. Pigeon Falls

Today's Saying

A man who asks is a fool for five minutes. A man who never asks is a fool for life. - Chinese Proverb

It is Sunday in Pigeon Falls. On this the last day of Old Timer’s week Pastor Marvel used to put on the old robes and wear clerical tabs like they did years ago but Pastor Joan says she can’t look like a pastor of one hundred years ago because the Lutherans had no woman pastors. She’d have to put on a fake beard and it would cover the tabs. But she did put on an old black robe in place of the white alb she usually wears. Here is part of her sermon for today:

“How many of you believe Jesus is really present in the Communion you will receive today? Raise your hands. Wow! Everybody
How many of you understand how Jesus is present in the Bread and Wine ? Will you please raise your hands. What! No hands raised.
Your going to take Holy Communion today and you don’t understand how Jesus is present.
It might surprise you but so am I.
I don’t know how Jesus can be there for us in the Bread and Wine.
I’ve read a lot of books with a lot of explanations but none of them satisfy, not one.
And yet I know He comes to me in the Bread and in the wine.
I know that somehow they are his Body and Blood.
Luther teaches that in the Small Catechism without ever explaining the how.
He says: What is the Sacrament of the Altar?
It is the true body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, under the bread and wine, for us Christians to eat and to drink, instituted by Christ Himself.
I guess we need to settle for that.
He who gives life is there to give us new life.
We do not need to understand or explain to receive.
We just need to receive.
Come Eat.