From Deacon Ron Reno:
Pine Ridge Christmas Project. For several years Saint John’s has collected 
Christmas gifts for the children of the Pine Ridge Oglala Lakota in South Dakota. Our church and others have helped with this project. If you can help, contact our Nick Behrens about possible donations. According to Nick this reservation is one of the poorest so even bedding, toilet paper, paper towels etc would be welcome. Jesus wants us to help the poor, so please do what you can to help for this project.
O LORD, we beseech thee, absolve thy people from their offenses; that through thy bountiful goodness we may all be delivered from the bands of those sins, which by our frailty we have committed. Grant this, O Heavenly Father, for Jesus Christ’s sake, our blessed Lord and Saviour. Amen. Collect for the Twenty-fourth Sunday after Trinity.
Our service last weekend included the Litany. This was the first officially sanctioned liturgy into English in the English Church during the time of Henry VIII. It came about with the English Reformation following the break from Rome. This work was done by Archbishop Cranmer and is mostly from the Latin Sarum Rite. Influences for this litany came from Cranmer himself, influences from Martin Luther and from early church father John Chrysostom. We at Saint John’s sing the Litany at the first service in any calendar month for its historical, ancient penitential and intercessory nature.
Father Andrews homily is attached and is really two homilies in one. This is a must read, as it addresses our last election and takes a wonderful Godly historical spin that honors our veterans, world history and how faith enters into this history. Thirteen pages, so brew up some tea to read. God bless, Deacon
We celebrated Saturday with Sung Morning Prayer and Communion of the Presanctified Gifts, with an emphasis on All Saint’s Day in our music and our homily. Who doesn’t love to sing music we know such as “For All the Saints” and “I Sing a Song of the Saints.” The choral postlude “The Souls of the Righteous” was especially moving. We are so blessed to have a joyous group and sing music honoring God and His Saints. Our homily gets into the reason why we 
celebrated this day. Our observance goes back to the early centuries of the Christian Church when we celebrated the many martyrs on the anniversaries of their death. In the fourth century the Church established a common day to honor all martyrs. Both All Saints and All Souls Day have special prayers. We Anglicans believe in the power of prayer and sometimes ask for these Saints to have a spiritual connection to us and pray for those who have passed. By the way those martyrs have eternal life with Jesus. Our purpose on this earth is to do our best to have eternal life with Jesus too.
What a blessing it is to hear the noise of children in our midst. We have new people with children. God loves it when His children make joyful noise. That definitely includes all of us with our choir, Nick, Lynda, Julia and the rest of us singing out of the 1940 Hymnal. We are all God’s children. We use the 1940 with its supplements because it is simply one of the best hymnals ever printed. Our hymnal is a nice worship resource and can be used at home as well at the church. Our hymnal, along with the 1928 BCP, is very orthodox in its following of scripture, the seasons of the church, Saints days and it follows our one year lectionary. Some of our hymns are ancient and go back to the late 1500’s. I especially appreciate that its text is dark, easy to read and feels like a history book companion to me.
peace, that they may be cleansed of all their sins, and serve thee with a quiet mind; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. Collect for the Twenty-first Sunday after Trinity. Jesus is always teaching us. He is telling us to be strong in the Lord, trust Him and you will find pardon and peace. We read collects at every service because their importance to lead us in a short prayer and a petition to God. That request, an invocation and doxology (praise to God) that ends with Amen is a wonderful Anglican practice. Collects are good spiritual food for you to intellectually digest.
We had three adults with three children visit us last Saturday. It was a blessing to have them and the children to be amongst us. One visitor, Josh, was there the previous week and brought friends and family this week. God willing they will be back with us this week.
devotion. O my God, Eternal Love, my whole Good, Happiness without measure, I long to receive Thee with the most vehement desire and being reverence, which any Saint ever had or could have.
Fall is finally here in Nebraska. I love this time of year, for the cooler weather, the changes of color of the season and a great time to be outside. Please get outside as much as you can and embrace the beauty that God has given us. Stand under one of our golden trees; see the light filter itself through the leaves and take time to thank God for His beauty. In class we discussed looking for the Comet
Tsuchinshan-Atlas looking to the southwest after dusk, the beauty of Fall and discussed the Aurora that was visible in Nebraska last week. One of the main purposes of these discussions is to get these students to look up and see the beauty that surrounds them. It is important for all of us to take time to see God’s beauty and get away from the digital world that tries to impose itself upon us.
O ALMIGHTY and merciful God, of thy bountiful goodness keep us, we beseech thee, from all things that may hurt us; that we, being ready both in body and soul, may cheerfully accomplish those things which thou commandest; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
we have wiped away all prejudice: racism, sexism, bigotry of all shapes and sizes. These sentences came from one of Father Ponec’s last homilies. This homily was written for the Nineteenth Sunday after Trinity with a reference from Galatians (3:27). Please take time to read it. This homily was written by our priest in 2020 and is a must read. It shows the love of God this priest had and strength he had to write this homily. I remember Father was very sick at this time and I suspect he sensed his time on this earth was coming to an end. I can see through this homily that Father was fighting as a soldier of God to the end. This was a great man of God and many were blessed to know him.
O GOD, forasmuch as without thee we are not able to please thee; Mercifully grant that thy Holy Spirit may in all things direct and rule our hearts; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
We were blessed to have Father Andrews and Anneliese for our Michaelmas. As noted from our email last week, the Church took up this devotion to the archangel Michael from its earliest years. Both in the East and the West churches, we have embraced these God given origin stories.
fault. Therefore I beg Blessed Mary Ever-Virgin, blessed Michael the Archangel, blessed John Baptist, the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, all the saints and thee to pray to the Lord our God.
the start of the season of fall. With the autumnal equinox just starting, we can look forward to the landscape to be exploding with vibrant colors and seeing pumpkins everywhere. We had our Harvest full moon last week; our Harvest moon was also a super-moon that was bright and beautiful. It is a fantastic time of year to explore the outdoors and take a moment to thank God for the beauty around us. We get to enjoy most of God’s palette because He is the greatest of all artists and His creation is ours to enjoy. I would suggest doing EP outside as a change of pace. I did MP in the Rockies this summer and found it most gratifying.
God willing Father Andrews and Anneliese will be here Saturday. We need to pray for traveling mercies for them. God willing we will have the Feast of Saint Michael and All Angels (Michaelmas) this weekend. It is also associated with the beginning of Autumn. We won’t be eating the fattened goose as they do in the British Isles; but they say in England “Eat a goose on Michaelmas Day, Want not money all the year.” That may have worked for Queen Elizabeth I in the late 1500’s, but hard work and a belief in God does it for us Americans.