The Staff - Lent 2020 by Good Shepherd, Lookout Mountain

Lent 2020 Celebrate the Possible with God in Lent How can we enter into reconciliation?

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ASLAN IS ON THE MOVE

WELL FED: HOLY FOOD FOR A RECONCILED LIFE

Fr. Robert reflects on the movement of the Holy Spirit at Good Shepherd.

Learn about our Lent theme and some ways you can begin entering into reconciliation.

PALM SUNDAY & EASTER FLOWERS

BLESSING OTHERS

ENVISIONING HUNGER

SAVE THE DATES

A reminder about Palm Sunday and Easter flowers .

The Outreach Grants Committee reports on its work throughout 2019, blessing others andcelebrating their work.

Reconcilng ourselves to the truth about food insecurity, Deacon Janice shares about our Lenten Food Drive.

Lent & Holy Week at Good Shepherd.

MUSIC & LITURGY DURING LENT

YOUTH NEWS & DATES TO SAVE

John Wigal shares about upcoming music events and liturgical changes for Lent worship.

Youth programs during Lent and spring and summer information for Grace Point Camp.

On the cover & above: Lenten roses in bloom. Photos courtesy of Jody Seiferth

“They say Aslan is on the move- perhaps has already landed.” The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe ~ C.S. Lewis

Robert Childers, Rector

When our children were young, around five and seven, as a summer reading project, we read C.S. Lewis’ entire Chronicles of Narnia. I had never read any of Lewis’ fiction and was as excited as Rob and Liz were to embark upon this literary journey. Aslan, the great Lion and Christ figure, is the central figure in all the books of this series, regardless of whether he is present or absent, seen or unseen. The above quote comes from Mr. Beaver who excitedly proclaims that Aslan might be about. This was a time of cold, of winter, the time of the White Witch. The inhabitants of Narnia were hopeful Aslan could free them from the reign of the evil witch. When the children who had come into Narnia - Peter, Edmund, Susan and Lucy - heard the name of Aslan, they each felt something jump within them. Though they knew nothing of the great lion, they sensed his presence would change their lives and even their world. As I read this passage to our children, each of us had a wonderful sense of excitement that something powerful, wonderful and even life changing was about to happen. Just as the children in the story felt a new sense of trust towards the talking beaver, as well as excitement and expectation regarding what might happen, so did we as we turned each page of the book. Since I first read the Chronicles of Narnia so many years ago, the phrase “Aslan is on the move” has reminded me that God is always at work - and moving - in our lives and that world in which we live. We, as God’s children, are called to pay attention to God’s movement, so we can follow the Spirit

as she moves about, in and amongst us. In recent months, the refrain, “Aslan is on the move” has been dancing about in my heart and mind. This past summer, when we realized we were not going to be able to meet our planned budget, I knew that our fall stewardship campaign would be a pivotal time in the life of the parish. Because of the death of several generous Good Shepherd members, the rest of us were going to have to step up and re-evaluate our commitment to our church and her future. What did we want Good Shepherd to look like in 2020? What did we want the church to look like in the future? What kind of church did we want to leave for our children and their children? To be honest, I didn’t know how we would react to this challenge. Moreover, I felt a heavy burden to “make” the stewardship campaign a success. Out of desperation more than inspiration, I gathered together a group of folks hoping for ideas and encouragement. George Robinson, Tina Currin, Henry Oehmig, Phillip Lang, Susan Stein, Mike Slocumb and Katherine Currin came together and provided wisdom, creativity, patience, perseverance, humor and a deep love of this church, proving to me there are no limitations to what we can do as the people of God and the body of Christ. Each of them dug down deep into their hearts to express their love for and devotion to Good Shepherd. Each of them expressed that love and devotion in their videos and words from the pulpit. They challenged themselves and the parish to stretch and more fully live into our call to be Christ to and 3

for each other. And YOU, people of Good Shepherd, responded showing your love for and devotion to this community. You said, this is my home; I want to “be the church.” Through your generosity, we not only met our budget, we exceeded it, allowing us to secure our facilities, programs and staff. Though I am certainly appreciative of the increase in pledges, I am more excited about the spirit and excitement I am experiencing within the parish. I am seeing it in our worship, our classes and studies, Shepherd’s Night Out, Supper Clubs, the Annual Parish Meeting, and our recent Vestry Retreat. Wherever I turn, in all aspects of our parish life, I believe “Aslan is on the move!” As we move into Lent, the time of selfexamination and preparation for Easter, let’s pay attention, keeping our eyes, ears and hearts wide open to the Spirit of God as it moves about. Let us follow where the Spirit is leading us, always remembering, “Aslan is on the move!” Grace and peace to you, Robert

Well-Fed: Holy Food for a Reconciled Life

Kathleen Crevasse, Director of Christian Education

In the early days of the Church, the 40 days of Lent were a time when converts to the faith would prepare themselves for baptism on Easter by observing a time of self-examination, penitence, and prayer. The 40 days of Lent hearken to the 40 days Jesus spent in the wilderness before beginning his ministry, time to figure out who he was and what his work in the world was to be. During that time, he was tempted to feed his desires rather than his soul – to feed his earthly hungers, to feed the need for recognition, power and glory. But Jesus resists and heads back into the world to teach, to heal, and to transform. He leaves the desert wilderness ready to feed his sheep in heart, mind and soul. Our theme this Lent is Well-Fed: Holy Food for a Reconciled Life. Along with many churches around the diocese (see Bishop Brian Cole’s video here: http://bit.ly/WellFedIntro), we will be exploring what we hunger for – food, spirit, community, connection, simplicity, Good News, permission – and how we might satisfy those cravings to live lives reconciled to God and one another. The one who said, “I am the Bread of Life” was all about Holy Food. From multiplying the fishes and loaves on the shores of the sea of Galilee to gathering with his friends at the Last Supper, from reappearing to followers on the road to Emmaus - where he was made known to them in the breaking of the bread - to grilling fish for his beloved disciples on the beach, Jesus’ ministry was about gathering around the table to break bread, feeding his flock body and soul, and teaching his followers to do likewise. To Peter: Feed my sheep. We invite you to take advantage of the many offerings available to you at Good Shepherd to have a holy and soul-nurturing Lent to prepare to fully realize the new life of Easter. + Lent Retreat: The Eucharist as Reconciliation, February 21 (6:00 - 8:00 pm) and February 22 (10:00 am - 3:00 pm). Before Lent even begins there will be a retreat to set the tone. The Rev. Sarah Hill, Vicar of Lindisfarne (The Holy Island in Great Britain) and former Canon for Reconciliation at Coventry Cathedral will present 5 hour-long sessions on reconciliation. The first will be Friday evening, 6:00 - 8:00 pm (talk at 6:30 pm, drinks and hors d’oeuvres before and after; the other four will be presented on Saturday, 10:00 am - 3:00 pm, including lunch ($10 for lunch). The entire retreat will conclude with a Eucharist in the church. + You may also partake of our usual Lenten fare: Morning Prayer (MWF, 8:30 - 9:00 am in the chapel March 2 - April 3, daily devotion booklets, Wednesday night classes (Bring Your Own Bible and Beverage style, exploring what we hunger for), making palm crosses, using the prayer wall in narthex + Lenten Learning Challenge: Folks often give things up for Lent. Would you be willing to take something on instead? Like aiming to be at worship every Sunday and/or going to Sunday formation offerings for the duration of Lent? (Same goes for your kids and grandkids – How we would love to experience the stories of Lent with them!) 5

+ Experience the whole of Holy Week – Showing up on Palm Sunday and then again on Easter doesn’t really allow the full experience of the main story of our faith. Without remembering and reenacting the beautiful pathos of Jesus tenderly washing his disciples’ feet and sitting through the Last Supper with his friends (Maundy Thursday), without the wrenching drama of the crucifixion (Good Friday), can you fully experience the glory of resurrection on Easter morning? Your ALLELUIAs will be all the fuller for your full participation in the events of Holy Week. + Lenten Food Drive and Sack Pack Collection - There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread (Gandhi). As we give thanks for our daily bread and plenty, let us remember those whose primary hunger, for physical nurture, obliviates every other desire. Give generously to our non-perishable food collection this Lent and perhaps join us (or at least contribute financially) when we prepare bags of non-perishable items for kids from Fairyland School experiencing food scarcity at home to take home over the weekend. Watch your weekly emails for more information. Next time you’re in church, turn to the catechism at the back of the Book of Common Prayer. Find the mission of the church. You’ll see: “The mission of the church is to restore all people to unity with God and each other in Christ.” If you find yourself bemoaning the current level of polarity and disunity in the world, wouldn’t this Lent be a great opportunity to do your part to reconcile things – yourself to God, yourself to another? The catechism continues, “The Church pursues its mission as it prays and worships, proclaims the Gospel, and promotes justice, peace and love.” Let this season of Lent be a season of reconciliation in your life and in the life of our church. Consider the feast of soul-feeding opportunities set before you and dig in! The new life of Easter awaits us all on the other side. Come, partake; let’s celebrate the possible with God!

Palm Sunday & Easter Flowers

Nicole Seiferth, Parish Administrator

As we do each year, the Flower Guild will have a general memorial fund for donations to remember and honor special people and groups with flowers on Easter Sunday. We will also have a few memorials available that will be in place for Palm Sunday and Easter both. You may email or call Nicole in the church office (nicole@gslookout.com or 423-821-1583) to make a gift or with any questions. Envelopes for Easter flower offerings can also be found in the pews throughout Lent.

Blessing Others

Outreach Grants Committee

This Outreach Grants Committee was formed many years ago as a response to the needs of the wider community beyond our parish. The Committee meets quarterly, in March, June, September, and December. Working with funds allocated from the Annual Budget and from Endowment, it evaluates requests that have been submitted and makes grants after thoughtful consideration. Petitioners must complete a formal application and are encouraged to attend the Committee meeting to present its request in person and to answer questions. In 2019, the Committee’s budget was reduced by 20% to reflect the decline in parish giving to Good Shepherd. Regardless, grants were made to the following organizations: Metropolitan Ministries Signal Centers Center for Mindful Living A Step Ahead East Side Elementary School Girls, Inc. Lookout Mountain Conservancy Renaissance Day Camp Thankful Memorial Episcopal Church (basement renovation fund) The Community Kitchen Bridge Refugee Services Life Spring Community Health The Partnership for Families Habitat for Humanity Children’s Nutrition Program of Haiti La Paz We were also able to provide $1,346 to MetMin as emergency funds to help relocate people who were evicted suddenly from Residents City Suites. Many requests were not funded because the Committee believed the request did not fit well within its mission or because no parishioners were involved in the organization. The Mission of the Committee is as follows: To seek to advance the mission of the Church of the Good Shepherd by funding ministry to others outside the parish. Using monies available from the Church’s

Basement in Thankful Memorial Church

annual budget and Outreach endowment, it will target projects and needs, both local and global, which are creative and far-reaching and are consistent with the interests of our parishioners. Grants may be made to the Youth Group for its ministries outside the parish. The Committee encourages diversity of groups or programs requesting funds and generally prefers not to fund operation costs or to fund the same organizations or programs on an on-going, multi-year basis. Currently serving on the Committee are: Mike Slocumb (chair and vestry member); Linda Harwell; Susie McGinniss; Jim Moore; Marian Steffner; Martha Westbrook; Milly Rawlings; Jo Ann Yates; Jo Pine; Martha Elder; Vickie Berghel, and the Reverend Janice Robbins, Deacon (clergy member). The Committee submits this report with much gratitude for the generosity of Good Shepherd’s parishioners.

Envisioning Hunger Janice Robbins, Deacon

It’s difficult to believe that people are still starving in this country because food isn’t available. ~ Ronald Reagan Our imaginations have a hard time envisioning hunger not only for ourselves, but also for our children, our parents, and grandparents. But just because we have a hard time imagining food insecurity, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is designed to supplement what families cannot afford. Good Shepherd hopes to help those families whose income puts them at nutritional risk each month as any SNAP assistance they might receive for food runs out, usually close to the 21st of the month. Benefits per person are about $115 per month. The Chattanooga Area Food Bank provides food to an estimated 20,000 clients each week; 40% of the members of households served are under 18 years old. On the other end of the spectrum, more than five million senior citizens fall into the category of food insecure. We are always called to be the hands of God, which can mean among many things to help feed those who are hungry. Food insecurity is a real thing – and the people who experience it are our neighbors. From Ash Wednesday, February 26, to Palm Sunday, April 5, we will have a Lenten Food Drive to help families with food shortage needs and also to help students at Fairyland School have food on weekends with Sack Packs. Donations may be brought to church anytime and placed in the wagons in the entrance foyer (narthex). We are collecting these non-perishables: • Specifically for children’s sack packs: individually packaged healthy nutritious snacks – protein bars, granola bars, mac and cheese, fruits, pasta, chips, crackers, canned fruits (with easy off lids), nuts, pudding. • Canned vegetables • Canned tuna, or salmon • Peanut butter • Meals in a can or sack (soup, stew, chili), that do NOT need meat or chicken to be added. • Canned fruit in its own juice or water • Baby foods • Low-sugar whole grain cereals • Canned ham or chicken • Beans – canned and/or dried • Healthy snacks (granola bars, nuts, dried fruit) 8

Save the Dates

Music & Liturgy During Lent John Wigal, Director of Music

February 23, 4:00 pm Metropolitan Ministries Evensong

The Adult Choir of Good Shepherd will join forces with the choirs of Grace, St. Paul’s and St. Timothy’s Episcopal Churches to offer an Evensong on Sunday, February 23 at 4:00 pm at St. Paul’s Church, 7th and Pine Streets, Chattanooga. There will be moments of celebration of the MetMin volunteers, words from the Executive Director and music provided by the combined choirs of the four churches. An offering will be taken to benefit the work of MetMin. Please come and join us!

Liturgy During Lent

This Lenten season we will be using some liturgical elements to reflect our overall Lenten theme which is being taken up across our Diocese of East Tennessee. The theme is Well-Fed: Holy Food for a Reconciled Life, and one can see it is directly connected to our Eucharistic worship. For the 10:30 service, we have chosen and received permission from our bishop to use a version of the Eucharistic Prayer prepared by the Iona Community. The Iona Community began in 1938 as a project led by George MacLeod, at that time a minister of the Church of Scotland, to close the gap which he perceived between the church and working people. He took a group of ministers and working men to Iona to rebuild together the ruined medieval Iona Abbey. Today the community is a dispersed one, with members who work and live throughout the world. There are 270 Full Members, around 1,800 Associate Members and 1,600 Friends of the Community. Among them are Presbyterians, Anglicans, Lutherans, Quakers, Roman Catholics and people of no denominational allegiance. The community has a strong commitment to ecumenism and to peace and justice issues. The Lenten theme has several sub-themes, namely: Food, Spirit, Simplicity, Good News, Community, Connection, and Permission. We will be connecting these sub-themes to the various petitions found in the Prayers of the People during the 10:30 service, which have been specially prepared for our use this Lent. It is always most exciting, meaningful and interesting when our worship elements relate closely with each other and we hope that you will continue to find these relationships meaningful in your own worship.

The Trinity Choirs in Worship

The two choirs of our Wednesday night Trinity program will assist in leading the music for our worship several times in the coming weeks. If you need more information on the program, please see Kathleen Crevasse (kathleen@gslookout.com) or John Wigal (jwigal@gslookout.com). • • • •

February 23 – Trinity Kids (5yrs.-1st grade) will sing for the 10:30 am Eucharist February 26 – Trinity Choir (grades 2-5) sings for Ash Wednesday Eucharist, 6:30 pm March 22 – Trinity Choir sings for the 10:30 am Eucharist March 28 and 29 – Trinity Choir participates in the community-wide Chorister Evensong at 4:00 pm Sunday at St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church, Signal Mountain, TN • April 19 – Trinity Kids and Trinity Choir sing for the 10:30 am Eucharist • May 10 – Trinity Choir Musical! at the 10:30 am Eucharist

Youth News & Dates to Save

Wednesday Night Youth and Youth Sunday School continue in Lent. Save the dates below for your studentâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s spring and summer planning!

The Church of the Good Shepherd

211 Franklin Road Lookout Mountain, Tennessee 37350

Return Service Requested

Canon Hills has lived in South Africa and Northern Ireland during times of deep division within those countries. She has been involved with Church of England reconciliation projects in South Africa, Northern Ireland, Iraq, East Africa, Germany, and elsewhere, and continues to be today — for example, in South Florida and Cuba two years ago. She is connected with reconciliation ministries across the world, and is close to both Archbishop Tutu and the Archbishop of Canterbury, whom both held her previous position as Canon for Reconciliation at Coventry Cathedral.

Presentations are free; lunch on Saturday will be $10. Reservations will be required for Friday and Saturday, and the retreat will be limited to 75 people across the Diocese of East Tennessee. Registration is open to Good Shepherd parishioners until Friday, February 14 before opening to the rest of the diocese as well. To register, contact Sandra in the church office, sandra@gslookout.com or (423) 821-1583

Friday, February 21, 6:00 - 8:00 pm: Evening Retreat. “Eucharist as Reconciliation” followed by drinks and hors d’oeuvres. Canon Hills’ talk will begin at 6:30 pm. Saturday, February 22, 10:00 am - 3:00 pm: continuation of “Eucharist as Reconciliation” concluding with a Eucharist in the church Sunday, February 23: The Rev. Canon Dr. Hills will present during the formation hour and will preach at the 8:00 and 10:30 am services.

The Reverend Canon Dr. Sarah Hills, Vicar of Holy Island, Lindisfarne, Northumberland (England) will be visiting Good Shepherd to offer a spiritual retreat based on the Eucharist as Reconciliation.

Eucharist as Reconciliation