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Good News From New Road St. Matthew Lutheran Church, God’s Family in Service August 2015 St. Matthew Evangelical Lutheran Church THE 2015 ELCA YOUTH GATHERING IN DETROIT – “RISE UP TOGETHER” We are writing this, together as a youth group, on the final day before we fly out of Detroit. We have spent one glorious week rejoicing in the Lord and changing this beautiful city for the better. Before we begin our run-down of the week, we would like to say a big thank you to our congregation, who graciously helped pay for this trip. If it wasn’t for you, this wouldn’t have happened and we wouldn’t have had the time of our lives, so thank you all so much for your support. Our first day, Monday, was quite an early start. We flew out of Waco at 5:00 a.m. This was the first time to fly for three of us. Our flight from Dallas should have been from Dallas to Detroit, but instead we made a quick stop in Nashville to refuel before arriving in Michigan. One of our first excursions in Michigan was a trip to Big Boy, a treat that is definitely foreign to us. After our burgers, we spent the money that the congregation raised (650 dollars!) at Wal-Mart on diapers and wipes. It was a hoot and a holler to get some strange stares as we walked out of the store with 5 carts of diapers. We tried to make our way to Ford Field, the stadium where the worships took place, but Mrs. Jasek misdirected us to some random soccer field that definitely couldn’t have held 30,000 Lutherans. After our brief detour, we arrived in downtown and pointed out the actual Ford Field and COBO, the convention center. We spent ten minutes by the Detroit River and gazed longingly at Canada across the water. We headed back to our hotel and found a small pizza joint that served humongous 24 inch pizzas. After this overwhelmingly long day, we were more than happy to crash on our beds and have a good night’s sleep, excited for the rest of the week. The gathering didn’t start until Wednesday so we had a free day that we decided to spend at the Ford Rouge factory tour, where Ford makes the F-150 truck. The assembly lines were very interesting to see, as the hundreds of workers added parts one-by-one to create some nice looking vehicles. We decided to save the tour of the Henry Ford museum for Wednesday since the factory took a lot of walking. We had lunch at Chili’s, came back to the hotel and registered, dropped off our diapers and had a swim in the hotel pool. We had dinner at Mallie’s, which holds the World Record for largest hamburger (328 lbs). We did not have the largest hamburger. Wednesday was the first day of the gathering, which started at 7:00 at night. However, in the morning we revisited the Ford Museum and saw some very interesting exhibits, including the Oscar-Meyer Weinermobile, presidential cars, the chair Lincoln was assassinated in, and the actual bus that Rosa Parks sat on to kickstart the civil rights movement. Rachel was really into some Stradivarius violins. The service that night was a huge success and we all had an amazing time. We listened to a band called “Lost and Found,” listened to a very engaging pastor who talked about not being afraid, heard a cool South Korean adoptee talk about hunger, and we were graciously welcomed to Detroit by Bishop Eaton. Thursday was our day to spend at the Convention center, and we got there as soon as we could as there was so much stuff to do. There was a labyrinth to make our way through, a simulation where we tried to walk with gallons of water around an obstacle course, a mini-golf course set up to learn about the Lutheran Seminaries, and booths and booths about current social issues. There was even a mock-house set up to simulate what it is like to be in a wheelchair. Before the service we had some great Coney Island hot dogs, a favorite of Andrew’s, and arrived at Ford Field to sing some songs and move our hips. A singer named “Blanca” performed and a great poet named Natasha T. Miller read a poem about how broken Detroit was and how the ELCA had come to help fix it. A woman spoke who Page 2 August 2015 New Vision on New Road worked in Madagascar, and gave us a connection to a foreign society that we didn’t know much about. A Puerto Rican religion professor spoke about how the church lied to him saying that every race is the same. A reverend also spoke about poverty and much needed immigration reform. From Thursday we learned that Detroit was a broken city, and it knew it was a broken city, but as long as there was hope they could turn it around. That night we went to bed early in preparation to wake up early for our service project; but it turned out that a fire alarm in the hotel woke us up at one in the morning. We ran through the “smoke-filled” hallways in our pajamas and made it outside as the firetrucks made it to the hotel. They looked around inside for like five minutes and they said it was okay to go back to bed as it was just a kitchen fire. A bit anti-climactic, but still an exciting experience. Anyway, we woke up at 5:00 in the morning and waited for our service project in the rain. As we boarded the buses for the project, the rain had cleared up and it was a beautiful day to work in the neighborhoods. Our project was an alley clean-up led by George from an organization called “360 Detroit,” which included trimming trees, picking up trash, sweeping dirt and pulling weeds up. Once we finished that, we took our dirty bodies back to downtown for the service at Ford Field. We listened to an Arab-Lutheran pastor who spoke about Muslim stereotypes and gave a prayer in both English and Arabic. We had another speaker named Sarah Funkhouser who worked as an English language teacher for blind children in Jerusalem, which was quite a feat. Easily the best part of the night for everybody was a Motown performance by two of The Temptations, a Pip and a Capital, which had everybody moving their feet. A powerful speaker told us about a black child who was killed by a racist, and the child’s mother who looked past his sins and forgave the murderer. Saturday was a late start for us, but once we woke up we went back to the convention center and shopped a bit at the Old Lutheran store before going to a close-by hotel for a nice service with our North Texas- Northern Louisiana Mission Area that focused on people telling their faith stories. That night was our final night of gathering presentations, where we heard Kyle Larson talk about integrating the morals of camp into our regular life, and a woman who spoke about her program in Detroit that gives homeless women jobs making coats. Rozella White spoke about mental illness and anxiety and the love that other people will always extend to you, and Marian Wright Edelman, the first female African-American lawyer in Mississippi, spoke about poverty and educating children for the future. We also listened to a Christian rapper named Trip Lee, and the finale was performed by an extremely loud rock band called “Skillet,” which brought mixed reactions from our Youth group but was an exciting way to end the day. Sunday, fittingly, was the final event for the gathering, the worship service. It was a brilliant end to a brilliant week, with a great sermon from Bishop Eaton that spoke about the changes that we made in Detroit, a communion that took less time than communion at St. Matthew (with 30,000 people), and a fantastic gospel choir that were featured on the show America’s Got Talent. The grand finale was a big reveal that the next gathering in 2018 is going to be in… Houston! We all agree that this was one of the best weeks of our lives. We rose up and proclaimed justice in this brilliant city, and made a lasting impact that the local citizens of Detroit will not soon forget. We will not forget this either. Our faith in God and the impact that his children are capable of is astounding, and we are so glad that we have been able to attend this gathering and worship with so many young Lutherans like us. Rachel Cotner, Andrew Dittmann, Aaron Jasek, Abigail Jasek, Ryan Taylor, Elisabeth Vanderkinter, Kyra White, & Shawnna White (Adult Sponsors: Shelly Jasek, Maggie Lambring, & Pastor Paul) Page 3 August 2015 New Vision on New Road Highlights—July 12, 2015 Council discussed suggestions for the bathroom Present: Karen Aho, Alaine remodel that had been made at the open forum. Karen Copeland, Hope Cotner, Rosemary Aho will ensure that the Property Committee hears Fielder, Lyle Gripp, Bill Jones, those suggestions. Pastor Paul Krupicka, Bill Moeller, and Meridith Sellers. The meeting was adjourned following the Lord's Prayer. Absent: Stephanie Abright and Paul Larson. Respectfully Submitted, Karen Aho, Secretary Minutes of the June meeting were approved. Bill Moeller provided the Treasurer’s Report.