Dear church,
It was nice to see some people yesterday for the ice cream social in the church parking lot, probably the first time some of us have seen each other in person. The day was beautiful, and we had plenty of space to keep the appropriate distance. We counted 71 people over the course of the hour. The ice cream, I can officially attest, was delicious. We thank our generous donors who made this possible!!! I hope you also enjoyed the Father’s Day service with all those contributions from different dads; it was another great team effort. I also received our Steeple Views newsletter on Saturday already. Lisa and her crew must have gotten it out at lightning speed and for once the postal service upped its game! She was still working on it on Thursday and less than two days later it was in my mail box. I was so pleased how it came together. Our staff is doing a tremendous job and I want to thank them all for their creativity, work and innovative ideas!
I was recently thinking that exactly two years ago, at a time when international travel was as normal as eating ice cream, our St. Peter’s Travel Group stayed in eastern Germany, walking in the footsteps of Martin Luther. We arrived in the city of Erfurt on June 21, on summer solstice day. What we didn’t not know but would soon discover was that the city was hosting a summer music festival on that very day. It was such a wonderful surprise! After checking into our hotel in the old city, our people wandered all over the place. Erfurt is a small city and its historic center is highly walkable. There were food stands and music bands, performers and street artists all over the place. The entire town was in a cheery, festive mood and we were drawn into it. What a start to a wonderful trip! The next day we visited the Wartburg castle were some 500 years ago Luther was kept under a different name for a full year for his own protection, a time that he used to translate the New Testament into German. Later that afternoon on June 22 we had a walking tour through the city of Erfurt and concluded the day with a medieval dinner in a restaurant that specializes on that. Our people were in a very good mood and started dancing to the lute player’s tunes, also singing some of our choral repertoire carefully chosen by Kirsten with some serious and some lighter pieces. The German people in the place were delighted and our medieval musicians told us afterwards that they had never had such a good crowd. Wonderful memories! I included two pictures from that trip.
Bethany C. gave me an update on Aiden yesterday after the emergency removal of his appendix. “Dear Pastor, Thank you so much for your thoughtful gesture on behalf of Aidan. The more prayers the better and we appreciate the love and support! Last night was difficult but today has been so much better! He is much more like himself, physically and emotionally, and has been motivated to move more on his own. His temperature is staying down and his white blood count has further decreased, which makes us hopeful that he won’t develop an infection from the perforation.
Thank you, again, for thinking of us!” The last attached picture shows “Super Aiden” going for a walk! We wish you a good recovery, Aiden!
Please do not forget the Car Wash on Saturday, which will benefit the Innocence Project.
June 22 is another popular birthday. Celebrating are Patrick O., Nathan B., and Jean M..
Happy birthday to all of you!
Be blessed and be safe!
Pastor Andreas Wagner