Celebrating Special Days in the Church Year

Not being raised in the Lutheran church, it took me a while to understand and come to appreciate many of the visual aspects of our church's liturgy. The vestments our pastors wear, the paraments on our altars, the stained glass in our windows are just a few visual tools that point to greater teachings in Holy Scripture that are good to be reminded of each week. I knew that once I had a family of my own I would make a point of teaching my children what all these tools point to.

So on days like today, which is Reformation Sunday, a special celebration in our church, I do little things that give emphasis to what we are celebrating. Church life and home life should not be separate things.


Our church year has six seasons and for those seasons we see different color paraments, each with its own meaning. Since on Reformation Sunday our paraments are red, (the color of fire and blood, symbolizing the Holy Ghost, martyrdom, fervor, and love) we wore red clothing to church and set the table in a special way for our Sunday lunch, yes, a simple red table cloth is "a special way" around here!

Never a Dull Moment

Learning Basket

This week: Church Life

Because Sunday is Reformation Day I decided that this week we would focus on what we see, do and hear in church.

Praying
Our Bible and Hymnals
The Crucifix
The Baptismal font and Baptism
Holy Communion

Activities:
Maybe take a tour of our church and let Lily see the altar more closely than she does on Sunday morning
Color pictures of things we see and do in church
Look at pictures from the children's baptisms

Songs:
Favorite hymns
Songs from "Growing in Christ" hymns for children
This is the Way We....go to church, etc.
The Bible is God's Word

Golden and Noble Works

"A wife too should regard her duties in the same light, as she suckles the child, rocks and bathes it, and cares for it in other ways; and as she busies herself with other duties and renders help and obedience to her husband. These are truly golden and noble works. This is also how to comfort and encourage a woman in the pangs of childbirth, not by repeating St Margaret legends and other silly old wives’ tales but by speaking thus, “Dear Grete, remember that you are a woman, and that this work of God in you is pleasing to him. Trust joyfully in his will, and let him have his way with you. Work with all your might to bring forth the child. Should it mean your death, then depart happily, for you will die in a noble deed and in subservience to God. If you were not a woman you should now wish to be one for the sake of this very work alone, that you might thus gloriously suffer and even die in the performance of God’s work and will. For here you have the word of God, who so created you and implanted within you this extremity.” Tell me, is not this indeed (as Solomon says [Prov. 18:22]) “to obtain favour from the Lord,” even in the midst of such extremity?

Now you tell me, when a father goes ahead and washes diapers or performs some other mean task for his child, and someone ridicules him as an effeminate fool, though that father is acting in the spirit just described and in Christian faith, my dear fellow you tell me, which of the two is most keenly ridiculing the other? God, with all his angels and creatures, is smiling, not because that father is washing diapers, but because he is doing so in Christian faith. Those who sneer at him and see only the task but not the faith are ridiculing God with all his creatures, as the biggest fool on earth. Indeed, they are only ridiculing themselves; with all their cleverness they are nothing but devil’s fools."

-Martin Luther from The Estate of Marriage 1522

Commitment to Loveliness

Thanks to Mat. Emily for the inspiration to do some lovely things this week! Here are my goals:

1. Invest in some real facial cleanser and moisturizer. You'd all be appalled to know what my current skin care regiment consists of!
2. Finish Thank You notes
3. Send a Get Well note to a congregation member.
4. Paint my toenails (it's the little things!)
5. Bake pumpkin muffins

I'm half way through my thank you notes, yay!

What about you ladies? Any goals to increase femininity and loveliness in your week?

The Lily Show

Lily's new thing is wanting to look in the mirror at herself while she cries and if she's not crying hard enough by the time she gets to the mirror she'll pretend she's crying so she still gets a good show. She must get this from me.

Learning Basket

This week: Pumpkins

Activities:
Visit to the Pumpkin Patch
Magnetic Jack-O-Lantern

Crafts:
Apple Stamp Pumpkins
Finger paint (Red and Yellow make Orange) paper plate pumpkins

Books:
Our Library has a lot of books about pumpkins. I'm looking forward to taking the girls on Tuesday.

Songs:
I'm not that crazy about the pumpkin songs I've found so perhaps I'll write my own.

Snacks:
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins