The GLC Pantry continues to chug along like a “well-oiled machine.” We are especially happy to see several fully vaccinated volunteers now being scheduled back in to help with both restocking and Thursday distributions, which is a change from the procedures during the pandemic.  Before vaccinations, we worked with a “skeleton crew” of pantry leaders and a few other hearty people who felt they were at a minimum risk of infection. In recent weeks, several other volunteers have signaled a readiness to return to participate, and we are thankful.

 We are still distributing via drive-through pick-up only.  We realize it’s not perfect in that our clients are unable to make the many choices that were available to them pre-pandemic. We are still pre-boxing foods and placing them on a table outdoors for pick-up.  We will continue to assess the situation, but we are committed to being cautious given the current uptick in Covid cases in our area.

On Sunday, August 8, former GLC member Inge Knight worshiped with us.  Inge has been living in California for several years, to be closer to her children and grandchildren, but she was visiting Champaign-Urbana and we were delighted to see her and catch up with her.  Here are a couple of pictures taken in Fellowship Hall after worship.  Many of you will remember that it was Inge who began the emergency food ministry at Grace, working with only a metal cabinet and a few volunteers in the south kitchen. That was in the early 1980s!  We are blessed to be able to continue the good work that she began, a ministry that now encompasses a warehouse storage area, many cabinets in Fellowship Hall, two commercial freezers, and an additional combination refrigerator-freezer, all of which are typically full of products on Thursday mornings.  Praise be to God!

We appreciate your contributions and your prayers on behalf of the work we do together.

PLEASE DO NOT BRING EGG CARTONS AND PLASTIC BAGS AT THIS TIME.  WE HAVE AN OVERSUPPLY OF THESE ITEMS.  WE WILL ASK FOR THEM WHEN WE NEED THEM.  THANK YOU.

Your Pantry Board,

Kathy Bowersox, Jim Fleming, Dale Herrstrom, Karen Krusa, and Royce Wilken

I have lived in university towns for most of my life, and one of the constants of university towns is change. The student body changes by at least 25% every year as one class graduates and a new one matriculates. Most of the congregations I’ve been a member of have been on or near university campuses, and the transitory nature of that context has been reflected in congregational life as well. The good thing about that is that you have the opportunity to share the lives of all kinds of interesting people. The bad thing, of course, is that you also have to bid farewell to many of them at some point. This dynamic is intensified in the university context, but really, it’s true of all congregations, regardless of context, as it is true also of all communities and families. People come and go in our lives and in our congregations. But while meeting and getting to know people is a gradual process that you barely notice, bidding them farewell is typically fairly sudden, and is felt much more acutely.
As I noted in a recent sermon, several of our more active families have moved out of town in recent months. We’re going to miss them and their contribution to the Grace community. And now this month we also have a transition on the Grace staff as Caitlyn finishes four and half years as our Director of Youth and Congregational Life. She’s returning to Iowa to take up a position at a Lutheran church in the Des Moines suburbs. She will be missed here at Grace, but I am also excited for her and this new opportunity so close to family and friends.
We are working hard to make Caitlyn’s transition as seamless as possible, but there will be a necessary period of adjustment as we rethink and reconfigure staff duties. Part of our upcoming council retreat over the Labor Day weekend will be devoted to this.
All of these normal transitions are happening against the background of a still changing global pandemic. So much of life seems up in the air at the moment. The new Delta variant of the virus has complicated our anticipated return to normal. Vaccination rates continue to lag behind the numbers needed to achieve the “herd immunity” necessary to eradicate the virus. Wildfires and droughts are ravaging our western states. And our social and political polarization and dysfunction continue apace. Amidst all of these unsettling events beyond our control, we persist in turning to God in hope, gathering weekly around God’s sustaining, renewing, and life-giving gifts of word and sacrament, on the strength of which we encourage one another as signs of God’s enduring presence in our lives, come what may. We rejoice in those whom God has given to accompany us in this life, and we open our hearts to welcome still others into the life of faith that we share. May God bless our transitions, and use us to be a blessing to others in these unsettled times.

• Pastor Chris Repp

Building on over 75 years of experience, Lutheran World Relief tackles global poverty by helping people adapt to the challenges that threaten their livelihoods and well-being. Lutheran World Relief works with people based
on need, regardless of race, religion, or nationality, and does not evangelize. LWR provides aid in emergencies and helps families restore their lives. LWR partners with communities to build and grow rural economies. LWR breaks the cycle of poverty, so families and communities can thrive. Their goal is to help people build self‐sufficiency and create new community‐owned approaches to problem‐solving that will last long after
the project’s end.

Today, Lutheran World Relief operates in East and West Africa, Latin America, Asia, and the Middle East, helping some of the world’s poorest communities build the resilience they need to thrive. In November 2020, LWR was in Honduras when 2 hurricanes hit the country within two weeks. LWR responded with emergency aid, including personal care kits, and long-term support to rebuild homes and livelihoods. LWR school kits helped
displaced children in northern Iraq and Syria continue their education in areas where school supplies were limited. To read more about Lutheran World Relief go to: http://www. lwr.org

At Grace, we support Lutheran World Relief with our donations of school and personal care kits. In 2020, we sent 60 school kits and over 100 face masks to LWR. This year our goal is to send 75 school kits and 30
personal care kits. You can help by donating selected items (See Lutheran World Relief Kits in the Grace Notes or August newsletter) or by making a financial donation to Grace Lutheran Church; memo: LWR.

One of my favorite stories in the Bible is Exodus 32:1-14. It’s a favorite not
because it makes me happy or comfortable. It doesn’t. In fact, it’s a challenging story in many ways, especially if you continue reading past verse 14. It’s a favorite because it reveals something remarkable and surprising about God in the face of the uncomfortable realities of human sinfulness and unfaithfulness. This is the story of the golden calf. You remember that one, right? Maybe from Sunday school, maybe from
Confirmation? After God leads the people of Israel out of slavery in Egypt, God brings them to Mount Sinai, where Moses goes up the mountain to confer with God. Part of that conferring includes God giving Moses the Ten Commandments. But apparently, there was a lot more involved, because Moses was up the mountain for a very long time. In fact, he was gone so long that the Israelites became convinced that he was never coming back. Yes, Moses had been instrumental in giving them freedom from the
Egyptians. Yes, Moses spoke for God, the God of their ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But did that god have any power here outside of Egypt, or outside of the land given to Abraham and his descendants? In the ancient world, gods were usually thought to be local. Go to another country, and there would be other gods in charge, just like there would be other kings. This is why Jonah tried to run away from God when God called him to go to Nineveh. Until the storm at sea, he thought of God as a local god with
limited reach. So, when Moses doesn’t come back from the mountain in the expected time, the people of Israel feel not only leaderless but godless as well. So they ask Aaron, Moses’ brother who was left in charge, to “make gods” for them. This strikes us as strange. How can people “make gods”? Well, they didn’t actually think they were making gods, just creating a way to be connected to gods they imagined already existed and controlled that territory. As bizarre as it seems to us, this was a perfectly normal reaction in this time and place to the situation they were in. God, of course, finds out
about this development and gets angry that the people have given up on both Moses and God – so angry that God resolves to utterly destroy the people of Israel. But Moses intervenes. This is the remarkable part. Moses, a mere human being, stops God from the “evil” God intended to do. (The NRSV translation of the Bible we use says “disaster” here, but the old King James Version does not shy away from attributing potential “evil” to God: “And the LORD repented of the evil which he thought to do unto his people.”)

As I mentioned above, this story challenges our simplistic notions of God, and it opens up all kinds of possibilities for further discussion and conversation. For now, I just want to focus on one thing, namely Moses’ attitude towards his people at this particular moment, in spite of their unfaithfulness and inclination toward evil of their own. (See Exodus 32:22 where the NRSV gives us “evil” for the same word earlier translated as “disaster.”) Moses does not say, “Good idea, Lord! Blow them away!” Instead, he intercedes on their behalf and talks God out of destroying them.

Many Christians feel under attack these days because of their faith. They feel that the culture has become hostile to religion, particularly their religion. While there may be some truth to this, my sense is that they are mostly reacting to Christianity (or a kind of Christianized civil religion) no longer being the dominant default in our culture. There is an instinct to make this a binary, us vs. them, good vs. bad sort of situation – to defend the faith and fight back. Moses in this particular instance gives us another option, to recognize that we are all in the same boat, that we are all, in
our own ways, unfaithful and in need of God’s forgiveness. Moses doesn’t downplay the people’s sin. He intercedes on their behalf in spite of their sin.

What if we followed Moses’ lead here? What if we interceded with God on behalf of all the people in our country, or in our world, even and especially those who are hostile to us? What if we Christians dared to react as Jesus suggested if we were actually to “love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us”? (Matthew 5:44) Would we start to see them not as “them” but as “us”? Would we maybe even open doors to God’s love and forgiveness that no amount of reactiveness or self-defense could possibly accomplish? I think maybe so. I think that is where Jesus is leading us. So, in times like these, I invite you to pray like Moses. Who knows how God might respond? Who knows how we might change? We might be surprised.