Paul's post about being a "good enough" church motivated me to 
think of a place that many of us have spent imaginary Saturday nights in,
namely Lake Wobegon, Minnesota, the fictional hometown of Garrison Keillor....
Note that Garrison Keillor's ex-wife was a good friend of the wife of 
my current boss when they all attended the University of Minnesota.  Pastor
Helm is a real pastor who once served in Minnesota in places even more isolated.
-------------------------------------------------------------------

Pastor Helm was sitting in the back of the Our Lady of Perpetual Responsibility
church during the community Thanksgiving service for Lake Wobegon.  As usual,
the service was running overtime and he was thinking.  The service included the
usual readings about how things could have been a lot worse.  All the strong
women, good-looking men, and above-average children sang "Now Thank We All
Our God."  Pastor Helm had to stay through it all because it was his job
to hold the offering plate as the people were going out.

Of course, it wasn't much of an ecumenical service, since the Missouri Synod
Lutherans wouldn't be caught dead in the Catholic church, and were going to 
have their own service later in the day.  And since there were only three 
churches in town....well, the SDA's were almost a church.  Actually they met
in the building across from Ralph's Pretty Good Grocery, and above the
Chatterbox.  And a few of their members had gone down to Nebraska this weekend,
and it turned out that Pastor Helm was the only one who could make it today.

He wondered why he felt uncomfortable in this service.  He knew just about
everyone there.  They were all friendly to him, and they were pretty much 
like him.  The younger ones would come over to visit his kids whenever they 
were on home leave from Maplewood Academy.  He was the umpire for the 
baseball games in the summer.  He'd been active in the local Lions club.
But he knew, if this had been twenty years ago during his days as a young 
intern, he'd have been instantly fired for even setting foot in the Catholic
church. As it was he had filled in for the Catholic priest (who also had 
a 4-church parish) several times over the last few years on weddings and 
funerals.   "What's changed now?" he asked.

He'd heard the story from old Gunnar Trondheim, the pillar of the church,
about how the Lake Wobegon church used to have 100 members and all the 
successful evangelistic series that used to happen there. "You could pack
'em in to hear about the Mark of the Beast.  That would do it every time.
You should preach the good ol' Adventist message, brother.  Never know 
what that old pope is up to--got to warn people."  Then there was 
sister Ingrid Lutefisk, who was forever bemoaning the fallen spiritual 
state of the church.  "Oh, we're the Laodicean church.  We're wretched
and miserable and poor and blind and naked.  We need revival."

Then it hit him:  "Could it be that the SDA church is like Lake Wobegon
all over America?   Have we tried so hard to stay content with what our
church is doing that we're content to be 'good enough' and thankful 
that things aren't worse?  Have we centered so much of our identity 
around the label of Laodicean failure that success in spreading the 
gospel would destroy that identity?"  Suddenly somebody elbowed him
and he realized he had been speaking aloud while the service was
still going on.  But his thoughts were still racing forward.

"Have we developed an inferiority complex?", he thought.  "After all, 
we have contingents in the Minnesota church that have been calling 
for corporate repentance ever since 1888.  Yet at the same time, 
we spend so much time in self-chastisement that it's hard to see how
any more repentance is necessary or possible.  Why do we insist on 
feeling inferior?"  

He remembered his conversation with Lars "Larry" Trondheim, Gunnar's son, who
had gone to seminary and was now a big evangelist out West.  "People think
Seventh-day Adventists are weird," he said.  "If you're going to have any 
meetings, you should have them outside of the church, and don't put 
the Adventist name on it.  And just preach Christ, don't talk about the 
beasts or the 2300 days or any of that stuff."

"But Lake Wobegon folks don't think we're weird," he thought.  "And 
we can't hide our name, everyone knows who I am anyway.  The only people
who think SDA's are weird are our own members.  And as long as we
think we are weird, we will behave as weird and untouchable and inferior.
The thing is--we really aren't all that different anymore.  With all our 
kids in public school, they're pretty much like the rest of town.

The thoughts continued and he failed to notice that the service had finished
and most of the people had already filed out of the church, missing the 
offering plate that he was supposed to hold.  As the priest came back in
and started turning out the lights, he sat up with a start, then, embarrassed,
quickly walked out the door.  A few inches of snow had already fallen, and
as he brushed off his truck, he saw Joe Jacobsen across the parking lot
trying to start his truck with no success.  He quickly moved across the 
parking lot and offered a jump-start, but to no avail.

"It's Thanksgiving," he said.  "Gas station won't be open till Monday.
Let me give you folks a lift home."  Joe and Maria, his wife, quickly
climbed into the truck.  Joe lived about 5 miles north of town.  They
rode quietly--the pastor feeling self-conscious about his unplanned 
speech during the meeting, and Joe and Maria showing true Minnesotan restraint.
Maria whispered in Joe's ear "better invite the Rev. in for some hot tea."
And so Joe did.  The pastor knew that the proper Minnesota restraint 
would be to decline such an invitation, but something in Joe's voice led
him to follow them in.

What they saw surprised them all.  Water was covering the kitchen floor
and rapidly freezing.  "Oh, no--the pipes broke!  Joe said."
"It's so cold in here--is your furnace broken?"
"No, we  couldn't afford any heating oil this year--we were burning wood
but somebody stole our whole stack of firewood last week."

So the pastor insisted that Joe and Maria come back with him to spend the
night, and was somewhat surprised when they did.  The next morning found 
him in the Chatterbox Cafe, rounding up a fresh batch of firewood for Joe
and Maria, taking some tools out to Joe's place to help him fix the pipes,
and convincing one of the local mechanics to fix up Joe's truck. 

The next few days found the pastor downstairs in the Chatterbox Cafe
a lot more than usual.  Word travels fast around a small town, and he
was amazed at all the various people who before had seemed aloof and 
condemning who were suddenly confiding their problems.  In a short period
of time a Bible Study group had started in the Adventist meeting hall
above the Chatterbox.


A few weeks later, he asked Maria, "how long were you folks out of heating 
oil before you called someone?"
"Well, we knew we were going to be in trouble in June after the wheat crop 
failed."
"Well then, why didn't you ask someone at your church?"
"We didn't want our problems to be known all over town."

Pastor Helm wanted to ask the next question:  "why did you trust *me* 
to tell your problems?"  But Minnesotan restraint held him back 
and he started wondering.  Would he find out that *his* members had 
been going to see the Lutheran minister for just the same reason?
Was it just that he was an anonymous stranger?
No, he had known this family well.  Could it have been his unplanned 
"speech" at the service?  He decided to ask her after all.

"Well, I decided to trust you because I saw in the meeting when you 
talked out loud that your beliefs were more important than maintaining
the front of "good looking, strong, and above average."  Then when you 
helped us with the truck I saw that you really cared for us.  And I want
to be part of that caring, too."

And that's the news from Lake Wobegon, where the women don't have to 
be quite so strong, the men may not be good looking but at least 
they don't feel weird any more, and the Seventh-day Adventists
are above average.