October 18, 2020

Adult Education: Job’s Response to Misery

St. Andrew begins another adult education class on Sunday, October 18, when Steve Christiansen leads us through an exploration of the book of Job. It is a story with obvious parallels to our time.

As Christiansen explains, “the phrase ‘the patience of Job’ was taken from an incorrect translation of the New Testament book of James (5:11, KJV), ‘You have heard of the patience of Job.’ Job was anything but patient! In his misery, he demanded answers from God, sometimes resorting to blasphemy. No, this story is not about patience, but about endurance, about persistence, about somehow putting one foot in front of the other in spite of the odds. At the end of the story, Job’s fortunes are restored, but we are left with many questions regarding the suffering of the innocent. There are no easy answers here, but much fodder for discussion.”

EMO Voter’s Guide & Forum

Oregon voters will be asked to say yay or nay to four measures on their ballots in the coming days. Do you know what the issues are or how you will respond? Once again, Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon (EMO) has produced a guide for people of faith to consider when casting their ballots.

You’re also invited to join an Oregon Faith Voter Forum via Zoom on Tuesday, October 20, at 7:00 pm to learn about work to support the vulnerable and to hear a faith-based perspective on the 2020 Oregon ballot measures. Register now.

Spirituality Book Group News

The Spirituality Book Group will meet on Sunday, October 18, at 3:00 p.m. via Zoom, when Sharon Fako will lead the discussion of The Mountains Sing, by Nguyen Phan Mai. According to Amazon, the book is “an epic account of Vietnam’s painful 20th-century history, both vast in scope and intimate in its telling.”

The Zoom link will be sent out a day before the meeting to all who are on the Spirituality Book Group list. If you would like to attend, contact Mary Smith for connection information.

Blessing Our Reformation Earth Garden

Next Sunday, the congregation is invited to return to the church for a special outdoor event: the blessing of our St. Andrew Reformation Earth Garden. We’ll all wear masks, maintain a safe distance, celebrate the planting of Faith and Hope, and learn about our Community Carbon Science Team’s ongoing efforts to be good stewards of this Earth. Join us north of the sanctuary on the patio, parking lot, or in the garden itself. The service will be short, but bring a chair if you think you will need one.

Five years ago, we mourned the loss of the majestic Douglas-fir that once centered this space, but we now marvel at another native tree, the Reformation red cedar, that’s growing up toward the sky in its place. Good soil nurtures native plants that feed birds and other wildlife—and, ultimately, us. It’s a beautiful system.

Table Talk: White Supremacy

Gathered around the table in his home, Martin Luther talked freely and openly with his colleagues and students about matters of faith, theology, and varied aspects of daily life. In an effort to cultivate this kind of spirited discussion, we have a tradition at St. Andrew of gathering for Table Talks.

Though we cannot gather in person, Pastor Brocker invites you to participate in the next Table Talk via Zoom on Thursday, October 29, 7:00-8:00 pm.

At the first Presidential Debate on Tuesday, September 29, President Trump could not bring himself to clearly and unambiguously denounce White supremacy. In the essay “White Supremacy Is a Script We’re Given at Birth,” Reggie Williams, Associate Professor of Christian Ethics at McCormick Theological Seminary, observes “how prevalent and persistent White supremacy is in this country.” Williams is a member of the Board of the International Bonhoeffer Society—English Language Section. He has written a book entitled Bonhoeffer’s Black Jesus: Harlem Renaissance Theology and an Ethic of Resistance. According to Williams, White supremacy is not simply a problem for a small minority of violent young men; “it’s written in our flesh and rehearsed throughout history.” As a Black man Williams himself has experienced some of the consequences of the script of White supremacy.

In this Table Talk we will ask some very basic questions: What is White supremacy? How have we seen White supremacy manifested in our lives? Why is White supremacy so prevalent and persistent? To prepare for this Table Talk, you are encouraged to read Reggie Williams essay mentioned above.

Giving

The church I grew up in required every member give 10 percent of their gross income to the church. If you paid less than 10 percent, you were not allowed to do certain things, and we were told that blessings from God were being withheld.

At times in my life, my budget would not really allow for 10 percent of my gross income to go to the church. I always felt shame about giving 3 or 4 percent, so I stopped giving at all. Then I stopped talking to church leaders about it, and I eventually stopped going to church.

I didn’t want my spiritual experience for the week to feel like I was letting God down. So instead of going to church on Sundays, I started going for hikes. I felt peace and tranquility that made me feel so much better than the judgment I felt at church. And for several years, that was my church.

I know that God needs our help. We have a beautiful place of worship and, without help from the members, we would no longer have this beautiful space.

It’s easy to think about all of the wonderful things we receive from coming to this church, without thinking about the boring, behind-thescenes things that need to happen to make sure we are able to enjoy the wonderful things.

We think about the way we feel when we see our friends, the smile and hug we get from the pastors, the peace and reverence we feel as we take communion. And how often do we think about the mortgage being paid, the grounds being maintained, purchasing materials for Sunday School activities, deep cleaning the building? Well, we might think about the cleaning of the building a little more now due to the coronavirus.

We tend to focus on the things we receive more than the things we are helping to build. And we should all realize that by giving freely, we are helping to build the kingdom of God. This is not a membership fee; it is not a tax. We are giving freely so that we can be a part of the building up of His kingdom. And because we are doing that, future generations will have a beautiful place to worship. Children will have access to more opportunities to learn and to grow in faith.

If we look at our offering as an obligation, that is what it will be. But if we understand that our gifts are used by the church to make sure that we all can continue to receive the type of spiritual experience we desire, we will begin to enjoy it. We will look for additional ways to give and we will begin to make it part of our regular budget.

Andy Roberts

Donate to Outside in Oct. 1 – 24

Since 1968, Outside In has transformed lives by helping to break cycles of chronic homelessness, poverty, and poor health among Portland’s LGBTQIA+ community, people of color, those experiencing homelessness, and the underserved. With COVID-19 plaguing our country, Portland still has a high number of people living on our city streets every night.

Outside In provides a safe space where youth can get their immediate needs met and begin building supportive, trusting relationships with adults who can help. Your financial gift will provide the basics—safety from the streets, showers, laundry, meals, and case management— to help these young people get on their feet with dignity.

Please donate from October 1-24 and send your donation to St. Andrew with “Service Committee Special Projects” on the memo line. Thank you for your response!

Bonnie Bliesner and the Service Committee

Just Vote: Harnessing Our Values for Justice

On the day after the election, will you be able to say that you did everything you could to turn out the vote for climate justice? Join EcoFaith Recovery for Just Vote: Harnessing Our Values for Climate and Racial Justice for 90 minutes beginning at 8:45 am on Thursday, October 15, and Thursday, October 29, via Zoom.

Learn how you can get engaged with text banking and phone banking to turn out the vote for the elections. Or create your action plan for calling two or more friends or family members in swing states to engage them in conversation about the values that will inform your vote. Take action during the meeting to make a difference in this election while grounding yourself in spiritual practice with others and cultivating the power of your own story as a catalyst for change.

Through EcoFaith’s initiative, we empower one another and our communities to “rediscover the courage to rise up with the most vulnerable and oppressed in the face of systems that escalate injustice and climate chaos.” Even if you are just getting started, you will receive valuable information on campaigns you can engage with now, mentorship on how to start an action team, and support for creating an effective plan. Go to the Just Vote website to learn more and get the Zoom link.

2020 Beaverton Virtual Art Show

Artistic talent abounds among us! This month, you can go online to see the work of some 350 artists, including St. Andrew’s own Ken Reiner, who were selected to participate in Beaverton’s 2020 Virtual Art Show. Browse the entire collection or search by artist name. The art is available for purchase, too, so if you see something you really like you can follow up with the artist.

Faith and Hope

On Thursday morning, the men’s landscape maintenance crew planted Faith & Hope, two Oregon oak trees that are the keystone plants in our Reformation Earth Garden. Hope went in easily, but Faith had to deal with some resistant substrate. A pickaxe solved that problem. Come bless our garden next Sunday (see previous article).

Caterpillars Feed Hungry Bird Babies

Bird parents raising a cluster of hungry nestlings face a gargantuan task. Unlike humans, who eat three or four meals a day, baby birds feast on 30 or 40 meals a day. Typically, both parents fly out to find food for their chicks and race back to the nest to plunge more nutrition down the gullets of the next generation.

Careful observers have long known that caterpillars are the mainstay of most bird diets here in North America. It makes sense. Caterpillars are really just soft bags of fat and protein that deliver maximum nutrition for the effort required. It’s much easier for parent birds to scoop up a single caterpillar than to round up at least 200 aphids to provide a similar serving for their young.

So, if we’re to enjoy having an abundant variety of birds visiting and living in our yards, we must make sure that caterpillars are living there, too. Need some convincing numbers? During a normal nesting period of just over two weeks, chickadee parents must find 6,000 – 9,000 caterpillars to feed their young—depending on the number of nestlings they’re raising.

How can we support the thousands of caterpillars necessary for bird reproduction? Douglas Tallamy, author of Nature’s Best Hope, has the answer. Plant a native oak. It’s a keystone species that provides habitat for hundreds of different types of caterpillars. Other indigenous plants that are very good at ecosystem support (especially harboring caterpillars) are native cherry and willow trees.

St. Andrew is blessed to have a wealth of native species on its property already, and the Reformation Earth Garden being developed north of the sanctuary will highlight several of the keystone plants that support a thriving ecosystem.

Carol Harker

Dismantling Racism in Our Institutions

The 16 members of St. Andrew’s “Reckoning with Racism” cohort who are participating with 200 people of faith across Oregon in the Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon Reckoning with Racism process invite you to join us in our homework this week. We have learned that the Atfalati band of the Kalapuya Indians first made the Tualatin Valley basin their home about 10,000 years ago up until white settlers arrived. They lived in villages at Wapato Lake in what is now Forest Grove. Their villages extended out to Chakeipi, or “Place of the Beaver,” located in present day Beaverton. You can learn more here.

This week, please join our cohort in our homework of considering how we came to own the land on which our church building is located and how the previous three generations of our families came to own any land our families have owned. Who was the land purchased from? Why was it available? Where did the capital come from? What life did/does the land bear, and for whom?

If you would like to explore these questions with some of us this Tuesday, October 20, from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m., please e-mail me for the Zoom link. We would particularly love to hear directly or by e-mail from those of you who know about the history of the land on which our congregation is located!

Pastor Robyn

Habitat for Humanity Fundraiser

Help Habitat provide decent housing for low-income, hardworking families.

On Tuesday, October 27, at 8:00 am, Habitat for Humanity will host its annual Build a Home, Frame a Future fundraiser. We’ll gather virtually on YouTube to celebrate Habitat homeowners and raise funds to build and repair homes for families in Washington County. You’ll have the opportunity to hear from some of the families that have been impacted by having a Habitat home.

If you have questions or would like connection information to access the gathering, please contact Dan Fako by email or phone at 503-626-3414.

Thank You to the Faithful

Thank you to all the faithful at St. Andrew for your 2020 gift of $400. In today’s world, where everyone is banding together for the good of all, we appreciate your choice to support Willamette West Habitat for Humanity and our families. Thanks to your generosity, we can keep building affordable homes in cities throughout Washington County.

Together we are building homes for families headed by people like Ellen, who first learned about Habitat while she was volunteering on a Women Build volunteer day. After years of abuse, Ellen successfully escaped with her sons and Habitat was there with a hand up just when she needed it. Her 4-bedroom home means her autistic boys have a safe place to thrive and personal space to call their own.

Your generosity helps build and repair homes all over Washington County. With your help, we’re helping local families develop the strength, stability, and independence affordable housing brings. They, and we, can’t thank you enough.

Mark Forker
Habitat for Humanity Executive Director

Collins Summit: Shalom in Divided Times

What does shalom and unity look like in 2020, when racial unrest, political tensions, and COVID-19 have impacted nearly every aspect of our lives? This year at its Collins Summit, Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon is asking how we bring our whole selves to the table and stay engaged in light of our differences, not in spite of them.

The Summit will include a lecture from Lisa Sharon Harper, founder and president of FreedomRoad.us and one of today’s leading voices on the topics of poverty, racial and gender justice, and transformational civic engagement.

Register now for the virtual event to be held Wednesday, November 18.

Remember these dates:

November 3-7, 2020
for St. Andrew’s Online Book Fair

You’ll be able to shop online, with 20% of sales proceeds coming back to benefit our libraries. Details to come!

In Need of Prayers…

Family and friends of Diana Heidinger (sister-in-law)	Peace and God’s comfort at her death	Judy Heidinger
Family and friends of Dr. Philip Gehrin	Peace and God’s comfort at his death	Susan Reiser
Jim Smith	Peace, comfort, and support as Jim is in hospice care	Mary Smith
Patty Werner (sister-in-law)	Comfort, strength, and successful treatment	Susan Reiser
Janet Vorvick	Comfort and courage in facing mental health challenges	Janet Vorvick
Garett McDowall	Healing and recovery from a stroke	Mike & Linda McDowall
Noah Oyen	Healing and recovery from surgery	Pastor Robyn Hartwig
Jeff George’s grandmother	Healing and recovery from COVID-19	Gretchen Bancroft
Matia Brocker	Healing and recovery from surgery	Pastor Mark Brocker
Elaine May	Successful knee replacement surgery (Oct 27)	Staff
Sylvia Hazel Wood (great-granddaughter)	Blessings on her birth	Mary Nell Mahler
Our nation	Integrity of the election	Staff
Those confined to their homes: Mareline Barnes, Dave Bumgardner, Jean Fredrickson, Tara Harper, Douglas Hooke, Betty Horst, Dorothy Moore, Phyllis Morris, Ed & Jean Pacey, Helen Rogers, Dave & Sharon Roth, Margie Schindele	Assurance of God’s presence	Staff
All who are imprisoned	Peace and strength	Staff
Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon Holy Trinity Catholic Church	Blessings on their work	Staff
Good Shepherd Lutheran Church (Madras, OR), Our Savior’s Lutheran Church (Prineville, OR)	Serving with us in the Oregon Synod	Staff
Golden Temple of Oregon (Portland, OR)	Blessings on our interfaith partners	Staff

Help Set the Table for Immigrant Families

Across the world, the communal bowl signifies that one does not eat alone, in isolation. For refugees and immigrants, isolation is the most threatening aspect of leaving their homeland behind and rebuilding a life in the U.S. How do families cope? They come together at mealtime and they share.

Is it possible for us to understand what our refugee families have lost? How daunting it must be to navigate a new life in America—particularly during a pandemic. The people of Lutheran Community Services NW witness the enormous challenges of rebuilding a life. They set the table for refugees to thrive by providing the emotional and practical support they need. And you can help! View the Communal Bowl video or donate now.

Preparing for Next Sunday

Highlights for the Week

Check the church calendar for the most up-to-date information. When you go to the online church calendar, you can click “List” and “Week” to see details for the week (blue buttons in screen shot, below) rather than the whole month. Click “Next >” to see the next week.

Sunday, October 18: Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost

8:30 am	Livestream Worship	YouTube
9:30 am	Virtual Coffee Time	Zoom
10:00 am	Sunday School (age 3 – 5th Grade)	Zoom
10:00 am	Confirmation (6th – 8th Grade)	Zoom
10:00 am	High School Youth Group	Zoom
10:00 am	Adult Education:  The Political Responsibility of the Church	Zoom
11:00 am	Online Worship	Zoom
12:00 pm	Virtual Coffee Time	Zoom

Tuesday, October 20

10:00 am	Worship Planning Meeting	Zoom
12:15 pm	Community Carbon Leadership Meeting	Zoom

Wednesday, October 21 – Weekly News submissions due by 4:00 pm

6:00 pm	Handbell Ensemble Rehearsal	Sanctuary
6:30 pm	Informal Gathering Time	Zoom
7:00 pm	High School Youth Game Night	Zoom
7:00 pm	Wednesday Evening Prayer	Zoom
7:30 pm	Centering Prayer	Zoom

Thursday, October 22

12:00 pm	Team Ministry Meeting	Zoom
7:00 pm	IT Meeting	Zoom

Sunday, October 25:  Reformation Sunday

8:30 am	Livestream Worship	YouTube
9:30 am	Virtual Coffee Time	Zoom
10:00 am	Sunday School (age 3 – 5th Grade)	Zoom
10:00 am	Confirmation (6th – 8th Grade)	Zoom
10:00 am	High School Youth Group	Zoom
10:00 am	Adult Education:  The Political Responsibility of the Church	Zoom
11:00 am	Online Worship	Zoom
12:00 pm	Virtual Coffee Time	Zoom
1:00 pm	Blessing of St. Andrew’s Reformation Earth Garden	Next to Patio

Connecting to Worship

Ways to Give

Monthly Finance Report