Page 17 - Lenten Devotional 2023

Week 1: February 27-March 3 (cont)

loved children. Her wiry gray hair framed a face that nearly always had a smile. She
adored each of her grandchildren in the gentle, matter of fact, not-gushy way that love

shows up in people with Swedish roots. The childhood welcome story I remember most,
a snapshot embedded with sound that I can bring to life at any time, is my Grandma
Patterson’s expression of pure delight and the lilt of her voice when we arrived at her

door. For me, it was as simple as this: When she saw me, with arms wide, my beaming
Grandma excitedly called my name, “Barbara!” I can hear it to this day. It was more than
enough to last me for a lifetime. No one could convince me that God’s welcome, whether

now or for eternity, is anything less.
~Barbara Johnson Frank (50 yrs with First Lutheran)

Adult Choir was immediately welcoming for me. I had sung in church choirs since I was
7 years old. I had been attending and singing in a choir in another congregation soon
after I arrived in Lincoln. The opportunity to sing in a mass choir for a synod gathering

was offered. I went and First’s music minister, Bonita Johnsen, directed. She personally
was welcoming and open in that role. As I found a home at First, I always had a “family”

to sit with each Sunday.
~Susan Myren (36 yrs with First Lutheran)

Soon after Linda and I moved back to Lincoln so that I could begin graduate school at
the University of Nebraska (late 1970s), Linda's sister-in-law, Janie, called me to
"Welcome me to the family". Janie and I had never met, she only knew me by name only,

yet she went out of her way to extend a welcome to me. While I was very appreciate of
her gesture, I was also somewhat taken aback because I already had a family, my own,
which was located primarily in and around Lincoln at that time. Yet, over the years, I've

come to appreciate what Janie did because she was being welcoming to someone she did
not know, but whom she trusted as one who could and would be a new valued member
of her existing family simply because of my relationship with her sister-in-law.

~Les Carlson (21 yrs with First Lutheran)