Love in between

STORM LAKE, Iowa — A near record 650 people — more than 100 of them first-timers — sang and prayed and expressed their love to one another Sunday during opening worship at the 72^nd edition of Synod School, a ministry of the Synod of Lakes and Prairies held each year at Buena Vista University.

“Love in Between” is this year’s theme, with the Rev. Dr. William Yoo, Associate Professor of American Religious and Cultural History at Columbia Theological Seminary serving as convocation speaker. The Rev. CeCe Armstrong, Co-Moderator of the 226^th General Assembly and associate pastor at St. James Presbyterian Church in Charleston, South Carolina, is preaching each evening during worship. Matthew Black is the artist in residence and the worship leader for Song and a Prayer.

The Rev. Mary Koon, pastor of congregational care at Oak Grove Presbyterian Church in Bloomington, Minnesota, got perhaps the best gig of all Sunday evening: leading the children’s time.

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This week, “we’re going to learn about love by learning some lessons from birds,” Koon told  the assembled children. “God made birds of every variety, and they’re endlessly fascinating.” Hens, eagles, doves and sparrows all make appearances in the Bible, but crows may not get the attention they deserve, she said.

Koon’s daughter and her family have been feeding crows from their deck in Seattle. “These crows have become really good neighbors,” Koon told the children, including scaring away racoons who encroach on the deck. “I think we can learn lessons from these crows. God’s love is about sharing and taking care of one another, and I think that’s cool,” she said, handing each child a sticker of a bird they can affix to a water bottle or skateboard “to help you remember what you’re learning here at Synod School,” Koon said.

Armstrong read portions of 1 Cor. 13:1-13, assigning the rest as homework. “Y’all said this was school,” said Armstrong, herself a former teacher.

“Since we’re working on love, why not look how two things that are different … might blend into one,” she said, such as marriage, where “two different folks from two different backgrounds with two different outlooks on life and two ways of approaching the trials and heartbreaks of living — and in some cases, procreate and see what that might look like.”

“Preach!” one of those in worship said.

“I thought since I haven’t found that for myself yet, maybe I could learn from the birds,” said Armstrong, who said she’s watched finches on her front porch “share the responsibility for hatching eggs.”

“Even at Christmas we sing about birds,” she noted, counting down from the seven swans a-swimming to the partridge in a pear tree.

Save for that solo partridge, “no bird is ever left alone, and neither are we,” she said. “But for tonight, it’s this chapter on love, spoken to people in turmoil.”

“I want to share with you the impeccability of love,” Armstrong said. “There may be moments we feel swamped by things that separate us from God, but remember: love does not keep a record of wrongs, but rejoices in the truth.”

She called love “the strongest attribute of our circumstance. Truly, just love everyone,” Armstrong admonished those in worship. “You didn’t come here just to pick up all the feel goods. God’s promise to us is we are more than conquerors. God is love, and the command given to us is to love one another.

“Tonight, I want you to practice,” she said, asking each person in worship to turn to someone they don’t know well and tell them, “I love you.”

“Here’s why I wanted you to do that: to tell you that I love you and there’s nothing you can do about it,” she said, repeating a line for which she is widely loved.