April 2008

Dear Friends around the globe!

Easter and resurrection greetings from a rather cold spring in the northern half of Europe!  Though it was awfully early, Easter is still with us, at least in the tradition of the church in Germany, for Easter songs are sung till Pentecost.  One of my favorites has a melody that dates from 1160, with a text just as old.  Wikipedia says it is perhaps the oldest liturgical song in the German language.  Like many hymns of that era, it is not a particularly “happy’” tune, is in a minor key, but the words are amazing. As one might guess, they have been poetically translated

Christ is arisen
From the grave's dark prison.
So let our joy rise full and free;
Christ our comfort true will be.

Were Christ not arisen,
Then death were still our prison.
Now, with Him to life restored,
We praise the Father of our Lord.
Alleluia!

I do like the poetry, but a more literal translation is closer to the actual words: Had he not arisen, the world would die away but since he has risen, we laud and extol the Father of our Lord.

Reading the newspaper or listening to the “latest” on TV or radio or even realizing that things may not be moving forward or upward in this apparently “dying world” of climate change, war, questionable election tactics (in Zimbabwe as well as in the United States!), hunger, and an uncertain future—all make one seriously wonder about that Easter message. But Christ is risen! Amazing. Astonishing, even in 2008!

As I continue to try to beat the clock and get more done on my dissertation than time might seem to allow, I am encouraged and even spurred on by that astonishing fact, one which has shaped Christian community and fellowship since that first Easter morning. I am writing a thesis about a piece of East German and Presbyterian church history that is, as well, rather astonishing and improbable. At German invitation, not too long after World War II ended, American Christians, Presbyterians, and others came to Berlin all because of who Jesus Christ is and what we who follow him have been given! And what might that be? Well, in part, the chance to start over. Though we were once enemies, through this visitation program, Germans and Americans were reconciled through the living Christ. Then, in a divided city and a divided country and in spite of a Wall, the “fact” of resurrection and reconciliation was experienced again and again as handfuls of U.S. Christians traveled to meet with handfuls of East German sisters and brothers. That’s what I’m researching, from the East German perspective, using their words and recollections. Sure, it is just a small story, and it is only one of thousands of true stories of the Christian church, of our heritage, of our call. The more I work on it though, the more sense it makes and the more excited I find myself to write about it.

Recently, I gave the book that tells the pre-history of this post WWII developing program (Berlin Fellowship) to some good friends. Margrit gave it to her father, an active Christian and leader in his congregation from the former German Democratic Republic. He read it with great interest and called her, quite upset, not long after. He wanted to know why he and his congregation had never heard about this program. She let me know that if I ever met him, I’d have some explaining to do!  From the late 1960s and through the 1980s, Berlin Fellowship was a modest operation that functioned because of good will, gracious and generous gifts, a willingness to risk, open and trusting eastern congregations, implicit support of the church in West Berlin and from the bishops in the entire East Germany, and because of God's will. It was, as they say here, but a drop of water on the hot stone of thousands of years of church history, but it was also a certain mirror of God’s plans and ways, baffling the STASI (the secret police) and surprising even its skeptics and critics. The chapters I still have left to write are “cooking,” and I pray to use these last months diligently before I return to Lithuania. All things being equal, a year from now I hope to be defending the thesis and finishing this particular chapter of my life!I’ll finish the last details in the course of the coming year. In August I return to Klaipeda, Lithuania, and to Lithuania Christian College International University. I’ll again be teaching a two-semester course, Introduction to the Bible, I’ll start saying ačiu and prašom instead of danke and bitte, and learning the names of students from at least 15 different countries. The call to mission service is ever as strong, and I look forward to being back on the “front line” in the college classroom.I thank you for your part in this venture, for your friendship, for the cards and notes, the emails and hugs, for your prayers these last months, and for your ongoing interest and commitment. I thank God that our denomination is moving into a new era of mission and interpretation. Please visit the new Web site.  May God’s Easter truth, his purposes and his peace and be our beacon and a guide for all the days ahead.

Grace and peace,

Jane Holslag