Music in Worship

At First Congregational United Church of Christ we are blessed with wonderful music in worship thanks to strong choirs, strong musical leadership, and very talented organists. Ever since 1990, working with choir directors, organists, and the Music Committee has been one of Nancy's assignments, first as Director of Church Life and then as Minister of Church Life. I want to thank Nancy, the Music Committee, our Choir Directors and our organists across the years for the way they have inspired our worship week in and week out at Tenth and Locust.

While I was working on this article, Nancy was up in the sanctuary going over the ins and outs of our service with our next organist, Onar Haugli. We have been very blessed in recent years in discovering the musical talents of students at Wartburg Theological Seminary who were in the midst of transitioning from church music leaders to being ordained Lutheran ministers. J. Marvin Havard served us from the Fall of 2005 until the Summer of 2007. Marvin was ordained to the Christian Ministry on June 21 at Zion Evangelical Lutheran Church in Grand Rapids, Minnesota. Marvin had been the organist at that church for ten years before he came to Dubuque for seminary. He will now become the pastor at Littlefork Lutheran Church in Littlefork, MN, just fifteen miles from International Falls. We wish him well as he serves his first congregation.

Back in the Spring of 2007, Marvin gave me the name of Matt Masko as a possible organist when he went off for his intern year. Matt was responsible for eleven choirs and ensembles at a large Disciples of Christ congregation in West Des Moines before coming to Wartburg Theological Seminary. Matt had majored in Piano Pedagogy at Drake University. He has served us with great flair across the past two years. It is now Matt's time in his education to do an intern year. However, he has agreed to return to be our organist for one more year once the intern year is complete. Enter Onar Haugli. You guessed it. Onar is a student at Wartburg Theological Seminary. He is Norwegian and has served as a church organist and choir director for a number of congregations in the Church of Norway. Onar is in a six year program at a seminary in Oslo, Norway, but is spending two years in Dubuque. He is married to Erica who is from Boise, Idaho. Their children are Ella, Josiah, and Eden. Onar first played for us on June 28 and he will be back with us in August. Please give him a warm welcome.

Let us continue to praise the Lord with inspiring music in worship at First Congregational United Church of Christ.

Your servant in Christ,
Dr. Ken Bickel

PSALM 150

Praise the Lord!
Praise God in his sanctuary;
praise him in his mighty firmament!
Praise him for his mighty deeds;
praise him according to his surpassing greatness!
Praise him with trumpet sound;
praise him with lute and harp!
Praise him with tambourine and dance;
praise him with strings and pipe!
Praise him with clanging cymbals;
praise him with loud clashing cymbals!
Let everything that breathes praise the Lord!
Praise the Lord!

Notes from Nancy

Last weekend, Ken and I and our grandchildren headed to the Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium to see the new exhibit called "Lizards on the Loose." It was pretty amazing to see such a wide diversity of lizards, although sometimes you couldn't find them because they blended in so well with their environment.

There were tree lizards and flying geckos, long tailed skinks and a big iguana. Some were brown, some green and some spotted. Thank goodness they have shrunk in size since the age of the dinosaurs when they could be much larger than humans. Needless to say, they weren't on the loose for this exhibit although they can be found in their natural habitat all over the world.

What would it be like if we Christians were on the loose? We too come in all shapes and sizes but too many of us think of our Christian faith as something we practice confined within the four walls of the Sanctuary. When we return to our natural habitat, too often we blend in with the environment. We become so comfortable in our culture that many would have a tough time picking out who the followers of Christ really are. What if we really were on the loose, looking for ways to change our culture of consumerism, shallowness and violence.

Some of you are on the loose, volunteering here and there, serving the community, advocating for the poor, leading our youth, spreading your money around to the benefit of all. You live out your faith seven days a week and come to worship to be renewed for your work outside the church. You are making a difference. But what if every one who professes to be a Christian were out and about feeding the hungry, providing shelter for all, cleaning up the environment, mentoring children, speaking out against violence in whatever form it exists, building bridges of peace, creating closer community, and modeling humility, compassion, respect, and gentility?

Then there would be no confusion as to who is just an obnoxious talking head pretending to be a Christian or a self-righteous, self-promoting religious head who has distorted the Gospel to wield power. Christians on the loose would stand up and stand out and maybe the world would take notice. Maybe the world might change...

From the Youth Director

Dear Youth,

I hope all of you are having a great summer. Just because it is summer does not mean you should take a vacation from church. If you are in town, starting your week with your church family should be top on your priority list. I do not feel like my week begins right unless I go to church. It is a refreshing way to start the week. I know you may not have the activities you have during the year, but this is not a reason not to attend. Please put church on your calendar every Sunday. God and your church family are waiting for you. Hope to see you there! God bless and be safe.

- Julia

Upcoming Events

July 12: Ice Cream or lunch at Dairy Queen on Rhomberg at Noon. This is for all youth 4 years old-12th grade. Please bring the money you plan on spending for lunch.

July 16: 6th-12th grade youth "boating on the river" with the Shaws. We will start at 1:00 p.m. Please let me know if you plan on attending. Location to be announced later.

Aug. 14: Noah's Ark Family Trip. Everyone is invited to go to Noah's Ark in the Wisconsin Dells. Please sign up with me by August 1st so that I can get tickets, if you plan on attending. The cost is $30 per person. All youth going without a parent will need to get a permission slip signed. Youth need to be going into 3rd Grade to attend alone and they must be able to swim. Come end your summer with your church family and a splashing good time.

In Support of Education

"If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free."
John 8:31b-32

May was the month for many in our church to focus on education. Members graduated, children of members graduated, and even grandchildren of members graduated from high school and college. The United Church of Christ, as well as our ancestors in the Congregational Church and the Evangelical and Reformed Church, has always emphasized the importance of education. Harvard University, Yale University, Franklin & Marshall College, Oberlin College, Grinnell College, Elmhurst College, Ripon College and Lakeland College are just a few of the colleges that have been established by our ancestors in the faith. Christians started colleges in the first place to train ministers, but they also saw a necessity to train doctors, lawyers, teachers, and others. Christian colleges have usually been Liberal Arts colleges, encouraging students to balance the arts and the sciences and always encouraging students to learn more about God's creation and their place in the world. The motto of Lebanon Valley College, the Methodist college that Nancy and I graduated from, was taken from John 8:32—"You will know the truth and the truth will make you free." As we celebrate graduations, may we all celebrate the freedom that comes from knowledge of God and knowledge about the wonders of God's good earth, including the arts and the sciences.

As we turn to June and the end of the school year, we have a wonderful celebration ahead of us. Church member John Burgart will be retiring as the Superintendent of the Dubuque Community Schools. A festive day for thanksgiving is planned for June 7 at the Grand River Center. John has done a super job for our children and for our educational system in Dubuque. He deserves our thanks! Also, the Dubuque Community Foundation has established the "Burgart Fund for Educational Excellence" which will be used to accelerate school achievement for years to come and you are invited to make a gift to this new fund. It is a joyful way to honor John's enthusiasm for excellence in education. We all celebrate this month with John Burgart.

Your servant in Christ,
Dr. Ken Bickel

Notes from Nancy

The Public Relations Committee has been brainstorming numerous ideas about how we might get the word out about our church to the new IBM employees who will be coming to town this summer.

The UCC banner is about to go back up, we are considering a free hot dog and ice cream day, we are ordering a few items we might give out with our name on them, and we are composing a couple of ads to go in the newspaper in late summer. While all these are good evangelistic approaches, non of them compare to ...YOU!

All the church growth experts will tell you that the most effective way to get visitors to church is by invitation of a neighbor or a friend. It is your enthusiasm, your friendliness that works best in welcoming others into your church family. Many of the John Deere retirees who are members of our church, can tell you about how they were invited to First Congregational UCC by a friend or neighbor when they first came to town. Many of them said that they were going to visit a number of churches but once they entered the doors of our church, they never went anywhere else. After all, we do have a beautiful Sanctuary and some of the neatest and friendliest people in the world!

With the number of new IBM employees making their way to our fair city, you are sure to rub shoulders with them at your place of business, in your neighborhood, at your child's soccer game, in a restaurant, or at the gym. Please consider inviting them to help them find a great church home. Some of these folks might be churched and anxious to connect with a faith community and others might be under churched or unchurched. Invite them! If you would like some evangelism tools like brochures, newsletters, directories, free admission cards, etc, come to the church office and we'll give you a supply.

Remember there is no better evangelism tool than YOU!

From the Youth Director

Dear Youth,

Summer is here! Congrats to all of our grads. We are all so proud of you. Good luck in whatever the future holds. Do not forget your faith on life's journey. We will have a picnic in June at Eagle Point Park. This event is for all youth and their families.

In August we will take a trip to Noah's Ark where everyone in the church will be invited. Please make youth group activities a priority this summer. God bless and have a great month.

Celebrating Our Heritage

First Congregational UCC 1839 to 2009
170th Anniversary

It was on May 12, 1839, that the Rev. James A. Clark gathered five men and fourteen women together into a new congregation called First Congregational Church. Rev. Clark was a Presbyterian minister who was employed by the Congregational Home Mission Society. In 1839 Dubuque had a population of 1,300 people. The church's first meeting house was the Old Stone Church, located just east of Washington Park, where US Bank is located today. The congregation moved to the Main Street Church in 1846, and the church was located at the current site of American Trust and Savings Bank. At this time Dubuque was the largest city in Iowa, reaching a population of 12,626 in 1863.

To meet the needs of this expanding community, the members of First Congregational Church began in 1856 to plan to build a large sanctuary at Tenth and Locust. A financial crisis in the nation in 1857 made the congregation slow down its building plans. The first worship service in the Social Room was held on July 18, 1858. When the building was dedicated on April 1, 1860, nine hundred Dubuquers and guests attended the dedicatory service. The entire building cost $41,000 to erect and only Amanda Matthews was on the membership roles at the time of the dedication from the founding nineteen members. When Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox on April 9, 1865, the members of the congregation rang the church bell through the night to celebrate the end of the Civil War. The exuberant celebration resulted in the cracking of the bell.

The congregation purchased a Johnson Organ from Westfield, Massachusetts, at a cost of $4,000. In January of 1869 it was brought across a frozen Mississippi and once it was set in place it was declared to be the largest and best organ in America's west. We use that same organ today, 140 years after its installation. In 1886, our current bell was hung in the tower to replace the one that cracked after the news of Lee's capitulation. In 1972, the church began construction of an educational building on the site of the former home of Martha Baker. At a cost of $375,000, the new building was built to provide over 11,000 square feet of space for Christian education, church meetings, and administrative offices. The building was dedicated on May 11, 1973.

After 170 years, the work of First Congregational United Church of Christ is far from done. Worship and mission continue to be the centerpiece of our focus as a congregation. There are people in Dubuque and our surrounding communities who are living without the Gospel of Jesus Christ and there are others living without the basic necessities of life. May our ministry in 2009 focus on spreading the love of Jesus Christ to those within our church family and to those beyond our gates. Together we stand on the shoulders of our ancestors in faith as we live out our faith. Our stated purpose in our Constitution states: "The avowed purpose of this Church shall be to celebrate the Sacraments; to realize Christian fellowship and unity within the Church and the Church Universal: to be open and welcoming to all people; to render loving service toward humankind; and to strive for righteousness, justice, and peace." As we celebrate 170 years of our history, may we reach out and invite those who are new to the community and those in need of a loving church family to walk with us in the Christian faith.

Your servant in Christ,
Dr. Ken Bickel