Arvin Pirness | The Voice of Zion May 2024 - News & Notes Article --
Mother’s Day is May 12. Motherhood is a heavenly calling. When reflecting on her mother and her role as a mother, Verna Jacobson wrote in the May 2006 Voice of Zion “Our role as a mother is to instruct, create a loving atmosphere at home, teach morals, manners, and respect for each other, and above all to teach the importance of the forgiveness of sins. Forgiveness is the manna of Heaven that feeds our souls.” This reflection remains ever new and sound.
The notice and agenda for the 2024 LLC Annual Meeting, to be held in Kelso, Washington, has been sent to all LLC member congregations. Included in the packet is the 2025 LLC Operating Plan titled, “My help cometh from the Lord.” The Operating Plan is presented in video form like last year and as an electronic PDF file. We encourage congregations to schedule an event to discuss the agenda and the 2025 Operating plan. This will help prepare your delegates to serve your congregation and the Zion in North America at the annual meeting. May God bless the preparations for this meeting.
Update on LLC Activities
Camps
The 2024 Camp Season has begun with Ministers Camp at Stony Lake. Camp work weeks will be held at Hasscib Lake and Kamp Kipa in May. Please consider volunteering your time and effort by contacting local camp board members for details.
Each Camp Board has taken a more focused role in managing their respective camp centers, in alignment with strategic plans established by the LLC Board and subcommittees.
May 15 is the deadline to register for Peace Gardens. This long-standing event was canceled last year due to not meeting a minimum registration. This year we are facing a similar situation. This event has been a great blessing for many years for the participants. Please encourage your friends and acquaintances to register by May 15.
Education
“Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world” (Matt. 28:19,20). The LLC Education Committee has chosen this portion of Scripture as the foundation for its planning and guidance in this all-important work.
Mission Department
The annual Ministers Camp was held on April 5–7. Approximately 100 ministers gathered at Stony Lake Camp, including brothers from Sweden and Finland who had traveled for the biennial joint meetings of the SFC, SRK and LLC. We experienced love, unity and joy amongst participants during presentations, discussions and smaller visits.
We are arranging a webinar for the Area Mission Committees as they begin their planning and event scheduling for 2025 service and events.
The believers in Ecuador are anticipating the group trip at the end of May through the first week of June. The group will accompany ministers Keith Moll and Adrian Pirness on a mission trip.
Communications
Minnesota youth spent a Friday evening in April and an early-May Saturday evening at Elk River, Minn., church singing songs together. These joyous evenings of song were recorded, and these recordings will be made into an album to be released at a later date.
LLC Communications department hosted an online Content Creators Workshop. This online-only event included workshop sessions for writers, artists and those involved in services broadcast content creation. One highlight of the workshop was a guest lecture by Harri Vähäjylkkä of SRK, who spoke on the topic of believer fiction. Another highlight was discussion among both writers and artists around a plan to create illustrated children’s books of Bible stories.
At this time of year, we are finalizing our content for the Summer Services online broadcast. Many, many hours of work have gone into creating, producing and editing the programs. We are thankful to the dozens of believers from across the continent who have contributed to this work in greater and smaller ways.
The Päivämies, SRK’s weekly newspaper, is interested in finding correspondents. Any North American believer who would be interested in contributing writings and photographs to Päivämies is welcome to contact us. There are no particular language requirements; the staff there will translate any writings into Finnish. They are interested in writings on the joys, everyday lives and even sorrows that North American believers encounter in their life and faith on this continent.
There’s still time to apply for opisto scholarships for the 2025–2026 opisto year! The deadline is May 15. Find the application on the LLC website.