Greetings from the Stye! Fall is an exciting time for stewards because it is time for the harvest. This is when the long hours of field work and the desperate prayers for timely rain come to fruition. After the harvest has been gathered we can look at the storage bins and thank God for all the blessings we have received. In the middle of the American Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day, to be celebrated on the final Thursday in November 1863. The document, written by Secretary of State William Seward, reads in part: The year that is drawing towards its c ..read more

Greetings from the Stye… It’s been a while since we talked about money…wait… have we ever talked about it? In a DVD produced by tpt entitled, “money’n’sanity”, Nathan Dugan works with a family to help them talk about money. One of the folks reflects that we spend money based upon our emotions and that the two dominant emotions that control our spending are; fear and guilt. I thought that was interesting. But it makes sense. Our culture has brainwashed us to live in fear that we are short of something, that there is a scarcity or, that we are incomplete unless we purchase a certain product. As ..read more

This week I’ll begin a 7-part series looking at stewardship from a different angle. Our guest speaker is a pig named Stewie. Please welcome Stewie. Welcome to the stye! My name is Stewie, and I’m a pig who lives in the stye. I like to talk about how we can take better care of the things around us. Some people call this stewardship because ‘steward’ comes from the old English for ‘stye warden’ (do you see it?) Back in the old days the stye was the confined area that held the animals (including, but not limited to, pigs). The warden was the person who was hired by the owner to take care of the a ..read more

YOM KIPPUR (Day of Atonement) 5783 (2022) [notice…the Jewish people have been observing the High Holy Days for over 5700 years!] This year the Jewish High Holy Day of Yom Kippur begins at sundown on October 4 with Kol Nidrei (all vows) and continues for 24 hours until sundown on October 5 when the "gates are closed" for another year. Yom means "day" in Hebrew and Kippur is translated to "atonement." The common English translation of Yom Kippur is Day of Atonement. The name Yom Kippur is based on the Torah verse "...but on the 10th day of the seventh month it is the day of kippurim unto you ..read more

Join us in welcoming our new lead pastor, Dan Streeper! ** ** ** ** ** Greetings! At Redeemer, I have the honor and privilege of serving as Lead Pastor. More importantly though, it takes all of us working together to fulfill Christ’s mission of loving God and making disciples, while graciously and justly caring for each other and God’s creation.  A little about me... I grew up in Iowa and have been a lifelong Lutheran. As a kid, I sang in church choir and was involved in all kinds of youth ministries. I am a graduate of Luther College in Decorah, Iowa, with advanced degrees in Counselor E ..read more

Remember activities like trust falls, trust walks, etc.? Specifically I want us to consider how important it is when someone trusts you with a confidence. Sure, some ‘secrets’ are harmful to people. But sometimes information is withheld for the good of the whole system. We are in that stage of the call process where a small group of people have been entrusted with an important job: selecting the right candidate for our congregation. Part of that process is to safeguard the confidences that have been entrusted to them. They do well to not disclose who the candidates are. The Rev. Karen Parker o ..read more

Greetings! Perhaps there is a special blessing and opportunity in the Lenten season this year. Lent arrives as your new pastor begins his call to Redeemer. In Joel 2:13 We are reminded to do the following: Return to the Lord your God, who is gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. Joel calls us into community and asks us to dare to join in a community lament. This serves as preparation for the new life offered in Resurrection.  As a church body, you can strip yourselves of what you did not do well, the things you failed to do, perhaps even a reluct ..read more

Greetings, Redeemer! Our bridge pastor, Bonnie Lomen, will be starting at Redeemer this week. Take this time to get to know her and welcome her to Redeemer! Get To Know Me! I attended school in Silver Bay, Minnesota (60 miles up the shore from Duluth). After graduating, I attended Bemidji State University and finished at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. I have an Education degree and taught 1st and 2nd grade in Excelsior, MN. When I had the first of my two children, I became a stay-at-home mother with occasional part-time employment, including the Early Childhood Center which opened ..read more

This will be my final weekly message to you good folks at Redeemer in White Bear Lake. It has been a busy 14 months. We have accomplished some important tasks and there is yet more work to be done. That is how life is. I’ve been asking people to give us an evaluation on how we have done so far in this interim period. People sometimes ask me if I like doing intentional interim ministry. Truth…I do like interim ministry. It offers a new challenge every year (or so), I get to meet new disciples with new gifts and dreams, and I really feel connected to the larger church. Doing interim is like plan ..read more

Luke really gives a build up to the Messiah’s birth. First - An angel announced to Zechariah that the forerunner (John) will be born to his aged wife. Then - An angel announced to Mary that she will give birth to a son who will be called, “Son of the Most High”. Then-Mary visited Elizabeth and realized that these predictions were true and sang her ‘Magnificat’. Then-John the Baptist was born. Then- Caesar declared a census which forced Joseph to travel to Bethlehem with a very pregnant Mary. Then-Mary experienced her very first labor in unfamiliar and challenging circumstances. Finally – the p ..read more