“This gathering was very important for me” – Pastors’ gathering at Hankasalmi Camp, October 3–4, 2022

So com­men­ted pa­rish pas­tor Sam­po Luuk­ko­nen from Loh­ja du­ring one of the fi­nal speec­hes kept on Tu­es­day. Mee­ting ot­her [be­lie­ving] pas­tors [or­dai­ned in the Evan­ge­li­cal Lut­he­ran Church of Fin­land] and peer sup­port is es­pe­ci­al­ly im­por­tant when one at ti­mes feels lo­ne­li­ness in their work. The pre­sen­ta­ti­ons, de­vo­ti­ons, wors­hip ser­vi­ce and many dis­cus­si­ons of ti­me­ly to­pics cau­sed many to say as they left for home: “It was worth it to come.”

Blog: ”Continue to bless him in the future and also bless his dearest one”

We ce­leb­ra­ted our god­son’s wed­ding at La­pin­lah­ti in Au­gust. The yo­ung coup­le had wan­ted to inc­lu­de a se­lec­ti­on of be­au­ti­ful in­ter­ces­so­ry pra­yers in their wed­ding ri­tes. Short pra­yers were read by the of­fi­ci­a­ting mi­nis­ter, the mot­her or fat­her of the bride or the bri­deg­room, one of the sib­lings, one of the god­pa­rents and one friend.

Blog: I want to hang onto this psalm

We have been li­ving in un­cer­tain­ty for months, cons­tant­ly awa­re of the glo­bal si­tu­a­ti­on. News of the hor­rors of war may have kept us awa­ke at bed­ti­me. Many pe­op­le wor­ry about the se­cu­ri­ty of their own li­ves in the midst of this tur­moil.

The situation in North American Zion was discussed at the beginning of the meetings of the sister organizations.

The an­ti­ci­pa­ted mee­ting of the sis­ter or­ga­ni­za­ti­ons oc­cur­red af­ter a pau­se due to CO­VID. Rep­re­sen­ta­ti­ves of three cent­ral or­ga­ni­za­ti­ons of our Chris­ti­a­ni­ty, SRK, LLC and SFC, gat­he­red for about a week-long coo­pe­ra­ti­ve work mee­ting in Ou­lu. The re­gu­lar­ly sche­du­led mee­tings had been pau­sed due to the co­ro­na­vi­rus pan­de­mic. At the joint mee­ting, the joys and sor­rows of the work of Chris­ti­a­ni­ty were sha­red. A cent­ral to­pic in the dis­cus­si­ons was the di­vi­si­on that has hap­pe­ned in the midst of North Ame­ri­can Zion, which has re­sul­ted in a he­re­sy.

SRK, SFC, and LLC Executive Secretaries:

"We experienced a mutual understanding of faith in discussions"

The mee­ting of sis­ter or­ga­ni­za­ti­ons strengt­he­ned the mu­tu­al work even furt­her. The dis­cus­si­ons were open, and the par­ti­ci­pants ex­pe­rien­ced a strong mu­tu­al un­ders­tan­ding of faith.

Blog: Smell of the stable

One eve­ning I was dri­ving home from work. On­ce a week I need to drive about 50 ki­lo­me­ters to work, and I of­ten lis­ten to au­dio books on my way. I was al­re­a­dy a bit ti­red. For some re­a­son I wi­ped my cheek with my glove and was rou­sed by the smell. For me it is a good smell, though some pe­op­le might not like it. I had ac­ci­den­tal­ly ta­ken a pair of glo­ves that I usu­al­ly wear while wor­king out­doors and ta­king care of the ani­mals. The glo­ves smel­led of sheep. I simp­ly had to have anot­her sniff.

Blog: Fat in the veins, bits in the minds

Two of our child­ren ex­pe­rien­ced de­vas­ta­ting loss on suc­ces­si­ve days: their pho­nes broke down. I saw this as my luc­ky break. I went and col­lec­ted all the ot­her pho­nes, too, and dec­la­red that a no-phone pe­ri­od would start in our home right now. A 30-mi­nu­te hu­ma­ni­ta­ri­an cor­ri­dor would be al­lo­wed eve­ry eve­ning, as pur­po­se­ly cut­ting all stre­aks would be akin to a vi­o­la­ti­on of hu­man rights.

Blog: Art empowers us

I like many kinds of art, ver­bal, vi­su­al and vo­cal as well as their com­bi­na­ti­ons. When I lis­te­ned to an SRK book of po­ems, Äi­dit avaa­vat ik­ku­noi­ta (Mot­hers open win­dows), on the Kuu­le! ap­p­li­ca­ti­on, I mar­ve­led at the abi­li­ty of po­et­ry to high­light the va­lue and sig­ni­fi­can­ce of child­ren as part of dai­ly life and as a sour­ce of joy. I sel­dom lis­ten to po­ems, though I oc­ca­si­o­nal­ly write po­ems my­self. Po­ems can exp­ress so much in just a few words, use no­vel ima­ge­ry to ref­resh our thin­king, and the­re­by al­so bring ea­se of mind in­to dai­ly life. Do you like po­ems?

Blog: Loneliness and bullying

Many pe­op­le close to us may ex­pe­rien­ce lo­ne­li­ness, though we may not even be awa­re of it. What could we do if we find that so­me­o­ne is strug­g­ling with lo­ne­li­ness? We can in­vi­te them over for a vi­sit, a cup of cof­fee or sau­na or sug­gest that they join a hob­by group. It is of­ten enough just to re­cog­ni­ze them by gree­ting or smi­ling. Pe­op­le feel good when they are seen and spo­ken to.

Blog: Life is here right now

I am sit­ting in the sheep barn, ad­mi­ring the gra­ce­ful skip­ping and boun­cing of our lit­t­le lambs. They are on­ly a few days old, but they al­re­a­dy fol­low their dams out­si­de and run in and out of the barn as if pla­ying tag. They will have friends to play with, be­cau­se 20 of the lambs born this ye­ar are still ali­ve.