Dear members of Bethel Lutheran,

“Give thanks with a grateful heart; Give thanks to the Holy One” – Chorus lyrics to the song “Give Thanks” by Don Moen

Thank Goodness for new beginnings. Thank God for this feeling of thankfulness. I was just out on a tractor with a sugar beet farmer harvester. It is a good feeling to bring the harvest home, to see the digger freshly tilling up the dirt and watching the year’s growth coming out of the field. The defoliator clips off the still green tops of the sugar beet. The lifter lifts the sugar beets out of the ground at just the right temperature. Then the farmer harvester trucks the sugar beets to the plant where they get processed and made into sugar. The wonder of it all, these big plants, the fruits of labor 4-10 times the size of a common potato, also put forth the tiny seeds for next year’s planting. I will wonder with you if this is not going to be at least a little bit like the Intentional lnterim work we will do. It takes faithful hands, and wherewithal, to make these harvests happen.

We can thank God for the harvest at our table each day. We can thank God for minds, engineers, and mechanics that create such innovative machines to lift beets out of the ground. We can certainly be thankful for sugar, right? (Sweet tooths that we are.) We can praise God for the wonders of creation, for the blessing of salvation in Jesus, and for the direction of God’s Holy Spirit.

As we begin our time of Intentional Interim ministry together, I would invite you to begin with a spirit of thankfulness and praise. Start with your family, the blessings that you experience there, continue with your Bethel Lutheran Family, (I am so excited to be given the invitation to join you), but then, let us give it all to God. Let us give God the thanks and the praise.

We bring forth the harvest. We lift our hands and hearts in response. We give a portion of the harvest away in response to God. We marvel at what the past
days have been. Then, we plant the seeds and begin the growing process all over again.

“O give thanks to the LORD, for God is good, for God’s steadfast love endures forever.” - Chronicles 16:34

Partner in faith,
Intentional Interim Pastor Randy Fett