, and it was the Word that spoke creation into being.  In Babylon, the priests’ view of God was, in their context of exile, a bold proclamation of who God is and who God’s people are. God creates order out of chaos: days and months, light and darkness, water and dry land. This is a treatise on hope.

The Apostle Paul attempts to give similar hope to the Christians in Corinth.  Theirs is a corrupt community, full of chaos.  Paul appeals to the people’s best understanding of who they are and how they are to act: Examine yourselves to see whether you are living in the faith.  Test yourselves.  Do you not realize that Jesus Christ is in you?  “Become ordered again, be encouraged, agree with one another, live in peace.”

Then there is a shift.  How better to move from this taxing confrontation than to call upon the language of worship that reminds both the Corinthians and Paul of the holy things that they share in common. “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.”  The appeal and the Trinitarian blessing functions in a similar way as the Priests’ theological reflections did in Genesis.  Both bring life to a community which was full of discord and death.

We hear the Great Commission in today’s Gospel text: “Go,” Jesus says.  Here is a final call to match God’s initial call to Abraham, “Go from your country and your kindred…in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Gen. 12:1-3).  Now the disciples are to leave home and go to the nations. And the disciples are to do what to all the families of the earth?  

Baptize them “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”  This is the big moment today—the naming of the Trinity and ultimate revelation of God’s character. And the name is revealed precisely in service to God’s ultimate mission of making disciples and mending the world. 

As is the case for each new generation of Christians, we are now the disciples instructed to make more disciples. God is revealed as Trinity to us so that we might share this revelation with others. The purpose is not that they might be better informed of the nature of God but that they be invited into discipleship and to teach. At the heart of the mission is the instruction not of a particular system or specific theological formulation, but instruction concerning all that Jesus has commanded: “Love your enemy and pray for those who persecute you” (5:44); “Do not worry about your life…(or) about tomorrow (6:25, 34); “Ask and it will be given to you” (7:7); “Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice” (9:13); “Come to me, all you who weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest” (11:28); “If any want to become my followers, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me” (16:24).  And so much more.  

We are to teach for the sake of obedience to the many things Jesus has commanded not for condemnation or shame, but so all might know the grace, love, and welcome of God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as portrayed in Genesis 1.

And finally, we are left not with commandment or even commission.  We are left with promise, a promise of the constant presence of God.  This is always the way God takes leave from one who is called. With the promise and sign of God’s presence, we disciples of today are identified as called people who are sent.  God will be with us.  This is what we were promised at the very beginning of the Gospel of Matthew at the birth of Jesus when he is named Emmanuel, “God is with us” (Matt. 1:23).

Walked the Snake River canyon rim in Twin Falls Saturday afternoon

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Pentecost with St. Mark’s Lutheran

Posted on May 24, 2026 by megganmanlove

St. Mark’s Lutheran, Spokane, WA

May 22-23, 2026 – Pentecost

Acts 2:1-21

Baptism!

Grace to you and peace St. Mark’s Lutheran. It is so good to be with you and bring greetings from the synod staff and your siblings from across our vast Northwest Intermountain Synod. And blessed Pentecost!

Part way through this famous text from the Book of Acts, we hear the disciple Peter quote Joel: “Even upon my slaves, both men and women, in those days I will pour out my Spirit; and they shall prophesy.” There is a lot in this verse that I would rather ignore: the mention of slaves to begin with and the whole notion of prophecy to continue with. But sometimes what I want to avoid about a biblical text is exactly where the Spirit we celebrate today is pointing me to go.

The story and Peter’s address from the Book of Acts reminds us that a prophet is neither a fortune teller nor a foreteller. Prophecy is truth-telling. It is naming the places and ways where God intervenes or initiates in the world. Prophecy is part of proclaiming the word of God and identifying God’s restoration and healing at work. 

Today, we learn what it means to be a prophet by watching Peter do it. He speaks to the present question, “What does this mean?” He finds promises and images from the past. And Peter also points to the future, the day of the Lord. Prophets show how present events might connect to God and God’s purposes. 

All of us who claim to follow Jesus, all of you, are prophets of a sort. We are interpreters of both our present time and the good news of Jesus Christ. This role should not surprise us. Peter refers to a community full of visionaries and dreamers. He is not the only one equipped to make meaning. The work belongs to all who receive the Spirit, which is what we proclaim happens in the waters of Holy Baptism. 

That may seem daunting, to be a truth-teller, a prophet. We can be grateful that the message is always more powerful than the messengers. And yet, it takes care, this meaning making. We continue to trust that the Holy Spirit is among us whenever we invite her presence into our individual and communal deliberations. We cannot be messengers without her power. And so, we pray for each person who comes to the font to receive the Holy Spirit.

German Lutheran Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote that “speaking the truth must be learned.” I know who my closest friends are because they give me room to learn and practice speaking truth. I say, “considering my lived experience, what I read in the gospels, and this story about my neighbor next door or across the globe that I believe this, or I wonder this.” And my friend will perhaps raise their eyebrows or not or try telling a truth themselves. The Celts call this soul friendship Anam Cara—soul friends. I think Anam Cara is essential fro the life of the baptized.

This weekend Bridget Ann Kurth will be baptized here at St. Mark’s. Oh, how I love baptisms. Last year I spent Holy Week with our siblings at St. John’s Lutheran in American Falls, in the southeast corner of Idaho, a church that’s been waiting for a pastor for over two years and keeping its lively and life-giving youth ministry going all along. It’s a long story, but I ended up presiding at 14 baptisms on Maundy Thursday. And each baptism was amazing. I never got bored. The promises I spoke for the last child of God were just as powerful as the promises I spoke to the first, just as they will be this weekend for Bridget.

We will pray, Sustain Bridgett with the gift of your Holy Spirit: the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord, the spirit of joy in your presence, both now and forever. If we want to test prophecy, put it side by side with that that prayer, which is full of humility and hope.

I think the sacrament of Holy Baptism is amazing because it is once and for all, but also something we can and must remember again and again. During our rural ecumenical events: United at the Font: Partnering for the Future we end each day with Affirmation of Baptism by the Assembly. I cannot explain the metaphysics of holy baptism, but I know for myself that returning to the font is life-giving, life-giving because of water, because of promises God makes, promises made by my parents and later affirmed by me, and promises made by you, the Body of Christ. 

To affirm our baptisms is something all Lutherans do, but it lands differently for individuals and communities. As a guest preacher, I do not know what each of you brought into the sanctuary today, what you are carrying. But being a human being is simply a lot right now. It’s been that way before and it’s good to recognize that history. But that long view does not make the heaviness of this moment less for each of you. And that’s the world; the vast cosmos we are citizens of. You may have brought a very personal burden: a new diagnosis, a fractured relationship, a reality of unemployment. The Holy Spirit has been given to you also, for this time: the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord, the spirit of joy in God’s presence, both now and forever

I believe that right now the world needs as much enlightenment and wisdom and listening as we can bear. Oh, how we need the Spirit’s power. We need multiple conversation partners and stories of lived experiences. We need to reflect on individual scripture passages and keep in mind the entire biblical narrative. 

We need to hear how our next-door neighbors are experiencing daily life and we need to be aware of what it is like on the streets of Hong Kong, rural Tanzania, Patagonia, and across our synod from Jackson, WY to Chelan, WA. We need to listen intently to those who are currently suffering the most. And we are wise to be silent and still and listen to what is in our very own hearts. We might find a truth that becomes a gift of God to the world. 

You, people of St. Mark’s, take that listening very seriously, as evidenced by your offering and relationships with Communidad Cristiana and the children they serve, including those who have parents currently detained after their immigration status was questioned. Thank you for listening to the Holy Spirit through these neighbors. Thank you for listening to your neighbors. One of my favorite theologians (Willie James Jennings), commenting on the Acts 2 story, says that love of neighbor will take on Holy Spirit dimensions. He writes, “This is a love that cannot be tamed, controlled, or planned, and once unleashed it will drive the disciples forward into the world and drive a question into their lives: Where is the Holy Spirit taking us and into whose lives?”

God is not contained in any one people, in any kind of place, or in any one tradition, as that cosmopolitan crowd in Jerusalem surely began to discover. Today we give thanks for your conversation partners. And we give thanks for the Holy Spirit, who transformed Peter from a faithful but sometimes blundering disciple to a prophetic apostle. The same Holy Spirit moves through the church and Jesus’ many followers this day, helping you make meaning, call out injustices, and speak a word of love and hope that the world so desperately needs.

With Pastors Gretchen Olson and Edwin Weber
Jazz Ensemble and tongues of fire
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Central Lutheran, Yakima’s 100th

Posted on May 17, 2026 by megganmanlove

If you are a regular reader, some parts of this sermon may be familiar, because I preached on the end of John chapter 17 last year.

Central Lutheran, Yakima’s 100th Anniversary Worship

May 17, 2026 – John 17:1-11

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. 

It is so good to be with you Central Lutheran, Yakima for your 100th anniversary—100 years of memories, of faithful Word and Sacrament ministry, of passing on the Lutheran Christian faith to the next generation, of sharing the love of Jesus Christ with your neighbors in Yakima and across the globe. A merger of ethnicities and languages over 100 years ago was just the beginning of decades of discernment and decision making and adaptations. Today we rejoice that through it all, ministry and this expression of the Body of Christ continues. On your 100th anniversary, you are looking ahead to the next chapter, rededicating this congregation to the triune God who has accompanied you for so long, rededicating to sharing that same life-giving good news of Jesus Christ. 

When I hear Jesus’ prayer for his disciples in our reading from John’s gospel today, I hear his visions and hopes for authentic love and unity. I hear him speak poetically about his relationship with the Father, you might think Mother if that is easier for you. We hear of a loving and connected parent-child relationship. The relationality inherent in the God we worship is so present in this prayer. The love within healthy parent-child relations is abundant and real and inviting. It’s hard to carry out as human beings, sinful and broken as we are, which is one of many reasons Jesus prays for his disciples. If it were automatic human behavior, then there would be no need for prayer.

This struggle made me think of my first call in Soldier, Iowa, a town of 200 people near the Missouri River in what’s known as the Loess Hills. I served there from 2004-2010 and shortly before I arrived, the school district that Soldier, Iowa was part of was dissolved. A vote was put to the citizens and instead of merging with their long-time partner district, a pin was dropped in the middle of the current district. Like many ELCA Lutheran congregations, my new church was full of schoolteachers. They were grieving, in disbelief that other residents had not seen things the way they did. I clearly remember teachers telling me how difficult it was to stand around the Holy Communion rail with people who had voted in such a way that they had lost their jobs. But they kept coming to worship. They kept coming together and sharing the bread and wine, shoulder to shoulder receiving the gifts of new life and forgiveness. And very slowly relationships healed.

During Holy Communion we are literally invited into the unity portrayed in Jesus’ prayer. In the town church we had a straight communion rail but Memorial Day weekend through the month of June, we went out to the old massive country church for worship. And there stood a beautiful half-circle communion rail, one where you not only stood shoulder to shoulder with people, but those on the ends could look across and make eye contact. One big reason I am still in the church, with all of its faults and growing edges, is because of our audacious belief that when we cannot forgive, when we cannot reconcile, when we have no energy to be curious about one another, the means of grace can still be received through Word and Sacrament. My hunger for bread and wine draws me to the table where I feast shoulder to shoulder with my siblings in Christ. Today I think about Swedes, Norwegians, and Germans receiving communion together 100 years ago.

I have written to our synod that I think we forget how radical and rare it is for the good news of God’s love and grace to be preached and heard, and for the sacraments to be celebrated faithfully. It is radical and rare in part, at least within the geography of the Northwest Intermountain Synod, because there are so many other things parading as the gospel. 

On a 100th anniversary of a congregation, it’s interesting to consider what things have paraded as good news over the decades. And in the midst of all those false gospels, Central Lutheran in Yakima found ways to follow the Jesus we encounter in the gospel texts. You kept witnessing to Jesus Christ and God’s abundant love for creation. And you, gathered here today, continue to be a community for whom Jesus prays. 

What difference does that make, that you are a community for whom Jesus prays? Knowing God’s love for you and you all, Central Lutheran in Yakima, how will you share that love? And what stops you from sharing the love of God in word and deed? A church with 100 years of history must include highs and lows, disagreements, reconciliation, times when you erred on the side of focusing too much internally, times when you were so focused externally that you did not tend to the body, times when a scarcity mindset overwhelmed, times when fear of the unknown had you turning away from God. And yet we are here today. God is faithful and this church has been faithful, if imperfect. 

Jesus prays, “Father, the hour has come; glorify your Son so that the Son may glorify you.” Hear the mutuality and oneness. “And this is eternal life, that they may now you, the only true God, and Jeus Christ whom you have sent.” Eternal life is the primary description of the gift that Jesus brings to those who follow him. Jesus’ death, resurrection, and ascension reveal the extent and nature of the love that shapes his relationship with God and his “own.” They reveal the very character and identity of God, a God of abundant love. 

It is a love not for one set of people, but for the whole world, the cosmos, the same world sung about at the beginning of this same gospel: “The true light, which enlightens everyone, was coming into the world.He was in the world, and the world came into being through him, yet the world did not know him.” This is the world God made, the world God loves, and the world into which God sent the Son. Into this same world, Jesus will send his disciples. They are already in the world but now they are commissioned to bear witness in and to the world of God’s love.

Jesus’ prayer for the community models who the community is to understand and receive its identity in the world. This prayer is timeless, prayed before Jesus’ death, prayed during the Middle Ages and the Reformation, prayed in 1926 when three churches came together, prayed today. Overhearing this prayer has the power to remind you that the church’s life rests in and depends on God’s care. Jesus does not supply pragmatic directives on how to arrive at church unity or how to recognize the face of the “evil one” in the world. Jesus places the church’s future in the hands of God and invites you to listen in on that conversation. Today, we can hear and experience the love that Jesus and God have for you.

God’s love is constant and ongoing. Empires and ideologies come and go. God’s love will be with you forever. Disagreements within congregations, synods, and entire denominations are important and can keep us up at night, but the balm that gets you through the night is God’s love. For 100 years, the church of Central Yakima has pointed to God and God’s love as its rock, foundation, and source. As you remember, rejoice, and rededicate, celebrate all the saints, the people of this church, and point to God’s faithfulness as the source of your unity, love, and abundant life. 

With Pastor Ann Murphy
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Spring 2026 – Thanks for Mission Support

Posted on May 13, 2026 by megganmanlove

Write your love upon my heart as my law, my goal, my story.

In each thought, word, and deed, may my living bring you glory.

(Spirit, Open My Heart in All Creation Sings)

May 8, 2026

Dear Friends in Christ,

Thank you for your continued generosity to the NWIM Synod. Through Mission Support given by your and so many other congregations, we share in ministry around the synod, country, and globe, doing more together than any one person or congregation could do alone. Connected in this way, we experience Jesus Christ, seeking community, justice, and love.

Pastors and deacons continue to transition into retirement or new calls. This spring several of our ministry sites called new pastors. Alleluia! The transition time between calls is both like a normal hiring process and unique. Thanks to your Mission Support, our synod staff walks faithfully with congregations through those transition seasons.

This summer the ELCA will host two big gatherings: the Women of the ELCA’s triennial in Des Moines and the Rostered Ministers Gathering in Indianapolis. These will be times of connection, faith formation, learning, and worship. A Quality of Call grant Region 1 received from the ELCA is providing scholarships for rostered women leaders going to IN. Both events have registration fees, but administrative costs (planning!) are covered by Mission Support given by your congregation.

Many of you individually or as congregations not only give generous Mission Support, but you also give to ELCA World Hunger. This spring we celebrate that some of those funds came back to our synod through eight Daily Bread grants. And Shalom Ministry in Spokane received a larger Domestic Hunger Grant. Your generosity and your congregations’ feeding ministries are making a real difference in people’s lives—bodies and souls.

Peace,

Bishop Meggan Manlove

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Book Review: The Art of Gathering

Posted on May 10, 2026 by megganmanlove

Pastor Todd Buegler from the ELCA Youth Ministry Network asked me in December if I would write an occasional book review for the Network’s online Connect Journal.

Have you ever left a dinner party whispering “that was a waste of time” or walked away from a meeting or training saying, “I just met those people, but I feel like I’ve known them forever”? Pria Parker’s “The Art of Gathering” takes readers on the journey of creating flourishing gatherings. I told a colleague I was reviewing this book for the ELCA Youth Ministry Network and he said, “Can you imagine if every church meeting took a page from that book?” 

Read More

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2026 Bp Report for Assembly

Posted on May 8, 2026 by megganmanlove

April 2026 Bishop’s Report to Assembly – Kennewick First Lutheran

Scripture and Metaphors: During our 2023 bishop election, I said that I was guided by Galatians 5:13-14, 13 For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters, only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence,[c] but through love become enslaved to one another. 14 For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” That we are freed from sin and death and freed for love of neighbor has been a guiding conviction for me long before I was a pastor and guides me today as a bishop. 

To this I have added other metaphors. Shortly after I began my term as bishop, your synod staff starting using the phrase Wellsprings of God’s Love to describe our many and varied ministry sites. Though each ministry site makes known God’s love differently, you all do this beautifully and contextually, even if imperfectly.

And to these two I will add our Synod Assembly theme, Peace at the Now, a twist on the Peace at the Last liturgy written to help those accompany the dying. The liturgy was created by a team at Lake Chelan Lutheran, served by Pastor Paul Palumbo, who told us during a deans’ meeting that some people in his life said the liturgy is great, but they were also yearning for Peace at the Now. Together, in Kennewick, WA, we will give thanks together for the peace only Jesus Christ can bring. 

Connectedness and Communication: Your synod staff loves to visit congregations in person or through online meetings. Thanks for the invitations and keep them coming. We also are intentional about what is included in our twice-per-month electronic newsletter. And you can follow my adventures at http://www.megganmanlove.com.

Call Process: A large part of Assistant to the Bishop Phil Misner’s portfolio is tending to the mobility process. Pastoral (and one deacon call) vacancies filled since online Assembly in 2026 (as of April 7): Christ Lutheran in Walla Walla, Faith Lutheran in Leavenworth, Salem in Spokane, Lord of Life in Kennewick, Trinity in Pullman, and American Lutheran in Newport.

Candidacy: Our interdependence as ministry sites, NWIM Synod, and the ELCA Churchwide office is clearly lived out through Candidacy, the process for people becomes pastors and deacons. See Candidacy Chair Cory English’s report for more.

Thanks to the congregations that have raised up and supported one of our ministry candidates: Our Saviour, Pinehurst; St. Luke, Spokane; Salem, Spokane; Kennewick First; Immanuel, Grandview; King of Glory, Boise; Immanuel, Boise; New Day, Idaho Falls; Our Savior’s, Twin Falls; and First Lutheran, Ellensburg.

Thanks to congregations that have served as an internship site in the last two years: Grace, Wenatchee; Lake Chelan Lutheran; Immanuel, Grandview; Christ the King, Goldendale; and Advent, Spokane Valley.

I am grateful the Northwest Washington Synod is part of the Candidacy Reimagined Pilot and giving us a preview as they live into competency-based candidacy. One synod from each of the nine ELCA regions is part of this pilot.

Campus Ministries: Our campus ministries are all taking new shape.

Lutheran Campus Ministry (LCM) at Eastern Washington University called Pastor Emily Kuenker with a goal of broadening the ministry beyond Cheney into Spokane. It is now Grace Commons Spokane serving college students and young adults. Board members include Pr. Joel Skindlov (President), Diane Zemke (VP), Jody Harris (Sec/Treas), Pr. Tom Inch, and Ellie Powers.

Deacon Karla Neumann Smiley has served LCM at U of I for many years and more recently began serving at WSU (half time with each ministry). For decades, the ELCA and six other denominations have owned The Center, where Deacon Karla’s office is, adjacent to the campus in Moscow. Deeper collaboration is coming to campus ministry on the Palouse, but I will let Karla tell you about it in her own words during Assembly.

Two years ago, the PCUSA, UMC, and ELCA in the Boise/Treasure Valley area restarted a dormant Methodist campus ministry. The UMC had a board and income from property rentals. The board has undergone healthy transformation. UMC Pastor Hannah Andres is ¾ time at Whitney United Methodist and ¼ time as campus minister. ELCA board members are Pr. Mariah Mills (Redeemer, Boise and Grace, Horseshoe Bend) and Tom Trotter (Immanuel, Boise).

Companion Synods: Thanks to everyone who offered hospitality to Pastors Moses and Ezekiel last fall. I am excited for you to read about the solar kitchen project for Tumaini School. At closing worship of Assembly, we will bless our travelers to the Ulanga Kilombero Diocese this summer. Read more in the Global Mission report.

All 65 synods have one or more companion synods, and all 65 synods also relate to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land. So, every bishop is offered the opportunity to visit the ELCJHL. The bishop trip has been postponed several times since fall of 2023 but a group of us finally visited in January 2026. Hopefully you have read my reflections on my blog or in the synod newsletter. I am grateful that ELCA Sumud’s Program Director Maddi Froiland will be with us at Assembly.

Cultivating Leaders

Cohorts

One way we as a synod staff try to keep you equipped and adapting to the changing world is by connecting you to cohorts of our own or cohorts organized by trusted partners. 

  • Stewardship for All Seasons with GSB Fundraisers
  • College for Congregations by the Spokane Episcopal Diocese
  • Land Stewardship by the Spokane Presbytery
  • Living the Resurrection (currently in progress)
  • Congregation Leads Initiative (partnership with ELCA Churchwide and MT Synod)

Plus every month it seems I can nominate pastors and deacons for various regional and national trainings, cohorts, or experiences.

Discipleship Formation 

Several people have taken online classes through neighboring Montana Synod’s long running Lay Ministry Associate program. And we also have welcomed those who’ve completed Luther Seminary’s Lay Leadership School one-year certificate. Two lay people are currently enrolled in Wartburg’s pilot program for Synod Authorized Ministers.

At Assembly we will commission those who have completed the online coursework and attended our in-person retreats: Preach, Pray, Preside, and Polity.

Thanks to faculty who have come from our synod:

  • Pastor Yvette Schock (Riverview Retirement Community)
  • Pastor Jim Johnson (St. Luke)
  • Pastor Sierra Westerman (Emmanuel, Moscow)
  • Pastor Kimmy Meinecke (St. David’s Episcopal)
  • Pastor Andrew Hamblen (Our Saviour, Twin Falls)

Thanks to our hosts: St. Mark’s Lutheran-fall 2024 and the Grunewald Guild-fall 2025

We will be at the Monastery of the Ascension in Jerome, Idaho, May 29-31 and hopefully somewhere in Eastern WA again in the fall of 2026.

Gary Bracht (Holy Trinity, Ephrata) and Sheri Brown (LCM in Coeur d’Alene) are leading two workshops on pathways to lay leadership during Assembly.

New Ministries/Strategic Ministries: The ELCA has created new categories for the ministries that can receive grants from ELCA Churchwide, so if you haven’t been to an Assembly in many years, this language may be new.

Cultivating Justice in Wenatchee is a Synod Authorized Outreach Ministry. Zoe Jaspers is the mission developer, supported by ELCA Pastor Dane Breslin (UCC and Brethren Church in Sunnyslope) and Jess Ingman (Faith Action Network).

New Day Lutheran in Idaho Falls began as a Synodically Authorized Outreach Community after First Lutheran in Idaho Falls left the ELCA. It remains a Strategic Ministry.

Kitchen Tables is a very new ministry exploration in the Airway Heights neighborhood west of Spokane. Pastor Arianna Arends (Zion Lutheran, Deer Park) is leading this exploration.

Congregational Constitutions: Lisa Kraft (King of Glory, Boise) is now leading the team of people reviewing your constitutions. She is leading two workshops at Assembly. Our congregation, synod, and ELCA constitutions are excellent documents. Revisit Chapters 2-4 in your constitution if you need to plan a devotion for a council or committee meeting. 

CaSTLE Grant: We applied to Wartburg Seminary’s CaSTLE Grant Project in the rural ecumenical experimentscategory for 2025 and received $20,000. We organized three rural ecumenical gatherings called United at the Font: Partnering for the Future. We leaned on the 1992 World Council of Churches’ document Baptism, Eucharist, and Ministry, sometimes called the Lima text because the council met in Lima, Peru. Rebeca Hoyt and Lauren Hackman-Brooks are our facilitators. We gave participants pre-readings and pre-YouTube videos to watch and then we gathered at:

  • Immanuel Lutheran, Moses Lake, WA
  • Our Savior Lutheran, Clarkston, WA
  • First United Methodist Church Pocatello, ID

Five coaching cohorts came out of these gatherings. The coaches are meeting online with the teams, helping them deepen relationships and work on whatever they decide to do collaboratively in their rural area.

We also used grant funds to bring together a UCC Conference Minister, two Episcopal bishops, a Presbyter, a Stated Clerk, two UMC District Superintendents who will start this summer, Pastors Phil, and Liv, and me for three days at St. Gertrude’s Monastery. Each denomination had an hour to teach about our denominations’ preaching, worship, and governance. 

We purchased 64 copies of Mark Elsdon’s anthology Gone for Good? The Coming Wave of Church Property Transitions—a copy for every congregation that participated in the fall events. We know this has led to at least one ecumenical book study in the synod.

With the last dollars, we purchased midweek worship bundles and full series bundles from Barn Geese Worship for several of our rural congregations who already worship with ecumenical siblings during Lent. 

We applied for a second grant for 2026 from Wartburg and received $30,000.

We asked for funds for three more United at the Font events:

  • Lake Chelan Lutheran (Wenatchee to the Canadian border) – May 16
  • First Lutheran, Sandpoint (Coeur d’Alene & Deerpark North) – June 27
  • Ontario, OR (Malheur, Canyon, and Payette Counties) – Oct. 10

We will host half-day follow up events in Moses Lake, Clarkston, and Pocatello.

We received funds for more team coaching. 

Following Assembly, we have a one-day event planned for ELCA pastors serving other denominations and those of you from other denominations serving ELCA ministries. Pastor Liv has planned our time for mutual learning, worship, and meals together. Phil, Liv, me and 11 pastors are staying.

Region 1: We share a Financial Services Office which employees two staff in Mill Creek, WA. All six synods now plan and participate in First Call Theological Education (for pastors and deacons in their first three years of ministry). Region 1 staff meet and collaborate regularly. We had a generative all-staff gathering in March to deepen partnerships.

Serving the Larger Church

PLU Board – Three Region 1 bishops serve on the PLU board, something I did for my first two years as bishop. 

ELCA Church Council – I gave up my position on the PLU board and now serve as the Region 1 liaison bishop to ELCA Church Council.

I finally went on a bishop seminary visit (to Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago). 

I also continue to serve on several committees and task forces:

  • Seminary Debt Reduction Task Force of the ELCA Church Council
  • Outdoor Ministry Sites-ELCA Affiliation Task Force of the ELCA Church Council
  • F.S.I.C. Standing Committee of ELCA Church Council (same committee Rev. Dr. Barb Rossing sits on)—A new ELCA social message on rural life should come out in 2027!
  • Good Samaritan Committee of the Conference of Bishops 

Mission Support: Thank you to the congregations who faithfully give Mission Support dollars to the synod, a portion of which we send on to ELCA Churchwide. Over the past several years, I have asked over 15 specific congregations to increase Mission Support, not to be confused with general benevolence, and you have responded positively! Your Mission Support is helping our synod staff and council serve you. It is also supporting other ministries. SAMPLING:

  • Creation of our newest ELCA Social Statement: Faith and Civic Life
  • Vital ministries that will never be self-sustaining, like those on the Seward Peninsula of Alaska
  • Administrative costs for ELCA World Hunger and ELCA Disaster Relief so your donations go straight to relief
  • Young Adults in Global Mission
  • Solidarity with our colleagues in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and the Holy Land
  • New ministries reaching new Christians or Christians who were harmed by other churches
  • Administration of record keeping on a national level (it is hard to explain how valuable this is for synod staff members)
  • Access to legal help on a national level (around buildings, personnel, navigating new national, state, and local policies and laws)
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Synod Assembly Opening Worship – Sermon

Posted on May 6, 2026 by megganmanlove

Sermon for Opening Worship at Synod Assembly

April 24, 2026

Synod Assembly – First Kennewick

John14:23-29

As we listen in on Jesus’ final address to his disciples before his death, we hear about mutual love between Jesus, the Father (you might think Mother), and the Advocate. Jesus is clear that he is going to leave. He will no longer walk with his disciples as he has. But they will never ever be alone, so deep is God’s love. Jesus promises them peace. “Peace, I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives.” 

In the Old Testament (or Hebrew Bible), Peace was a leave-taking address, a version of “see you later.” But Jesus is not simply saying farewell to his disciples with this promise of peace. According to a favorite scholar, in the context of his coming death, the verb “to leave” takes on the meaning of a bequest. A bequest, I love that. Earlier, he promised to not leave his followers orphaned. Now his promise of peace backs up his earlier promise. The disciples will not be orphans—they will not be alone—because they will live in the peace of Jesus. 

This peace is not the world’s peace. In other words, it is neither the false promise of security nor the end of conflict. The peace that Jesus gives is his peace, a peace that derives from the heart of Jesus’ life. The peace of Jesus is “the all-embracing sphere of his life, his love, his joy” (O’Day). 

The first time I thought about any of this with what we might call the lens of faith; I was in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness of northern Minnesota, a magical place of lakes and rivers and forests. The specific evening I’m thinking of was actually north in Ontario’s version—the Quetico.

I was there for my third canoe trip. I was 16 years old, with a group of girls my age and one college-age counselor. I felt deep peace on these canoe trips, like I could be truest self. And I love the Northwoods—the forest, the lakes, the rivers, moose, beaver, the paddle pulling you through the water. And the call of the loon at night when you are settled for the evening. To experience all that in community was a profound way to experience God’s love and peace.

Our canoe trip was through a YMCA camp, and as one evening conversation progressed, I realized I was the only one who claimed to be a person of faith, a follower of Jesus specifically. And as I realized this, I sat not in any judgment, but in deep wonder and thanksgiving. Who did these sister campers praise for this amazing wilderness? Who did they pray to? To whom did they attribute the peace of the rivers and the peace in my own heart.

I was living these lines from father’s favorite Wendell Berry’s poem:

I come into the peace of wild things

who do not tax their lives with forethought

of grief.  I come into the presence  of still water.

And I feel above me the day-blind stars

waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

I tell this story because I think many of us in the Northwest Intermountain Synod experience God’s love and peace with others in the natural world together, so much so that our churches have hiking guilds, outdoor worship, summer campouts. And we are not pantheists, as some would accuse us being. We simply take the First Article of the Creed seriously. And our very lives tell us that we experience peace when we are in God’s beautiful creation. As Lutheran theologian and campus pastor Joseph Sittler said once, “nature is a theater of grace.” 

“Peace, I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives.” The promise of Jesus’ peace is not an occasion for complacency, however. Jesus is not simply telling the disciples not to worry. He is calling them, and us, to find strength to face the new circumstances in which Jesus’ departure places them. You leaders gathered here this weekend are anything but complacent. 

And as your bishop these past three years, I have seen you, so many of you, share Jesus’ bequest of peace in your larger communities. I have seen you bring the gift of Jesus’ peace (his own love and joy) to immigrant neighbors who are deeply afraid of being deported. I have watched you provide holy spaces for those who are experiencing food insecurity—feeding them with flavorful food but also with the gift of seeing in each of them the very face of Jesus. You have sat in solidarity with our transgender siblings as others dehumanize them. And during what some have named a loneliness pandemic, when we are more connected than ever online but yet so alone, you have provided places of belonging, not country club memberships, but the deep belonging shaped by prayer, storytelling, the sacraments, and abundant love. Thank you.

And there is more. Because Jesus’ deep peace is for you too. Sometimes I worry that the leaders of the church are so busy peacemaking, so driven by the world’s injustices, so committed to making sure everyone else has a share of Jesus’ peace, that we don’t think we deserve Jesus’ gift of peace ourselves. Maybe cognitively, in our heads, we have read enough good theology, sat in on enough Bible Studies, participated in ample worship services that we understand the gift of peace in our heads. And yet, we have not let the gift of peace drop down into our hearts. What is the anecdote?

Our worship informs us. Today we began with Thanksgiving for Baptism. Last fall, we held three rural ecumenical gatherings across the synod. We called them United at the Font: Partnering for the Future. We talked about what unites us across denominations. We named the realities of our local contexts. And we ended each gathering with Affirmation of Baptism by the Assembly. We remembered that wherever we are, at whatever stage of life, no matter what reign of God work we have left undone, as the old Confession states, that we remain beloved children of God. Jesus’ gift of his peace is for us, for you through the baptismal covenant.

When you do not feel the peace of Christ, remember your baptism. I have to imagine that’s what was happening to John of Patmos when he had his vision.

He seamlessly incorporated water into his own vision of the transformed world which lay beyond the suffering and evil of the present age. Today we read: “Then the angel[a] showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb 2 through the middle of the street of the city. On either side of the river is the tree of life[b] with its twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month, and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.” 

This is a weekend for learning and relationship building and experiencing deep peace–Peace at the Now. You have peace because you have been united with Christ and sealed by the Holy Spirit. You have all you need and you worship the God who is the source of living water. 

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Lutheran Church of the Master – April 19

Posted on May 5, 2026 by megganmanlove

LCM.Coeur d’Alane – April 19, 2026 (Quilt Blessing Sunday)

Luke 24:13-35

“We had hoped,” wow does that phrase resonate with me. We had hoped that progress could continue in this country and that we all agreed on what progress looked like. We had hoped that after the pandemic, people would return quickly to weekly worship patterns. We had hoped that national, state, and local leaders would care for all of their constituents and not be influenced by out-of-state money. We had hoped that our kids would never have to worry about another school shooting ever again. We had hoped that social media could be a place of real connection and not a place where people use hateful rhetoric. We had hoped the diagnosis would be different. We had hoped the marriage would not end. 

Being a guest preacher is an honor, but it is also an odd experience because I don’t know your community in the same way I would if I was shepherding you week after week. I don’t know what you had hoped for, but my guess is you have had hopes unmet. Today is the third Sunday of Easter. Just because we live as Easter people, followers of Jesus who celebrate the resurrection, does not mean all heartbreak is gone, all hopes suddenly fulfilled. And yet, Easter does change everything, for those travelers on the road to Emmaus and us. 

I think what is most challenging to me about this story is the important place of memory and remembering. Jesus, who they at first do not recognize, goes back through the scripture and reveals things to them. Memory can be powerful. 

But it can also be manipulative, because when we tell myself a story of how something happened, sometimes it is accurate, and sometimes it is not—that’s human nature. I can romanticize a story about myself. I can also demonize a story—making it worse than it was. We do this to make sense of our lives.

But when we tell stories as the church, as the people of God, we do it most faithfully like Jesus and the two on the road to Emmaus—we do it in community. Jesus said, “Where two or three are gathered in my name, there I will be in the midst of them.” I am all for individual prayer, individual reading of scripture, and individual acts of charity. But the church is the Body of Christ, not a single member. We remember and discern best together. Even the early desert fathers and mothers who spent months in solitude came back to community. This is why I am so excited for next weekend’s Synod Assembly. It’s why I am so grateful for the grant our synod received from Wartburg Seminary for rural ecumenical experiments, which is funding a rural ecumenical gathering the last Saturday in June in Sandpoint, Idaho! 

One of the things we do when we are together in worship is remember, as Jesus and the two disciples did. This deep, faithful remembering is not the same as nostalgia. Webster defines nostalgia as a wistful or sentimental yearning for a return to or the return of some real or romanticized past period or some irrecoverable past condition or setting.

But to remember God’s faithfulness is at the center of worship and actually at the center of the life of faith. In the center of our story today, we read, “Then [Jesus] said to them, ‘Oh, how foolish you are and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah[e] should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?’ Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.”  

Worship is not an exercise in nostalgia. It is faithful remembering set within a conversation between the assembly, you, and God. The words the presider speaks before we feast on the bread of life and cup of salvation are words of deep and long memory—from creation to the Exodus, through the lives of the prophets to Jesus’ own life, death, and resurrection, and finally God’s activity through the church empowered by the Holy Spirit. God’s faithfulness is sure.

In weekly worship, we move straight from the Words of Institution to the Lord’s Prayer. That prayer also helps us remember so much. We remember how we ought to pray and for what. We again remember God’s gifts to us of daily bread, forgiveness, new life, healing. And sometimes we might remember the company of saints, all the people who have prayed that prayer down through history and pray it each day around the entire globe. 

What is all of this remembering good for? It helps you treasure religious experiences in retrospect. Further, remembering God’s activity throughout all of history helps you recognize God’s presence, elusive or fleeting as it might be, in our own lives. We get better at distinguishing between happy coincidences and God’s presence. We begin to live with more gratitude. And then, in worship and prayer, we give thanks for God’s real presence in our lives.

The practice of remembering God’s presence throughout history also reminds you that the experience of the presence of God is not a private gift. It is never for us alone. It is not something to be horded. Neither in the discovery of the empty tomb nor in the discovery of the fellow traveler to Emmaus is there the familiar command to go and tell, that is typical of other resurrection appearance scenes. Nevertheless, in both instances the recipients of the revelation immediately and spontaneously return from the liminal tomb to share their experience joyfully with others.

Finally, remembering God’s presence in history and in your own stories, prepares you to perceive God’s fleeting presence in real time. There is so much that can keep us from this activity. Our lives are filled with distractions, information, data, competing stories, nostalgia, shouting, advertising, promises of what will fulfill us. We are programmed now to skim and scan and breathe shallowly rather than to drink deeply from the water of life—Jesus Christ.

Worship, prayer, meeting our neighbors, serving those on the margins, we do all of this to remember the God of history and to prepare to perceive God’s fleeting presence in real time. We do this, as Jesus did with those two disciples, most often around the meal of Holy Communion. The meal redefines the disciples’ understanding of Jesus. Jesus takes, blesses, breaks, and gives the bread to them (Luke 24:30), the same sequence of actions we recall from his final meal (22:19). 

Holy Communion is more than bread and wine. It is a means of God’s grace. It is an event in which we receive forgiveness and new life. As we return to this table again and again, I really do believe we build our capacity to perceive God in our other places, to perceive forgiveness, grace, and new life in daily encounters. Most often we will name it later, that was a grace moment, that was God’s love, that was God’s mercy, that was life given from God. And we give thanks.

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April 2026 Report to Synod Council

Posted on May 4, 2026 by megganmanlove

Bishop’s Report to NWIM Synod Council – April 2026

27 Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid. (John 14)

Since our January meeting online, I have been with the following congregations on a Sunday morning or for an ordination: Fairfield Community Church, King of Glory in Boise, Kuna United Methodist Church (served by ELCA Pastor Mia Crosthwaite), Good Shepherd in Pocatello and Emmanuel in Blackfoot, Salem Lutheran (with All Saints in attendance), St. Luke in Spokane, American Lutheran in Newport, Cameron Emanuel, and somewhere on April 19.

Our Candidacy Committee continues to do the good work of walking with our 11 candidates and is preparing for our first retreat—Lutherhaven in July with Deacon Tammy Devine presenting. We welcomed two new members at our February meeting: Pastor Nathaneil Christman (Ritzville and Sprague) and Mondo Davilla (Celebration, East Wenatchee). Just a reminder: Candidacy Manager is part of Cathy Steiner’s large portfolio. One synod from each of the nine regions is part of the Candidacy Launch pilot. I am grateful Northwest Washington Synod is part of the pilot and giving us a preview as they live into competency-based candidacy.

With the January trip to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Jordan and Holy Land, I was not as proactive in writing an issue letter anticipating the Idaho legislative session (like I did last year). However, I did make it to Olympia for Faith Action Network’s Interfaith Advocacy Day. I spent much of the day with two women from East Wenatchee (UMC and UCC-Brethren—ELCA Pastor Dane Breslin’s church) talking to legislators from Washington’s Seventh Legislative District (which includes East Wenatchee, Colville, and much in between). I have been on Zoom calls and in meetings about protesting the building of the death chamber in Idaho (to execute people using the firing squad) and supporting the Idahoans United for Women and Families (reproductive health ballot initiative). And I sat in the Idaho capital for Hunger Awareness Day with Pastor Bob Lewis (Immanuel) and Sunshine Evetts (Hope). 

In my capacity serving the larger ELCA, I finally went on a bishop seminary visit (to Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago). LSTC’s new president, Dr. Shauna Hannan, recently a professor at PLTS in Berkeley, has a big job—new space, shifting landscape of theological education, and a recent history of low enrollment. 

I also continue to serve on several committees and task forces:

  • Seminary Debt Reduction Task Force of the ELCA Church Council
  • Outdoor Ministry Sites-ELCA Affiliation Task Force of the ELCA Church Council
  • F.S.I.C. Standing Committee of ELCA Church Council (same committee Rev. Dr. Barb Rossing sits on)—A new ELCA social message on rural life should come out in 2027!
  • Good Samaritan Committee of the Conference of Bishops 

Retreat Season

Deans’ Retreat at the Grunewald Guild: During this annual gathering of our synod’s cluster deans each dean gets to report on all the ministry sites in their cluster. We also had two really generative discussions, one about the upcoming Synod Assembly (specifically how we are going to use small group time during the plenaries) and another about how our ministry sites can support the fall elections (prayers, being present at polling places, encouraging discussions in homes about local issues). I led and planned our closing Holy Communion worship, but three other deans volunteered to plan and lead morning/evening prayer. I always love watching their personalities shine when given these opportunities. The first night some of us played games and others enjoyed the sauna. The second night we enjoyed a hymn sing, turning to both of our hymnals. It was such a gift to both laugh and sing together.

ELCA Church Council Retreat in St. Charles, IL: At the triennial ELCA Churchwide Assembly (most recently in Phoenix in summer 2025) half of the ELCA Church Council is elected to six-year terms. So, every three years, in the spring, there is a retreat so relationships can be nurtured and trust can be built. Though I left the retreat (Thursday night – Sunday morning) quite exhausted, I am humbled and grateful to be a liaison bishop. This is a wonderful way that I get to serve the larger church and tell the larger church stories from Region 1. The group of pastors, deacons, and lay leaders who have volunteered and been elected are remarkable humans so committed to the ministry we do as the ELCA. It was a joy to get to know many of them at table discussions, over meals, and even during some physical team building activities. We also had many ELCA Churchwide staff with us, and I was able to have some helpful conversations with several of them as well. Some of that wisdom will show up in our spring synod council meeting.

Region 1 Staff Retreat in Federal Way, WA: Last Spring our region had four bishop elections. We won’t have any more elections until 2029, when NWIM Synod will have an election, so it seemed like the right time to invest some time and money in an in-person gathering. We spent four days at the recently refurbished Archbishop Brunette Retreat Center at the Palisades, very accessible from SeaTac Airport and right on the water. Our days were framed by simple worship services. We had time in affinity groups (DEMs, admins, bishops, assistants to the bishops…). We Zoomed in Bishop Curry for about 20 minutes to hear his vision and perspective right now. We gave every synod about 30 minutes to introduce their synod to everyone else. We had a few conversations about discipleship formation and training Synod Authorized Ministers. There were trails to explore in the mornings and during breaks. The hospitality was wonderful and we had lots of conversations over tea or coffee. During the final morning, we harvested what we could collaborate on easily that would have a big impact. Stay tuned for more!

Looking ahead to the fall elections and listening to the ELCA Witness and Society Office:

  • I will try to meet with, have contact with, both the Washington and Idaho Secretaries of State to offer support and prayers as they go about managing the midterm elections.
  • Could synod council members and cluster deans make a point to meet with county clerks and ask how the faith communities can support their work and make sure they know they are in our church’s prayers?
  • I commend two of our ELCA Social Statements and their accompanying study guides: Economic Life and Civic Life. 

I continue to explore grant opportunities for our synod and specialized ministries. I have, since summer 2023, made 15 asks of specific congregations to increase their Mission Support (with moderate success). Our synod staff does a great job managing expenses through following budgets and thrifty travel. 

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Easter Sunday-Palouse and Clearwater

Posted on May 4, 2026 by megganmanlove

I enjoyed the sunrise service at Cordelia on the Palouse. Christ is risen indeed!

Magical to drive from Lewiston to Cordelia at dawn
Pastors Sierra (Moscow) and Pat (Troy) were appropriately bundled!

Then I drove over to Cameron Emmanuel Lutheran to preach and preside for their Easter Worship Service. Cameron Emmanuel will be a detached internship site (with supervisor in Moscow) starting sometime this summer!

Cameron Emmanuel – April 5, 2026

Matthew 28:1-10

This is such a great resurrection scene, in large part because of verse 2. Mary Magdalene and the other Mary have gone to the tomb and suddenly there is an earthquake. An angel of the Lord descends from heaven and rolls back the stone in front of the tomb and sits on it. His appearance is like lightening, and his clothing is as white as snow. 

Confronted by the blinding light of this angel, the guards who had been posted in ensure that nothing would happen to Jesus’ body were so gripped by fear that they shook and became like dead men. Someone this week suggested we compare the men to fainting goats. 

Jesus’ resurrection already creates a life freed from the death that grips our everyday lives. This is life reborn, revealing to us how death has determined our living. And yet it is possible to remain dead, to live as dead men, as the behavior of these guards will make clear.

The guards are frightened to death. But the angel tells Mary Magdalene and the other Mary that they do not need to be afraid: “I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified. He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said. Come, see the place where he lay. Then go quickly and tell his disciples, ‘He has been raised from the dead, and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him.’” 

The angel’s speech contains all of the gospel. “Do not be afraid.” Jesus has made it possible to live unafraid. The disciples, followers, of Jesus are often afraid of the elites and the crowds, but Jesus has given them all they need not to be afraid. He has done so by drawing them, and us, into a way of life so compellingly true that we have no time to be afraid.

We read that Mary Magdalene and Mary left the tomb quickly with fear and great joy. The fear is that paired with joy. They leave the tomb in awe, knowing that they are now participants in the reign of God, which their teacher Jesus has spoken of so often. They fear they have as they leave the tomb is the fear that protects them from the fears that would have us deny the resurrection. Our human nature wants to create lives of security in the face of death. The joy filling the women saves them from this kind of fear.

The fear and joy they now experience is made possible by the resurrection. Mary Magdalene and Mary have seen the crucifixion; they have now seen the empty tomb. They are our first witnesses to the good news that the one crucified has been raised.

Jesus was handed over, made subject to sinners and death itself. But he has been made victorious. But the resurrection of Jesus cannot be seen. As one scholar [Hauerwas] says, we can no more see the resurrection than we can see creation. We can see only the empty tomb and the resurrected Jesus. 

The resurrection is not a resurrection of one who had lived, died, and then lived again. Jesus raised his friend Lazarus from the dead. But Lazarus was still to die. Resurrection is not the resuscitation of a corpse. Jesus is raised from the dead to be freed from death itself. He will never die again. Jesus has been raised from the dead, defeating death itself. 

Mary Magdalene and Mary rush from the tomb to tell the disciples, but suddenly, in an almost comedic encounter, Jesus meets them. It is Jesus, resurrected. It is the crucified one who is resurrected. Jesus greets them in a familiar way, and they come to him. They saw him and recognized him. They took hold of his feet. The resurrected Jesus can be touched. 

The resurrection of Jesus is not an idea. His body has been raised. The one born of Mary, the one baptized by John, the one who called the disciples, the one who delivered the Sermon on the Mount, the one who cured the lame, the blind, the deaf and mute, the one who disputed with the Pharisees and Sadducees, the one who endured humiliation by trial and cross—he has been raised.

Jesus’ bodily presence does not prevent Mary Magdalene and Mary from worshiping him. One worships only God. Yet they worship him. They had not worshiped the angel who announced Jesus’ resurrection. But they now worship Jesus, Immanuel, God with us.

That they worship Jesus marks the central activity of the new reality of the body of Christ, the church, us! What makes the church the church is the worship of Jesus. The worship of Jesus will take many different forms across time and space. But where the word is preached and the sacraments are enacted, we know that Jesus is present among us. By baptism and communion, we participate in Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection, making us an alternative to the world. An alternative of life, abundance, and deep abiding love.

Being the alternative is not, however, an invitation for self-righteousness. Instead, it enables us to worship, just as Mary Magdalene and Mary do. We take time to worship in a world that thinks it has no time to worship Jesus.

Jesus tells the women not to be afraid, but to go tell his brothers to go to Galilee where they will see him. Jesus’ disciples—brothers and sisters, will bring forth life. Again, we see the beginnings of the church, the same church you embody today. And Jesus is returning to Galilee, where he began his ministry. Jesus unleashes the disciples to go into the world not from Jerusalem, the center of power, but from Galilee. Galilee becomes the staging area for the disciples to go to the nations to announce the new age begun by Jesus.

For us today, as for Mary Magdalene and Mary, Jesus goes ahead of us to lead us into the world. Jesus leads us into a transformative way of life that testifies to the power of resurrection wherever we live. “Jesus is going ahead—not going away,” one scholar [Schuessler Fiorenza] said. The empty tomb does not signify absence but presence. It announces the resurrected one’s presence on the road ahead.

If Jesus is indeed going ahead, then we are asked to look for experiences of resurrection presence not only in Galilee but also in Cameron, Kendrick, Lewiston—on all the roads of our lives. Resurrection means that Jesus, the Living One, goes ahead of you. Jesus can be found only when we experience that “he is ahead of us” and he opens up a future for you. Like Mary Magdalene and Mary, you can run to meet that liberating future. The stone has been rolled away. 

Finally, the command to go to Galilee does not erase the experience of death and violence. Resurrection comes to us first of all in our most broken and unexpected places, breaking the structures of the Roman occupation regime in Jerusalem and the structures of every regime of death in our lives today. As we announce at every grave—death does not have the final word. Death itself has been swallowed up.

Jesus is going ahead. He continues into the future God has in store for the creation.  In the meantime, there is only the Word, the bread, and the wine, and the promise that “you will see him.”  We walk by faith and not by sight.  We can only trust that God will one day finish the story, as God has promised.

You can see Oregon, Washington, and of course Idaho from Cameron’s cemetary.
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