May 2025 Update

Arvin Pirness | The Voice of Zion May 2025 - News & Notes Article --

The month of May presents a season of change. In the north, nature exhibits her full splendor after waking from winter rest. In some areas, school ends, and many graduation ceremonies are held.

Dear graduate, we wish you God’s abundant blessings as you prepare for life as an adult. May you protect and preserve the most important matter in life – the gift of faith that holds the hope of heaven.

May also marks Mother’s Day. Dear mothers, may God richly bless you for the care that you provide for your family.

Updates on LLC Activities  

• The notice and agenda for the 2025 LLC Annual Meeting, to be held in Outlook, Saskatchewan, has been sent to all LLC member congregations. Included in the packet is the 2026 LLC Operating Plan, titled, “Whatever you do, do it with all your heart, as unto God.” The Operating Plan is presented as a PDF file and a video. We encourage congregations to make this document available to all members as they meet to prepare delegates for the annual meeting.

Facilities

• Facility planning is always ongoing. The Silver Springs camp board has requested a building committee to assist with constructing a permanent pavilion at Silver Springs. The purpose of the pavilion is to provide a place for service events and additional day uses, such as workshops and seminars. The planning for this structure is in an early stage.

Education

• The Mission Work Steering Group has developed a plan for nine teams to support mission work throughout the world. One of the teams is the Learning Materials and Education Team. This team is made up of eight people from the LLC. Currently, the team’s focus is organizing the work, identifying stakeholders and establishing a structure. Additional information will be forthcoming as this team begins its work. 

• The 2025 Camp Season began early April. The first camp at Stony Lake was held April 4–6, with just over 100 ministers in attendance. Camps are an important part of many believers’ lives. We often hear how beneficial days spent at camp have been on a personal level. 

Mission 

• The spring season is a busy time for mission trips with many brothers traveling from Scandinavia and North America to Ecuador and Africa. Upcoming trips are noted on page 18. Please remember in your prayers the brothers and their families at home as they serve. The believers look forward to these opportunities to gather and hear God’s Word with visiting ministers.

• As summer approaches, we are beginning to plan for confirmation schools in global mission work. If God allows, we will have a confirmation school in Ghana in August and possibly a similar camp for adults in Kenya.

• The Mission Work Steering Group has had initial meetings with each of the nine teams that support the global mission work efforts. The teams are beginning to consider the work in their respective area. Each team involves many volunteers that support this expanding work.

Pastoral

• The 2025 Ministers Camp was held at Stony Lake Camp in early April. There were just over one hundred ministers that attended in person and around fifteen were able to join online. We experienced the blessing of one spirit. The topics for discussion were around Doctrine, God the Giver of Life, Music in the Congregation and Discernment. 

• With warm memories of Winter Services in our minds, we continue the planning of the Summer Services in Outlook, Sask. Many ministers throughout North America as well as from our sister organizations in Finland and Sweden will be called to serve at these services. 

• The third Bible Translation Communication has been shared with the congregations. It has been important for us to discuss this topic openly in our congregations. Through these discussions, the delegates are able to receive guidance prior to the 2025 Annual Meeting where they will have an opportunity to discuss the Bible translation topic with other congregation delegates.

Communications

• We will hold our annual Content Creators Workshop September 12–14 at Stony Lake Camp in Minnesota. A content creator is one who contributes written material, art, digital media or music content, or one who contributes their skills and time in support of publications and broadcast work. A content creator is anyone who contributes to any of our projects in any way. We extend a warm thank-you to all who write, take photographs, create art, edit digital media such as audio or video, and otherwise contribute to anything we produce. We invite you to the workshop to meet other contributors—content creators—and to hear interesting discussions on how this work can support believers in their walk of faith.

• Editing is complete on a fiction work called Time for Words by Heli Jurmu. Next will come the layout process and then after a final check it will be off to the printers. We look forward to publishing this first work of fiction by a North American author.

• At a recent Print Publications committee meeting, there was discussion on our children’s magazine, The Shepherd’s Voice. Subscription numbers have remained at the same level for quite a few years. Do you subscribe to Shepherd’s Voice? Or is there a family with young children you know who might enjoy this publication? You can use the print magazine and the audio available on Hearken together so that young readers can listen and follow along!

• See the New on Hearken! feature on page 18 to find out what new things will be posted on Hearken in coming weeks.

• LLC’s Opisto Scholarship Fund supports those who have received scholarships to spend a year at one of three opistos in Finland. Consider making a donation to support opisto students! Or consider asking opisto alumni in your congregation to host a fundraiser for the fund. Over the past four decades, hundreds of North American youth have received a scholarship and spent a year studying abroad.