150 years

Today my church will celebrate its 150th anniversary.  We have been celebrating it since October of last year. Today is the close of the celebration activities.  As chair of the committee I will be glad to have it done, but am pleased to have accomplished what we have. Just one more day to go and I can take one of my spinning plates off the pole. [see April 15th entry]  Woo hooo!!!!

 Assuming that everything goes well, by evening we will have had a culminating worship service and a luncheon afterwards.  Past pastors will have spoken, old friends returned, a newly commissioned anthem will be sung, and, and, and, and, ...... .   For the last eight months I have been steeped in the transitions and evolving lifestyles of the last 150 years.  It has been fascinating to read the old church records to see the things that concerned early parishioners in the 1850s and all the years since.  Even as we chose hymns for Christmas and Easter and the other Sundays, we have been very aware of how many were written since this church congreagation began.  Things, hymns, traditions, etc that seem to have "always been" that are in fact much newer that it seems.  So much has changed about our lifestyles, our work habits, our schooling, our parenting, in the decades since 1859.  In some ways everything has changed.

And yet, the deeper we looked the more similarities we found.  The more we read and explored, the more the common threads became visible.  The key dreams, the ongoing principles of faith, the dedication and effort, the commitment, the love, the sense of community, the very faith itself,  ..... so much has stayed the same. In some of the most important ways, nothing has changed.  I find myself thinking about whoever will chair the events in 50 years when they look back on the history we have assembled just as we looked back at the materials from the 100th anniversary.  What will have changed?  What will remain.  And how does what each of us do, individually and collectively, affect that future?

I may or may not take a few days off to crash after today. If so, go back and check out some of the early posts, before you joined in.... I'll be back.