Congratulations to Tom and Amy Kliman on the birth of their twin granddaughters Rowan Iris and Emery Anne born 11-10. Parents are Andrew and Kerry Kliman. Both mom and babies are healthy and safe... praise God!

If you need a ride to an appointment, someone to stay with you and then take you home, St. Luke has a solution.  

Call Alice , 901-752-4973 , for confidential assistance.  We have members who are waiting to help you."

DRINK CANS NEEDED

Please bring your clean, empty aluminum drink cans to the church.  Jane Johnson  cashes them in, and is saving the money for some remodeling.  Place them in the old kit chen please!                 

Parish Talk & Cliff Note

contributed by Sue Malone

Reformation:  What a celebration!  Think of all the Lutheran churches around the world, celebrating such an awesome event in history, on the same day...  St. Luke was graced with a beautiful violin prelude, performed by Marcin Arendt and the Adult Choir performed "The Family of Christ" for us.  Many thanks for all the hours of practice and talent shared!

Have you seen the awesome Ulmer Munster cathedral that Ray Hatton donated to us?  It's the 5 th tallest structure in the world, built before the 20 th century.  Take a look or two at this amazing replica.  Many thanks to Rev. Hatton for his generosity!

Please join us in decorating St. Luke for the Christmas season, on Friday, December 1st at 9am.  We will have a great time and join together in fellowship over a chili lunch.  Many hands make light work!  

Welcome to our new members:  Rob, Cathy, Thomas, and Sam Dafoe and Leif Karnuth.  Don't you just love it when we get a bigger family of saints?! In this season of gratitude, we welcome you and offer our support.

We had a surprise visit from David Potter in November.  What a treat!  He even went to work and led us in music - no rest for the weary...  Many thanks, David; come back often!

And, speaking of surprise guests, Theresa Peters visited us with her mother, Peggy Nutzell.  Sadly, Peggy is leaving us for a new home up north.  We wish her every blessing. She and George were longtime members of St. Luke and worked very hard to build this church.

Wow!  Did you attend the Ceruti String Quartet concert, last month?  I told Pastor Cliff I almost ran into the sacristy to get a fire extinguisher.  The fingers of Marcin Arendt, Timothy Shiu, Lenny Schranze, and Kimberly Patterson were flying over the strings so quickly, I expected to see flames shoot out from their instruments.  Many thanks to them for their beautiful performance and for sharing their musical talents with us.  

Our Cherub Choir blessed us on Consecration Sunday with not 1, but 2 anthems!  They started out with "Kids of the Kingdom'' and then sang "Thank You Jesus."  How delightful!  They will be getting choir robes soon (how cute is that?!) and we thank each and every one of them for their wonderful performance!

Congratulations to Karen McCracken and Alice Burns for awards earned for their work at the Church Health Center.  Karen completed an 8 week course in Health Ministry and Alice completed a First Aid for Mental Health course, having already done the Health Ministry course.  We are so proud of these two women as they provide blessings to the St. Luke Saints.

Cliff Notes:

Reformation Sunday:  "We're WHAT?"  That's probably what Pastor Cliff said when his father let the German Lutheran skeletons out of the closet, a few months before Cliff's ordination.  It turns out this family has short Catholic roots, dating back to when they settled in Baton Rouge.  So - what does this have to do with Martin Luther?  Imagine Martin having an intimate discussion with his blue collar father, who scrimped and saved to send his son to law school and Martin, like Cliff, informed his father that he was changing careers, to become a monk.   Cliff is no monk, but he went the way God led him.  (Yeah for us!). In Luther's time, if a man and a woman were of different faiths and wed, the marriage wasn't recognized.  The church was re-formed by Luther, who had the creds to do it:  he was a parish priest, a monk, and a college professor.  His 95 theses were questions about the practices and beliefs that were accepted in his time.  Thank goodness he was a man of honor, passion, courage, and willingness to tell the truth.  He wasn't perfect, by any means - he was a saint and a sinner, like all of us, but his stubbornness paid off and we celebrate his work today.  When he died, a note was found in his pocket that read, "We are beggars; this is true."

Death and money.  Hmmm.  That's what Pastor Cliff spoke on for All Saints Day.  It was a day of remembrance of those saints who have passed away and we also held in our hearts those close to us who have gone before us.  God has given us everything we have and therein lies a covenant of faith that we will manage well with the limited time we have in this life.  Stewardship prompts us to regard every new day as a new beginning, a time to enjoy life.  We need to make preparations for how we are to be treated in our final days and we can do this in dialogue with our family.  As good stewards, we are to give and live generously; peace of mind is all we have and that comes from God, a generous God!  Generosity is strengthened by faith.  How will you manage what God has given you?

Ken Westphal shared with us his thoughts on stewardship.  Jesus gave the parable of the bridegroom and the 10 bridesmaids, five of whom let their lanterns burn out.  They missed the wedding!  Giving can be done with time, talent, and money; we need to discern how to share our gifts, which were given to us by a loving God.  We all wish to support the future of St. Luke like Moses led his people to the promised land.  He did not get to go in, just as we will not be able to see the future of this church.  Our goal is to leave a legacy for the future of our children and the saints that will come after us.

Dr. Scott Morris, founder and CEO of Church Health was our guest speaker on Consecration Sunday.  Pastor Cliff reminded us that St. Luke sponsors a full day's care every year at the center and he chose October 31st, in honor of Martin Luther as our day.  Dr Morris spoke about the early Thanksgivings, starting with Henry VIII  (who knew?!), who winnowed down 95 days of paid vacation for the people to 2 days, when everyone was to eat and be thankful.  (Sheesh!)  Then Lincoln declared the last day of November to be the American Thanksgiving (during the Civil War).  In 1963, President Kennedy pardoned the mighty fowl, the first president to do so.  Dr. Morris went on to speak about Jesus' return to the disciples while they were fishing and He asked Peter 3 times if he loved Jesus.  Three times Peter declared that he did and Jesus told him to "feed his sheep."  This was a call to discipleship:  "Follow Me."  Health is a state of having more joy, more love, and a closeness to Jesus.  Be generous beyond words to your church.  Remember that our gifts are not judged by God.  

Many, many thanks to our Stewardship Committee for putting on an incredible Thanksgiving feast.  We are so lucky to have these hard workers in our midst - true generosity to St. Luke.