St. Luke’s Stories

Last Sunday I met a new friend. It was his first time to come to church at St. Luke’s. When he arrived he asked someone if he could speak with a pastor. They found me and introduced me to him. I sat down with him and began to talk and found out that he had fallen on some difficult times. He had some medical problems that were preventing him from being able to work and he has now been homeless for a while. He was simply looking for a place to come to church where he could worship and pray with others.

This Sunday is All Saints Sunday in the Church calendar. November 1st is actually “All Saints Day”, but most people are more familiar with the day before – “All Hallows (Saints) Eve”, or “Halloween”. All Saints Day is meant to be a day to reflect upon the lives of those who have gone before us in the faith to bring us where we are today and give God thanks for their lives. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, wrote in his journal on November 1, 1767 that it’s “a festival I truly love.” On November 1, 1788 he said, “I always find this a comfortable day.” Then, one year later he called it “a day that I peculiarly love.” It seems strange to think of All Saints Day in these terms, yet I think he was on to something.

One year. That’s how long it has been since we first opened St. Luke’s Edmond’s beautiful new building at 900 N Sooner Rd. In some ways it feels like it was just yesterday that we were opening our doors, adding a new worship service, and beginning a journey that would change our lives forever. In other ways it feels like this has always been home. It feels like we have been making memories in this space, worshipping our Creator, serving our community, and growing a family of faith for my entire life. Time can be funny like that.

I’ve found myself having a very heavy heart this week after waking up Monday morning to the tragic news of a mass shooting in Las Vegas. Another tragic event. More lives lost in senseless violence. Countless lives and families impacted forever.

Growing up as a middle school and high school student at St. Luke’s, one of my favorite events we did every year was our Youth Force mission trip. Every evening after we were finished working on our houses we would come back to the host church and have worship together. As part of the worship service we would take time to do our “God sightings”. Basically, we had some huge bedsheets that would be spread out around the room and we would use permanent markers to write on them. We would write each day about how we had seen God at work that day, and by the end of the week these bedsheets would be full of the ways people had seen God working. It was such a powerful visual by the end of the week to step back and reflect on all that God had been doing.