There’s a lot of special stuff  happening this week at Trinity-come be part of the family!

Wednesday

Family Service Event 6pm

Join us for dinner and devotion as we serve our neighbors in need by making food for St. Columbo ministries, an organization that feeds the homeless in Norfolk. All ages are encouraged to attend and participate-bring your friends!

Friday

Youth Group Lock-In!!!  7pm

Middle and High School youth will have fun with their leaders Chris & Melissa Hales. There will be Lunar Golf, baking for Sunday’s Bake Sale, skits, and fun check out the facebook group for more info.

Saturday

Car Wash 9am-12pm

The Trinity Youth Group will have a car wash to help raise funds for their retreats and activities come on out and have your car washed by the best car washers in town!

Bathroom Painting 9am-11am

While you’re getting your car washed come inside and help paint the bathrooms. Trust me, it’s more fun than it sounds.

Sunday

Yes, there’s worship at 8:30 & 11:00am and Bible Study & Sunday School at 9:45am, but be sure to bring some money for coffee hour! The Youth Group will be selling some of their homemade goodies to help raise funds for their projects for this year.

Later in the day there is something special happening at Christ-the installation of their new pastor! At 3:30pm at Christ Lutheran Church (6510 N. Military Hwy, Norfolk, VA) will install their new pastor. Join our daughter congregation for this very special celebration!

Join us for a special family Thanksgiving Eve Worship Service.

We begin on Wednesday, November 23 at 7pm as we thank our Heavenly Father for all that He has done for us-especially sending Jesus to be our Savior!

Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

On Sunday, September 11th, the world will stand still as the first post-9/11 decade comes to a close. As I pause to pen this note to the church, I’m flooded with a swirl of disparate and even conflicting thoughts and feelings. I recall the progression that morning from interest that a “small plane” should have hit the World Trade Center, then the shocking news of a jet airliner hitting the first tower, by mistake?

Then the second. The Pentagon. The plane down in Pennsylvania. Confusion. Disbelief. Fear. Frustration. Anger. Revenge. All of that took place for me in the LCMS International Center from which I write now. We all have a story.

Having visited Manhattan the week after the event, and then Ground Zero later, speaking with our LCMS brothers and sisters who lost family and friends (one dear brother shared with me, as we surveyed Ground Zero on an anniversary years later, that he had lost 30 friends that day), I feel ashamed even to write of my own insignificant thoughts. This week the pain that invaded the lives of thousands upon thousands is re-lived, as though the event were just last week. Our own struggles in the Missouri Synod at the time cause me deep lamentation still. Lord, have mercy upon us all. But it is a hopeful lamentation.

The people of the LCMS responded in overwhelming generosity. Thousands upon thousands were assisted through Lutheran Disaster Response of New York (LDRNY), to which we provided funding. We assisted children who lost parents, provided tuition, counseling, care and much more. LDRNY concentrated on help for victims’ families, and was a major force in the September 11th Families’ Association, which throughout it all has been committed to attending to the concerns and needs of affected families.

The Lord Jesus himself, in the face of the profound suffering He would undergo for the sins of the world, prayed, “Take this cup from Me. Yet not My will, but Thine be done” (Matt. 26:39). And so it is human and by no means wrong for those so terribly hurt by the senseless carnage 10 years ago, to lament their loss and pain even today, and to cry out, “Why, Lord?” Somehow, in an unfathomable way, the Lord’s hand is not shortened and His universe is still His, despite the carnage of a few madmen. And like His very cross—which appeared senseless and pointless and an end of all hope—so this suffering is purposeful. “My strength is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9). At the last, we have one thing to say. One thing to hope. One thing to trust. And that is Christ.

Let us join in prayer for the LCMS Atlantic, Southeastern and Eastern districts, and for all their leaders and people, for the witness of the Gospel in New York from Ground Zero, to the Pentagon, to Pennsylvania and beyond. Let us pray for our nation, our president and the military, for faithfulness in duty and an increase of all honorable vocations in public and military life. Let us pray especially for those who still suffer the loss of loved ones. Grant faith, O Lord, in the resurrection and in Your blessed Gospel. Let us pray for our enemies, for justice and for peace. And finally, as we lament this sinful world of pain and loss, let us lament in hope. Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy, Lord, have mercy.

“Through [Christ] we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God” (Rom. 5:2).