State of the Synod Report
Bishop Rick Foss
21st Annual Eastern North Dakota Synod Assembly
Fargo, North Dakota
April 5, 2008
“Let Mutual Love Continue: Living as God’s Abundant Gifts”
I like this assembly theme. In a year when there are some transitions, we lift up the deep continuities of life together in this synod. At a time when transition brings some loss, we lift up the profound promise that we are incarnate gifts to one another.
This is my 16th and final report. It will be a bit different, since I will not talk about plans/dreams/challenges for the year ahead; a new bishop will do that with you.
In 1992 I circulated a list of 100 verbs, and asked pastors and lay leaders in this synod which were most important for the bishop/synod office to be doing. You told us (and 5 years later, when asked again, you responded the same way). Of the 100 verbs, which included just about everything found in a bishop’s job description or a letter of call, you selected your “Top Ten Verbs.” Continue reading…
This homily, written by Bishop Rick Foss, is available for use by congregations in the Eastern North Dakota Synod on Synod Assembly Sunday (April 6, 2008).
ยป Download the sermon: The Emmaus Road (download pdf file)
The Emmaus Road
Luke 24:13-35 (external link)
No one really knows where the town of Emmaus was. I think four villages currently claim the distinction. Nobody knows much about Cleopas or the other disciple who was with him on the road to Emmaus that Easter Day. But Emmaus will always be remembered, because Luke preserved for us the encounter on that road between Jesus and two crestfallen men.
You remember the story. They were crushed. They had pinned their hopes on Jesus, and now he was dead- and all was lost. I don’t know what was taking them to Emmaus. Maybe they just needed to clear their heads and get out of town.
In any case, as they plodded along and tried to make sense of that awful last week, a stranger fell in with them. As they rehashed what had happened to Jesus and to them, the stranger asked, “What are you talking about?” I don’t think they were very polite or patient, and I don’t know what they were thinking when the stranger began to tell them what it all meant.
I would love to have been there, listening, as Jesus retold the familiar stories, but from the vantage point of the power of the resurrection Continue reading…