Family and Friends of Ruth Banasiak
PRAYERS – Jon Cook; Millie Mutka; Jim Moravec; Myria Strong; Kathy Mayo; Barb Zima’s friends Mick, Steven and Marilyn Hummel; Gregory Bowens; Laurie Nelson; Amber Ross’s daughter Linda; Jerrie Van Haverbeke’s niece Jolane Gervasi; Sandy Bishop’s friend Kelly Newman; Randy & Diane Niemczyk’s daughter Julia VanAvery, niece Sarah Joda, Denise Runde and Denise Hazel; Dick Volland; Valeria Hesselberg; Chris Markussen; Anne Verona’s sister/brother-in-law Pat & Woody Woodworth and friends Dennis Peterson, Natalie Madine, Eli Peters and Randy Ballard; Strong’s friend Erin Molle; Debbie Cyrtmus’ mother, Rose Wicker and sister, Corrie Trittin; the Ebert’s friend Patricia Kulzick; Karen Stanton’s friend Mary Lou Zelinski; Patricia Rasmussen’s sister Christine; Joyce Leander’s cousin Laurie Nelson and friend Casey Hohs; Bishop’s friend Pastor Bob Dahm and Sandy’s brother Larry; Ashley Clark’s friends Keith & Becky Hernandez and Kristie Dehart; the Waggoner’s sister-in-law Cheryl Busse, and friends Karla Zyhowski, Melissa Branta ; Karen Engels niece Lisa and friend Bob; Ann Carlson’s people Walt, Martin, Darren, Curt and Troy; prayers for those impacted by Hurricane Melissa; peace for all nations and comfort for those in distress.
PRAISE GOD FOR ANSWERED PRAYERS! Curt is staying on the list; however, his situation has greatly improved!
PRAYER LIST PROCEDURE – Submit your prayer requests to the office in writing, by phone, by email or in person. If requesting prayers for someone other than yourself or an immediate family member, please obtain permission – unless the circumstances are public in nature.
Happy Anniversary to you
May the Lord Jesus Keep You
Ever faithful and true!
GUESTS – if you are visiting us today, please sign our book at the entrance to the sanctuary.
PLEDGE CARDS – thank you to everyone who has submitted a pledge card. If you were planning on pledging – please return your pledge card by the end of this month.
GRAB A CUP? GRAB TWO ! – we need assistance with coffee hour. There is a sign-up sheet in the Fellowship Hall. Please consider assisting with set-up or clean-up.
ENDOWMENT GRANTS – Help the Endowment Team use our Endowment Fund as effectively as possible to enhance the mission outreach of Prince of Peace. As the fund’s custodian, the team is looking for ways to help the church ministry in the community. If you would like to offer a suggestion to the Endowment Team or financially contribute, get a request form from the narthex, the church office or the website. A donation of any amount will help immensely and be much appreciated. Recently our endowment made a contribution of $1,000 to the Children’s Museum, $250 to Leathernecks of the North, and $1,000 to Praise in the Pines.
JOLABOKAFLOD – is the tradition of gifting a book to someone on Christmas Eve. I will be hitting the local library book sales/thrift stores to find some good reads. Books will be wrapped and here for the taking after our Christmas Eve service. If anyone else is interested in participating – please feel free. (Please do not purchase new books). [I know it’s early – but I wanted to get it out there for planning purposes]
ONLINE T-SHIRT SHOP – We are in the process of creating an online t-shirt shop. This would enable people to order a “Hearts on Fire” t-shirt whenever they wanted. We’ve also been working on a couple of designs that you may be interested in. If you have a t-shirt idea that you would like us to create – please let us know. All shirts will be sold ‘at cost’.
WORSHIP IN THE WILD – Nov 22 at 4pm. Faith Lutheran Church in Three Lakes. Enjoy spiritual reflection and smores as we gather around the campfire. Please bring your own drinks. Questions? Contact Pastor Catie at 715-600-3980 or at pastor-catieford@gmail.com.
FUN FACT – This is a heavily edited for space – information regarding “My Lord, What a Morning”.
“These few words conjure up powerful apocalyptic images, both visually (“stars begin to fall”) and aurally (“trumpet . . . sound,” “sinner moan,” and “Christian shout”). What are the possible origins of this spiritual, and how did it come to be a part of the African American repertoire?
[…]
Southern credits A Collection of Spiritual Songs and Hymns Selected from Various Authors (Philadelphia, 1801) by Richard Allen (1760–1831) for the inspiration behind this spiritual. Allen was the first bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church, the first independent African American denomination. He observed that African Americans in Philadelphia were creating a category of congregational songs beyond those composed by the traditional British hymnodists of the day, especially eighteenth-century hymnwriters John Newton, Isaac Watts, and Charles Wesley. This collection may be the first one to distinguish between hymns and spiritual songs in the African American context (Southern, 1972, p. 12). These “spiritual songs”—later spirituals—often employed call-response forms of performance and incorporated refrains. They found a voice in independent black churches and camp meetings, though never appearing in printed collections.
While many spirituals may have been conceived on plantations in the southern United States, Southern contends that free African Americans also composed them “in the independent black congregations of the North, where black congregations, freed from the supervision of white clergymen, could conduct their religious services as they wished” (Southern, 1972, p. 11). “My Lord, What a Morning” appears to have been one of those composed in the North.
Allen’s collection contains an unattributed hymn (No. 10), perhaps composed by Allen, that probably inspired this spiritual. The collection indicated no tunes. Stanzas 1 and 4 follow:
Behold the awful trumpet sounds, The sleeping dead to raise, And calls the nations under ground; O how the saints will praise!
The falling stars their orbits leave, The sun in darkness hide; The elements asunder cleave, The moon turn’d into blood.
The numerous apocalyptic images in this hymn have scriptural foundations. Note, for example, the symbolic “trumpet”: 1 Corinthians 15:52, “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed” (KJV, emphasis added.) A companion text is I Thessalonians 4:16-17: “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first: Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord” (KJV, emphasis added).
“The falling stars” is a particularly powerful metaphor. Revelation 6:12-14 provides a stark description of the end of the world: “And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places” (KJV, emphasis added).
[…]
A version of this hymn appears in Slave Songs of the United States (1867) as “Stars Begin to Fall” (no. 34), the first authoritative collection of this repertoire published after the Civil War. Thus, the date of this spiritual would be between Allen’s collection in 1801 and the publication of Slave Songs in 1867. We can safely conclude that this was an antebellum spiritual that most likely had its origins in Philadelphia or, at least, the North.
[…]
Jamaican-American singer and actor Harry Belefonte (b. 1927) offered an additional interpretation on his recording My Lord What a Mornin’ (1959). His performance is available at
[Highly recommend!]
A Word for Today?
Theologically, African American theologian and Civil Rights leader Howard Thurman (1899–1981) indicates that this spiritual portrays “the judgment [that] is personal and cosmic so that even the rocks and the mountains, the stars, the sea, are all involved in so profound a process” (Thurman, 1975, p. 129; italics in original). W.E.B. DuBois (1868–1963), author of The Souls of Black Folk (1903), comments on this genre of text in the book’s final chapter, “Of the Sorrow Songs”:
Through all the sorrow of the Sorrow Songs there breathes a hope—a faith in the ultimate justice of things. The minor cadences or despair change often to triumph and calm confidence. Sometimes it is faith in life, sometimes a faith in death, sometimes assurance of boundless justice in some fair world beyond. But whichever it is, the meaning is always clear: that sometime, somewhere, [people] will judge [people] by their souls and not by their skins. Is such a hope justified? Do the Sorrow Songs sing true? (DuBois, 1961, p. 189).
[Content From https://www.umcdiscipleship.org/articles/history-of-hymns-my-lord-what-a-morning.]
NOTES FROM ANN – The picture at the top was taken by Arnold Jack – a local artist/photographer – last night Nov 12, I believe he was on Sand Lake in LDF What an incredible shot! I immediately saw the angel and contacted Arnold to ask him if I could use his picture. He graciously gave consent as long as we attributed it to him. Done!
I’ve been fighting a cold. That sounds so much more active on my part than it actually it is. Mostly it consists of me taking dayquil, whining and coughing and being tired, with some more whining. With an occasional lung-raking sneezing attack. I left work early yesterday and went home to snuggle up in bed with Magnus. (Magnus is a world class snuggler. He doesn’t like to be held, but will snuggle at any given time. For those of you who have met him at the church – it doesn’t match with his – ah – lets say “challenging public personality”).
I found it very hard to feel sorry for myself yesterday tho. The lightshow started a little bit after 6:00 pm. I had a blanket outside on the steps and would wrap myself up before heading outside. I spent most of my time watching the sky without using my camera (if you use your camera, you can see the Northern Lights more clearly and with more colors). At first it was a haze on the horizon, with occasional pillar or flag appear. Then it got more pronounced. I didn’t see near the activity that Arnold saw, but I also tapped out around 8:30.
Oh – and I added some ‘test’ designs we may be adding to the online store once I figure everything out. Let me know what you think.
I’m not sure if the link included in the text will actually work in regards to Harry Belefonte singing My Lord What a Mourning. If it doesn’t work – I highly recommend finding his version on YouTube and giving it a listen.
