Pastors Corner: Preparing for Lenten Season

Once a month, I like to use the words in this article to let you know what will be taking place at our next Greater Havre Area Ministerial Association - GHAMA - meeting.

At our meetings, we allow one special guest to present for the first 15 minutes. At our February meeting Les Odegard will be presenting "Grief Share."

After that presentation, we will be planning for this year's series of Lenten Luncheons and our annual "Walk of the Cross" Good Friday observance.

One of our ongoing projects is to provide pastoral presence at the Feed My Sheep Soup Kitchen during the times they serve lunch there. So far, on Mondays we have pastors/deacons from First Lutheran and St. Jude's Catholic Church serving; on Tuesdays folks from Fifth Avenue Christian Church; and on Wednesdays and Thursdays pastors from Havre Assembly. We do not yet have Fridays and Saturdays covered.

Then we make assignments for who are writing which weekly religious article for the Havre Daily News this next month.

Finally we hear reports/updates as to how we are serving our Havre schools; how the Feed My Sheep Soup Kitchen is doing; how the Havre Food Bank is getting along; whether Northern Montana Care Center is open for church services and if so, which churches are providing services; how the Salvation Army is serving people in our community; when we will be able to provide services inside the detention center; whether or not we are able to provide chaplaincy options for our law enforcement entities.

We close our meeting with specific announcements from our participating churches and with prayer one for another.

There is an old song with the refrain "They will know we are Christians by our love ... ." This refrain comes from John 13:35, where Jesus states: "By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." Interestingly enough, we tend to apply this verse only to how we treat each other within our particular church group. I believe that Jesus meant this statement to be applied to the church at large. What this means is that people will know whether or not we are Jesus' followers (disciples) by how we love each other across denominational lines. The main objective of our ministerial association is to demonstrate that we are Jesus' disciples by the way we love and care for each other in our community. It is not enough just to demonstrate love to our little groups. Jesus expects more from His disciples. In a culture that seems to be more and more divided, where are people supposed to see unity displayed? The answer is the church as started by our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I want to encourage each follower of Jesus to look for and build relationships with Christians from different denominations. Your life will be thoroughly enriched and you will be demonstrating that you really are a disciple of Jesus Christ. I know that I cherish the relationships that are being built within our ministerial association and I want to see those kinds of relationships built across denominational lines in our community. Are you with me?

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Written by the Rev. Edroy "Curt" Curtis: president of the Greater Havre Area Ministerial Association; chaplain of Northern Montana Health Care, and lead pastor of Havre Assembly of God Church.