A big THANK YOU to all the amazing girls and women who joined us for our Women's Luncheon on Saturday! 🌸 We're so grateful for your generosity in supporting the 2026 First Lutheran Women's Mission to Ecuador. It was such a joy to connect over beautifully designed tablescapes, share a delicious lunch, and be inspired by our special guest, Dr. Tracy Alin, who spoke about her work with Amistad Worldwide, helping people and sharing Christ's love with people living on the margins in India and Nepal. We wrapped up the afternoon with a style show brought to us by Scheels Fashion Boutique. Thank you for making it a wonderful day of connection, faith, and joy! 💕 (fb)

Today's devotion from Pastor Marty Tollefson: "From a Goose to a Swan" October marks the season when the migratory birds pass through North Dakota. In the early morning, out in the country, you can hear the sounds of life all around. You can hear geese cackling louder and louder and louder just before they lift off the water. Swans, on the other hand, do not cackle. Swans are much bigger and more majestic. When they fly through the skies with grace and beauty – you know it. They have this trumpeting sound which is much different than that of a goose. You can see and hear the difference. Jan Hus was a reformer in the church. He was born in 1369 in what we know today as the Czech Republic. His last name – Hus – means goose in Czech. He was found guilty of heresy and burned at the stake in 1415. Tradition says that before being lead to his death, Hus said something like this, “Today they will roast a goose but after a hundred years they will hear a swan sing that they will neither boil or roast.” Just over a hundred years later, a reformer by the name of Martin Luther posted 95 Theses on the church door in Wittenberg, Germany and touched off the great re-formation of the church. The swan was about to sing… In his teaching on Galatians and Romans, Luther began to discover that we are justified, that is, made right before God, through Christ alone. We are made right not by works, but through Christ, and that justification comes as gift to us, namely faith. There is nothing that we can add to what Jesus has already done. No more buying indulgences for purposes of salvation. No more throwing money at bad religion. No more guilt and shame and asking the question, “Have I done enough?” The swan was singing… For Luther, faith comes by way of hearing. It came by way of proclamation. The preacher proclaims – you are a child of God, your sins are forgiveness for Christ’s sake, hear these words at the waters of Baptism, hear these words from the table – and, and get an ear on these words – neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. There are a lot of cackling geese in this world. There is a lot of cackling going on, out there. There is a lot of noise in daily life. The sound of a trumpeter swan, in the midst of all of this cackling is unmistakable…because it is different. Luther was this swan that sang of God’s grace in Christ. It is a sweet, trumpeting sound that we need to hear over and over and over again – God loves the world in this particular way, that God sends God’s son – it is by grace, through faith, that you are named and claimed and saved and it comes through Christ alone. This is our swan song! Blessings, Pr. Marty (fb)