Forty Years and Counting

On November 17, 1985 a group of people gathered in Dublin, Ohio to start a church.They didn’t know if it would work or not. They didn’t even know if this small town would become a city, or if other people would move out to the northwest side of Columbus, or if people still wanted to be part of a church family. 

But they took a leap of faith and stepped forward into the future, trusting that the love of Jesus Christ would take hold in this community and be a force for good in the world.

They were right. Their commitment, their desire, their dream bore fruit and became what we know today as Prince of Peace Lutheran Church in Dublin, Ohio.

That was 40 years ago. A lot has happened in the past four decades. And we are glad to be wrapping up a year of celebration with an Anniversary Gala, a new bell Tower, and four gifts of $40,000 each to four of our partners in ministry. What a year!

But being a church isn’t just about what we’ve done and become, it’s about whose we are.

I believe that through our baptism, Christ has claimed us and made us his own.  Washed in the waters of salvation, we have become a people who are open to a new way of living and being.

I love that when we do a baptism at Prince of Peace, we conclude the water blessing with these words from St. Paul in Galatians:

Pour out your Holy Spirit; wash away sin in this cleansing water;  clothe the baptize with Christ; and claim your daughters and sons, no longer slave and free, no longer male and female, but one with all the baptized in Christ Jesus.

If I were St. Paul, I would have thrown in “no longer rich or poor, no longer white or brown or black, no longer republican or democrat, no longer me and you, no longer us and them . . . “  You get the idea.

What a group of people did 40 years ago was to trust that Christ would unite us and get rid of all the things that separate us.

They were right, and a church was formed.

In Christ,

Pastor John D. Morris