A youth-led energizer puts a jolt into closing worship at Synod School

STORM LAKE, Iowa — Assisted by the Rev. CeCe Armstrong, the preacher during last week’s Synod School, youth who’d attended Presbyterian Youth Triennium in 2025 and others amped up closing worship on Friday.

For the 650 or so people in attendance, the energizer served as an exclamation point at the outset of worship, with the Rev. Dr. Melanie Hauser, the chaplain at Buena Vista University in Storm Lake, whose cat Reepicheep is Synod School’s unofficial mascot and beloved therapy cat, offering up the children’s time.

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“I have a story to tell you about one of Reepicheep’s friends,” a sad-looking and hungry cat people called Nacho but whose real name was Puma, Hauser told the children. A woman whom Puma called Food-Getter came into his life, nursing him back to health and taking him to the veterinarian for additional care.

“He began to feel more and more like a real cat instead of a bag of bones,” Hauser told the children, and Food-Giver’s home became his forever home.

“This is a story of triumph and success — what love and prayers can do — and a story that will never end because love never ends,” Hauser said. “Puma knew home was with the person who loved him. We know home is with the people who love us and with God, who loves us.”

“Remember Puma and his forever home,” she told the children, “and that our forever home is with God.”

With a look at the swallow, Armstrong, Co-Moderator of the 226^th General Assembly and the associate pastor at St. James Presbyterian Church in Charleston, South Carolina, completed a series on Friday on the lessons birds can teach us. Her scriptural texts was Psalm 84:1-4.

Swallows garner only a few biblical mentions. They’re small and agile birds and have a distinct forked tail, Armstrong pointed out. Here’s how she spelled out their attributes: Swift fliers, Worldwide migrators, Agile, Loyal nesters, Long-distance travelers, Organized and Watchful.

“God expects us to be quick to tell about our experiences here [at Synod School],” she said, and she recapped the other birds that received scrutiny during Synod School worship:

• OWL, Only With Love
• HEN, Help others, Encourage others, Nurture others
• EAGLE, Empower, Ascend, Guide, Launch, Endure
• SPARROW, Strengthen, Persevere, Adapt, Resourceful, Reliable, Ordinary, Worthy
• DOVE, Discover the calm, Offer Kindness, Value every moment and Embrace hope.

“Scripture reminds us we are to be happy to be living in God’s house. We are happy and we know it, which is why we can sing God’s praises,” she said, launching those in worship into an energetic “If You’re Happy and You Know It.” We’re called to “go into the world with the power God has given us,” Armstrong said, “to fight the good fight of faith in places where God needs it the most.”

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As the congregation sang and performed the motions, Armstrong offered her take on what she was seeing.

“We clap our hands remembering to become the hands of Christ, bearing on another’s burdens,” Armstrong said. “Stomp your feel is to stand up for justice,” such as the Matthew 25 calling to build congregational vitality, dismantle structural racism and eradicate systemic poverty. “Folks may take it as if you have an attitude,” she said. “But if you stomp loud enough, those little ones,” she said with a nod to the youth seated in the balcony, “won’t have to endure what we’ve gone through.” Shouting “amen” is to “speak up with holy boldness. Are you being an ambassador of Christ? Are you shouting ‘amen’ loud enough that when children hear it, they know change is about to come?”

“My hope is that we will do all three,” she said, “knowing that God loves us and there’s nothing we can do about it.”

The 30-minute service came to a close with those in worship singing “We are One in the Spirit.”

Synod School is a ministry of the Synod of Lakes and Prairies. Look for additional Synod School reporting by Presbyterian News Service throughout the week.