Church #48: Ebenezer Swedish Lutheran Church
The message of the sermon was powerful and couldn’t be more relevant to what so many of us are experiencing in the world today.
So many of us feel lost, and we are all so inundated with contradictory messages coming from every different direction. The pastor’s sermon provided guidance on how to handle these messages.
But more on that later…
Chicago’s history consists of a series of waves of immigrants, and I have been to churches founded for Polish, German, Irish, and Italian immigrants, to name a few. This is my first time visiting a church organized by Swedish immigrants. Olaf Gottfrid Lange arrived in Chicago in 1839 as the city’s first Swedish immigrant (the city itself was founded only a year prior). He only stayed two years and then moved to Milwaukee to become that city’s first Swedish immigrant.
A few years later, Swedish farmer John Anderson bought land in what is now known as Andersonville. The area was dominated by a large cherry orchard at the time.
But there was also an area on the north side of the Chicago River (in the area of River North) known as Swedetown that developed in the 1840s. The first church for the community was St. Ansgarius Episcopal Church, founded in 1849 (which closed in 1920 - it opened a couple of times in an attempt to repurpose the church but without success). Eventually ten Swedish-language churches served the area.
By 1870, over 6,000 Swedes lived there, making it the larged Swedish community in the country.
But we all know what happened in 1871: the Great Chicago Fire. Swedetown burned to the ground. A new city ordinance forbade the construction of any new homes made of wood going forward. Houses were required to be built with much more expensive stone or brick. This rule priced out the city’s poor, including the recently arrived immigrants.
As a result, the Swedish moved further north to the area of Andersonville, where the city’s ordinance banning wood did not apply. By 1900, over 150,000 Swedes lived in the area.
Although the Swedish immigrants had moved north, residents continued to have to travel out of the new neighborhood to attend church. So in 1891, a group of families decided to instead meet at a local candy store on Sundays before founding Anderson’s Ebenezer Lutheran Church in 1892. Ten years later in 1902, the church bought property and constructed the building where they continue to meet.
In the 1950s, many of the Swedish congregants were moving to the suburbs, and the church started offering services not only in Swedish but also in English.
As for the church’s connection to the Lutheran religion, Ebenezer was founded as a part of the Augustana Lutheran Synod, which was formed in 1860. Then in 1962, the organization merged with other Lutherann groups to form the Lutheran Church in America (LCA). The big difference in church philosophy that came with this reorganization was the acceptance of women as pastors.
Another change occurred in 1988 when the LCA merged with two other Lutheran organizations to become the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (which happens to be headquartered in Chicago!).
The next major change came when Ebenezer Swedish Church declared itself as Reconciling in Christ. This title signals to the community that the church welcomes all sexual orientations and gender identities and is a safe place for LGBTQ+ congregants.
This is a cute, little, warm church. It seemed like a very comfortable place, with people happily greeting each other and chatting before the service got started. I would guess there were 60-70 people in attendance. And it was mostly middle-aged people, with a few younger couples with kids. For some reason, I am always surprised at how many men attend church services alone. It seemed like that might have been the largest demographic here.
I think I am surprised because the stereotype seems to be that it is the women who are the ones who lead the religious life of a family. I assume that the men I see are either divorced or widows, but it still surprises me. I did a bit of research and although the numbers vary from source to source, all agree that in recent years the gender gap has narrowed. And the gap seems to be only a few points. I find that interesting.
The pastor came in from a side door and declared, “Peace be with you.” In the meantime, the choir, in white robes, wandered in from a variety of doors in the front and made their way to the back of the sanctuary. It was very strange. It was as if none of us were there.
The pastor made some announcements and reminded the congregation of upcoming events as choir members continued to walk through. Then he introduced the start of the service with a song from the three musicians: a pianist playing a baby grand, a drummer (using brushes rather than drumsticks), and a double bassist. They played “Down by the Riverside,” and I felt like I was in a jazz club. The music throughout the entire service was simply great!
The pastor then led us in a public confession before he joined the choir in the back for the procession as we sang a hymn.
Everyone turned around to face the back, and a teenaged boy led the procession holding a pole with a crucifix on top. He was followed by eight choir members and then two pastors: the gentleman who welcomed us and a woman. Although they both wore white robes and blue stoles, it was obvious that the woman was wearing torn jeans, with a frayed hem that had clearly dragged on the ground one too many times, and tennis shoes under her robe.
I have mentioned the level of dress in church quite a few times. Other than in orthodox churches, everyone is dressed shockingly casually. I’ve even seen attendants and ushers in shorts. The torn jeans from the pastor also seemed a bit much. At the end of the day, I believe how someone dresses matters, and that we should dress for the occasion. It makes me sad that when it comes to dress, we treat going to church as equivalent to running to the grocery store. Also, the white robes were fairly thin and transparent, meaning it was possible to read the back of t-shirts people were wearing. But I do want to point out that the double bassist did wear a suit. Ok, enough about that.
I also want to mention that the teenager carrying the crucifix was African American. I only bring that up because I have seen this before. Every single person in that church was white except for an elderly black lady and that teenager. This isn’t the first time I have seen this. It always strikes me as odd when the only person of color in the church is put center-stage. Yeah, enough about that too.
A woman from the congregation led the first reading, which came from Malachi 3:1-4 -
See, I am sending my messenger to prepare the way before me, and the Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. The messenger of the covenant in whom you delight - indeed, he is coming, says the Lord of hosts. But who can endure the day of his coming, and who can stand when he appears? For heis like a refiner’s fire and like washers’ soap. He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the descendents of Levi and refine them like gold and silver until they present offerings to the Lord in righteousness. Then the offering of Judah and Jerusalem will be pleasing to the Lord, as in days of old and, as in former years.
After a song, the woman lead the second reading, Philippians 1:3-11 -
I thank my God for every remembrance of you, always in every one of my prayers for all of you, praying with joy for your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now. I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. It is right for me to think this way about all of you, because I hold you in my heart, for all of you are my partners in God’s grace, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. For God is my witness, how I long for all of you with the tender affection of Christ Jesus. And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight to help you to determine what really matters, so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless, having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.
Another song and then the pastor rose to the elevated lectern to read the Gospel: Luke 3:1-6 -
In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee, and his brother Philip ruler of the region of Ituraea and Trachonitis, and Lysanias ruler of Abilene, during the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas, the word of God came to John son of Zechariah in the wilderness. He went into all the region around the Jordan, proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins, as it is written in the book of the words of the prophet Isaiah, “The voice of one crying out in the wilderness: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’”
Next came the sermon, which was pretty short, but I thought it was incredibly creative and powerful.
He began with an echo of the Gospel reading.
On the sixth day of the twelfth month, in the neighborhood of Andersonville in the city of Chicago, in the region of the Great Lakes, in the nation of the United States of America, during the final days of the presidency of Joseph Biden, the parish pastor received a message. And that message said, “You are out of data storage.”
Needless to say, this was followed by a laugh.
The coming week will include the project of deleting unimportant email, test, and social media messages. And he admitted that sometimes he is overwhelmed by the number of messages. And as a result, it is easy to be less receptive to messages and it is more difficult to sort through and evaluate them.
And in this season of advent, the pastor pointed out, we are all waiting for Jesus’s birth. The first message comes from Prophet Malachi.
In Paul’s letter to the Phillipians, Paul realizes after his experience being imprisoned how to sort out what matters and what doesn’t (and to harken back to the beginning of the pastor’s sermon, how to decide what to put in the priority folder vs the junk folder).
And then in the Gospel, John shows up in the wilderness and delivers a message, the pastor reminds us: “Prepare the way of the Lord. Make His paths straight.” It is our duty to make sure the way is marked clearly for others, to clear the way when it is blocked.
That is God’s gift to those who are in the wilderness, whatever form that wilderness might take (personal, family, community, etc.), there is always a way out of the wilderness, but you have to discern what is true.
If a voice is encouraging you to make things harder for your neighbors, that is a false voice. If it is asking you to create obstacles for those around you so that they will become lost or lose the pass, that voice is not trustworthy. If that voice in the wilderness is resulting in making life more difficult for someone, that voice is false.
The voice that is calling out in the wilderness from Christ is always about helping others make the journey, that they might be able to navigate the path.
So, he instructed, listen more carefully these days for the voice crying out in the wilderness that seeks to make things better for your neighbor, and then invite them to walk with you.
Wow. Great message and great job tying the lessons of the Bible to our lives today.
The sermon was followed by a moment of silence to reflect on what we just heard. That seems like a nice idea.
Next came the Children’s message, which was a bit surprising because in most churches, the message for children comes before the sermon so that the kids don’t have to sit through the sermon. Four kids went to the front for this (although there were a few who clearly weren’t comfortable leaving their parents and remained in the pews).
The man who had been running the live stream gave the message, which he said was about symbolism. He only spoke to the kids for a couple of minutes at most. I’m not sure it made much sense because he never really discussed symbolism. He carried a bucket that held cleaning materials and explained that we are coming into a busy time of year when Jesus is born. And we are told that Jesus will bring us peace and answers as well as make our lives better. The world will become clean (hence the bucket and the 409). He concluded with a message that at this time of year there is a lot of symbolism of good things to come.
Following the children’s message, the female pastor offered prayers of intercession. It seemed that she was reading things that people in the congregation may have submitted. There were LOTS of names, mostly first names. But then every now and then interspersed with those names were things like “hostages” or “those killed in Gaza” or “those who have been in disasters.”
Then we were asked to greet each other. I never saw name tags anywhere, but the program asked us to be sensitive to the indications on the name tags that refer to each person’s comfort level. A yellow square means a distanced elbow of fist bump (good God - how weird and awkward). A red circle means a verbal, distanced greeting only. Well, every single person who came over to greet me shook my hand - which is the normal way to greet someone, honestly.
For the offertory, the choir got up from their chairs and faced us. The ushers collected for the offertory, and the pastor prepared for communion.
We did say the Lord’s Prayer, but it was different than any other I have heard:
Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. Save us from the trial and deliver us from evil. For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and forever. Amen.
For communion (the meal), the two pastors both put on masks. Ugh. No one in the congregation (other than the man doing the livestream - oh, and he took the mask off when he did the Children’s Message!). It seems strange because the masks do nothing (yes, check the science), but they do cause a barrier between people, something I would think a pastor would NOT be interested in doing. It creates a separation.
Then they set a table in front of the altar with the bread and with both a cup with red wine and a cup with white grape juice. Congregants took a piece of bread from the male pastor and dipped into one of the drinks offered by the female pastor.
And after the benediction, the choir, the altar boy, and the pastors processed out.
Honestly, the service was pretty standard stuff. However, in many churches, this kind of service feels sort of robotic, as if everyone is just going through the motions. But this church did not feel like that. I can’t explain it, but the energy felt like everyone was engaged.
Just a final couple of points about this visit. One, someone in the congregation actually crossed himself at one point. I looked this up because I was surprised. Here is what I found:
The sign of the cross is ecumenical, in that it is used by the Orthodox, Roman Catholics, Lutherans, and Episcopalians, and is slowly increasing in use among mainline Protestants. It is also a remembrance of the death and resurrection of our Lord: the center of our faith. The sign of the cross is a treasured part of our heritage as Lutherans, because the practice was encouraged and used by Martin Luther himself.
I also noticed that some people bowed, primarily to the crucifix, but not everyone. My research on this told me that the practice of bowing in the Lutheran church varies widely and is usually practiced mostly by clergy..
Finally, the service contained lots of music! And the little “jazz” band was fantastic. It was a lot of fun and really impacted the environment of the room.
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