Dear friends in Christ, You are almost certainly familiar with the Fergus Falls Cyclone of 1919. An event like that leaves a long, lasting memory on a place, even after all those who were there are gone. On June 22, 1919, the cyclone struck Fergus Falls and killed 57 people, making it the second deadliest tornado in Minnesota history. The tornado destroyed large parts of Fergus Falls. At the time, Trinity was located at the
In this 150th anniversary year here at Trinity I want to share with you another interesting story I unearthed from the Trinity archives (that is to say, random nooks and crannies around the church). It is a story told through letters I found in a file dating to 1958. In 1958, it may be that the most well-known LCMS Lutheran was Rev. Oswald Hoffman. He had served as the director of the LCMS Department of Public
Dear friends in Christ, Trinity has entered her 150th year of ministry here in Fergus Falls. The congregation was founded on August 10, 1873. Throughout the next year we will be marking this anniversary, leading toward our chief celebration, scheduled for next summer on August 13, 2023. Through this anniversary year, I will tell a few stories of the congregation’s history, as I discover them. You may have noticed in the narthex that recently we hung a
Dear friends in Christ, As I am writing this, this past Sunday we held a “Multigenerational Bible Treasure Hunt” here at Trinity. Adrianne Bolland put in a lot of effort to set it up – you should thank her! Thank you Adrianne! I mostly just observed and tried to keep up with Sophia so that my wife and other children could participate. But it is difficult for me to find the right words to express
Freedom. Independence. Nothing captures the American spirit like these words, and at no time do we celebrate these things as much as around the 4th of July. One might wonder how blowing stuff up (fireworks) came to be one of the chief means of celebrating our national independence, but that is a subject for another day. Instead I would like to talk a little bit about our freedom as Christians, our freedom in Christ. Martin Luther