Well, you know…

…it only took, what?, six years for me to finally figure out that having ethernet in my study would be a good thing. Got it done today, thank you Madisontelco. Cindi and I love to sit in here in the evenings, and it is such a delightful work space: small and cozy, but quite peaceful. And I just love writing at the table that sat on my grandmother’s back porch and where we shared many a meal as a family. 

P.S. YES, the rug is off center due to the electric fireplace. And YES it bothers me every single day. 

Thanksgiving Feast (for Jaime)

Dear Northern Brother, this is the menu this year:

Pre-feast

Deviled eggs (half plain, half topped with smoked salmon)

Various cheeses and cheese balls and crackers

Feast

The usual turkey smoked on grill

Gravy (both regular and also a carnivore version)

Rope sausages

Twice baked mashed potatoes

Sautéed mushrooms and bacon (in a wine reduction)

Broccoli casserole

Sweet tater casserole

Cranberries

Homemade light rolls

After-feast

Pumpkin pie

Apple pie

Chocolate pie

Dark Chocolates 

Pecan pie

Beverages

Whiskey, Wines, Water, Coffee served with various liqueur options, and Kid’s “wines”

This year, we should be serving 20 or so. 

Homily for the Last Sunday of the Church Year 2025

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

People loved by God, did you notice the tension between the Gospel reading and the hymn we just sang by Pastor Philip Nicolai, and on which Bach wrote that marvelous cantata with the joyous duet we also just heard (and also the prelude)? You see, there’s an edge to the Gospel reading. A warning implicit in it. You hear it and begin to wonder: am I like the wise or the foolish virgins?  Do I have oil for my lamp? What is the oil? Will I be ready when the Bridegroom shows up? But then you sang a hymn which simply assumed that you are NOT among the foolish, but the wise. It tells you to get ready to meet your Bridegroom with the joy and confidence. He will welcome you and usher you right into the wedding feast that has no end. “We enter all the wedding hall to eat the Supper at thy call” and “Therefore will we eternally sing hymns of praise and joy to thee.”

I’d like to ponder that tension with you by way of a quote that I encountered on X (that’s the old Twitter). I’ve come to know and treasure posts my friend Sarah makes. She lives out on the east coast. She wasn’t raised Lutheran, but came to our Church as an adult. She wrote this a while back: “The thing I love so much about being Lutheran is that I literally just live my life, trying to love my neighbor as much as possible, and I don’t ever even contemplate my salvation. Like it’s not even a question whether I will go to Heaven. Not because I’m an antinomian- but because I know losing Heaven would only happen if I intentionally chose to lose heaven. There is no accidental way I will end up losing my salvation, and that’s pretty nice.” 

I smiled a big one when I read her words. They provoked a lot of people online who just didn’t like her confidence and tried to suggest that it was sinful presumption. But she wasn’t buying that. She knew it wasn’t presumption at all to simply trust the promises of salvation God makes in His Word: “He who began a good work in you will bring it to completion on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.” Philippians 1. Or again, as St. Paul so recklessly assured the Thessalonians in today’s epistle: “God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.” 1 Thes. 5:9

So there’s the key to the whole puzzle: “through our Lord Jesus Christ.” It was in confidence in Jesus and His sacrifice upon Golgotha and the perfect righteousness He delivers in Baptism, that Pastor Nicolai wrote his two great hymns “Wake, Awake” and “O Morning Star.” He wanted to sing the assurance of God’s salvation right down into the hearts of his members. And he wanted them to sing that joy into each other in the face of the most horrific death and sorrow. They didn’t have to fear if they were wise or foolish, provided only, as Sarah said, they don’t “intentionally chose to lose heaven.” Provided only you place yourself intentionally where the oil flows, God takes care of keeping you in repentance and faith and bringing you home to the Feast that never ends. 

So notice that the two groups of virgins were alike in every point (including falling asleep) except for carrying the extra oil. If you ask what the oil means in Jesus’ parable, an old Lutheran study bible answers simply: “the oil is the gift of the Holy Spirit, who through Word and Sacrament kindles faith, love, and all good, preparing the heart for joyful service.” (Weimarische Bibel-Werk). I love that. You see, being a Lutheran Christian is as simple and joyous as this: YOU plant yourself where the oil flows. You live at the receiving end of the Word and the Sacraments, and then you can trust that God will do everything to finish the good work He’s begun in you.

He uses the preaching of His Law to keep you humble, so that you know you have zero righteousness that avails before Him. As Isaiah said so graphically, your righteousnesses are like a filthy menstrual rag. Your righteousness, not your sin. The best you can do, not the worst. The Law will never let you believe that you can stand before God on the basis of your good actions. It crushes that pride in you all the time. As James said: “For the person who keeps all of the laws except one is as guilty as a person who has broken all of God’s laws.” James 2:10 NLT The Law humbles us all by showing that we all stand condemned. BUT God also uses the preaching of His Gospel to fill you with joy! For it hands you JESUS as the One who has perfectly fulfilled every demand of God’s holy Law for you and who has fully paid for all of your sin upon His cross, and who gives you in His Sacraments His own righteousness. The preaching of Law and Gospel and the gifts of Baptism, Absolution, the Eucharist: THESE are the means by which the Holy Spirit is continually poured out upon you, and through them He will do His work. He will make you ready for that great Day of the Savior’s appearing by keeping you in saving faith. You just live where the oil flows, where the Holy Spirit is given, and He’ll take care of the rest.

And that means that you can sing “My beloved is mine and I am His, and heaven is where you are certainly headed.” The great joy of the wedding feast is that you have a Bridegroom who is exceedingly rich. He became one with us and died in order to bear our poverty and our wretchedness and sin, He now LIVES that you might become one with Him and share in all the riches and treasures of His grace. That’s what He reaches you today at His banqueting table, His Holy Altar. 

So do not be afraid, people loved by God! Keep on hearing Jesus’ Word and receiving all that He wants to give you in His means of grace, and you will have oil enough and to spare. But DO fear wandering from His Word and His Sacraments, because not one of us can sustain faith on our own. Faith can only be received, not possessed, and the means of receiving that faith is simply the faithful use of the means of grace. 

Yes, my friend Sarah nailed this one. The joy of being a Lutheran Christian is that you don’t need to worry about going to heaven. He’s covered that fully and completely. You just need to make sure you always give a listen to His Words both of Law and Gospel, and that you joyfully receive all that He gives you. And then it’s His job to get you home. And He will. 

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Gary Dean Steinmann Funeral Homily

Robin, Jay, Rebecca, Dustin and Whitaker; Kirk and Dan, family and friends of Gary Steinmann, today is November 22. Thus it was 65 years and 9 days ago that Carl and Betty walked through those doors and carried their little one to old Pastor Deichmann who standing at that font. Though he was so little and his life stretched forth before him bright with promise, they knew even then that this day would certainly come. They just didn’t know when. So they were determined to do what Lutheran Christians have always done: to pick up their baby and hand him over to Jesus, so that Jesus could forgive all his sins and fill him with a life so strong and powerful that death itself could not take it away from him. 

And for the same reason they made sure he attended St. Paul school where the Words and promises of God were pressed into his heart and mind, and even after many years, he still valued and loved all he learned from his teachers there, including Mrs. Judy Steinmann. And then when he was 14, he himself stood before this very altar before Pr. Waldemar Hischke and spoke for himself the promises his parents made for him at his Baptism years before, and then with the laying on of hands, Pastor spoke over him the words of Matthew 5:5 (ESV) “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.” The meek are not wimpy. They are strong. They know that their heavenly Father has an outsized inheritance for them, and they are content to wait for it. 

 As Gary grew, it became evident that he was a most precise, neat and tidy man. I suppose in some ways that was rather a combo of both Carl and Betty. I remember Carl fussing over that picture over there until the hoofs on the sheep were just so; and of course Betty was our decorator in chief for the Sausage Supper for years beyond count. He didn’t like things messed up or out of order, and I suppose that inevitably led him into the medical profession. He knew, of course, that he was facing down an enemy that he could not finally win against, but I think something deep down inside of him raged against the disorder and pain and distress that sickness and death invariably bring in their wake. 

I will never forget when I rushed to the hospital after hearing that our dear Marianne Altevogt was in a bad way. She’d been having the most awful time, and Gary and the medical team had valiantly worked to save her life, but I knew when I turned the corridor and saw him leaning against the counter with a vacant look on his face, that they had lost this battle. It occurred to me as I rushed on to comfort Delmar that Gary looked like HE needed some comforting too. The mess of sickness and death. He fought it tooth and nail even knowing it was finally a losing battle. 

And it was in his battles for so many patients, that he found an ally and companion in you, Robin. You spoke your vows before this altar. And you and your children brought the joyful mess of another kind into his life. I’m a dad. Ask me how I know! And yet it was a joy he would not have traded for all the world. He truly landed on his feet with a ready made family and how he loved you all!

He was actually my PA for a short time, right before he retired. I got to experience his skillful compassion and care, and because I was his pastor as well as his patient, we got to talk a bit about life’s heartaches and trials.  And I could go on about him: about his love of flying; of playing the guitar; of fixing machines that were broken; of snowmobiling up north. Having a blast with life. But I think he’d be yelling at me at this point and saying: don’t forget to tell them about what really matters.

And that would be this: despite his love of perfection, Gary was NOT a perfect human being and he knew that. Whenever he gathered with the saints to worship in this room, he spoke the truth when he called himself a poor, miserable, sinner who had deserved God’s temporal and eternal punishment. He knew that truth about himself in the deep way that only a true perfectionist CAN. 

But he also knew a deeper and more profound truth: that despite his sin, he was loved and had a Redeemer, whose blood had answered for his every failing. If HE had failed to be perfect, Jesus had NOT and that Jesus had given that perfect righteousness to him right there in that font. Gary knew he would never be able to pass muster before God based on his own perfection. He clung for dear life to the perfection of Another, of His Savior. And that Savior promised him life everlasting as a free and undeserved gift.

So when I brought the Sacrament to Gary shortly before he died, I reminded him of why his parents had handed him over to Jesus when he was not even a month old. They knew who had eternal life and who didn’t. By the time I saw Gary, to use St. Paul’s analogy, his tent was wearing out. He had become skin and bones (even worse than when the tree fell on him) and he knew that the time for “putting off” his earthly tent was fast approaching. He made his confession again and then received the medicine of immortality. He received it with the promise of Jesus that whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, will never perish, and sweetest of all: and I will raise him up on the last day. Raise him up to receive that inheritance of the new heavens and new earth that Pastor Hischke had spoken of to him on the day of his confirmation.

I don’t think I’ve ever known such a long time to pass between a death and burial and interment. But it serves as a good reminder that while Gary’s spirit has been commended into the hands of the heavenly Father, he’s in the waiting room we call heaven. You see, what God has in store for him (for you and me too) isn’t DONE when we die, nor when we go to heaven. There’s more. And that’s what Gary’s waiting for now with all the forgiven sinners who are gathered together in the presence of the Lamb. They are waiting for the day when the One who was nailed to the cross, pouring out His blood to cover the sin of the world; when the One who was put into a tomb to sanctify our graves; when the One who was raised in a body incorruptible on that first Easter morning; when the One who has ascended into heaven and sits at His Father’s right hand…they’re waiting for the day when HE appears again in glory. For then it will all be done. Perfection at last.

Gary’s body raised in the same incorruption as Jesus’ own and united again with his soul: so that the full person is wholly healed, wholly restored. It’s no pipe dream. Gary knew that. He knew the One who had already passed that way and who promised him that “because I live, you will live too.” A body and soul finally made perfect, forever beyond the grip of the grave. He’s still waiting for that day with Carl and Betty, with all the saints, so that “what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.” And we wait for it too, and as we wait we pray: “Though my flesh awaits its raising still my soul continues praising. I am baptized into Christ. I’m a child of paradise.” Amen.

A Reminder!

If you haven’t ordered your copy yet of I Remember: A Life of Mary, it might be just the Christmas gift you need for children or grandchildren. Here’s the link: I Remember. Kelly Klages’ artwork is what will make this book one of their favorites!

A Perennial Irritation

I refer to the Collect of the Day for Trinity 14. In TLH this ran: 

Keep, we beseech Thee, O Lord, Thy Church with Thy perpetual mercy; and because the frailty of man without Thee cannot but fall, keep us ever by Thy help from all things hurtful and lead us to all things profitable to our salvation; through Jesus Christ…

But in LSB we have:

O Lord, keep Your Church with Your perpetual mercy; and because of our frailty we cannot but fall, keep us ever by Your help from all things hurtful and lead us to all things profitable to our salvation; through Jesus Christ…

I am not griping about the updated language, but about that clause after the first semicolon. It would work, I suppose, if we eliminated the “of” and read it “and because our frailty cannot but fall” or if you put back in “the frailty of man without You”, or even just went with a more literal rendering of the old Latin: “because it cannot continue in safety without you.” But as the prayer stands in LSB the sentence always strikes me as wrong (not theologically, but linguistically). 

Has anyone else noticed how off that collect sounds?

On Charlie

I had just finished writing an article for our Issues Etc. Journal yesterday when I checked in on X only to read what seemed about a thousand Kyrie eleisons arising and filling my news feed. Something horrible had happened, I knew, but it took a while to find out. At first it was just the horrific news of Charlie being shot, but then came word that he had succumbed to his wounds. That joyous, bright, vivacious man—probably the foremost witness to Jesus Christ in the public square—had been plowed down by an assassin’s bullet. I spent the afternoon doom scrolling with the rest of you, and praying for him, for his wife, for his poor children, and for this nation.

How could this happen? During the past few years, I’d come to treasure the man’s posts and his fearless and friendly debates. He never regarded the person in front of him, vigorously disagreeing with him and even calling names, as an enemy, but as a friend to be persuaded and won. I confess myself a great fan of the current VP, J.D. He’s an incredibly gifted man and a great debater, but Charlie was in another league. I mean, hands down. J.D. sometimes stays on too intellectual a field for some to follow, but Charlie had the gift. He could speak to us all. And he used that gift to speak to the youth across this nation who have been swindled by the demonic into self mutilation and bitterness and hatred of their own family. He spoke to them with a charisma and genuine friendliness that they simply did not know what to do with. He walked the way of our Master, and he walked it to the end. My brother said to me this morning what so many of us thought: we expected him one day to be the President of these United States.

He could speak hard and devastating truth, but never in scorn and hatred. It came from a heart that was filled with the love of Christ. If you never heard him speak or debate, youtube has TONS of his efforts posted. Please, go listen to this voice of goodness (yes, I dare to call it that) that has been silenced. If all you know of him is the hatred spewed his way by the left, you don’t know the man at all. Still, as so many folks have insisted on X and in other forums, Charlie’s voice will NOT be silenced. We will not allow it. His message has only grown stronger and I believe will grow stronger yet. 

Indeed, as the Federalist published, Charlie is not merely a political victim; he is a martyr. His witness for Jesus over the past few years has been a thing of beauty to behold. He cared so much about his nation because he knew that this nation is not the ultimate; the ultimate is the Kingdom of Jesus Christ, and he wanted to serve the One who had laid down His life for him even in these penultimate things. And he wanted everyone to enjoy that Kingdom with him. He’s there now, awaiting the day of the Resurrection. 

Rest eternal grant him, O Lord, and let light perpetual shine upon him! 

About that trip…

…so Cindi and I promised Carlo before we went to the Netherlands that we’d set aside our usual zero carb diet and just enjoy whatever food he recommended. We enjoyed an Indonesian “Rice Table” one evening, a dutch “pancake” one evening, some schnitzel and numerous pastries and desserts. Unusually for me, I mostly forewent my wine and enjoyed numerous drafts of Swinkel beer. I left home weighing 175.8, already a tad high. And?

I came home weighing 187.6. All that talk about how folks LOSE weight eating European food? Not at all true for me (or Cindi!). By the time we got home, I felt bloated, my ankles were swollen, and was just definitely not my usual chipper self. 

We had decided we’d immediately head back to our zero carb diet. The result? It’s still early days, only the fifth morning after I recorded that high weight. But this morning, I weighed in at 176.4, so about a half pound heavier than when I left. The ankles are no longer swollen. Was able to run sprints this morning and each day I’ve felt better and better. 

Whew! The experiment convinced me that we’re on the right track with eliminating the carbbage. The treats we enjoyed were indeed tasty, but my body is telling me: “Thank you for returning to normal!” 

P.S. And about that jacket. Carlo told us to be sure and bring a windbreaker for the frequent rain. I didn’t have one, so looked at Dollar General. Nada. Went over to Loves. Found that one. It was pricey, though, and I had no idea why. But it fit well, and it had a cool bear on it. Cindi is the one to break the news: it costs so much because it is a NFL jacket for the Chicago Bears. I’m serious: I couldn’t have named a football team from Chicago if I tried. So now, I look like a Bears fan. I’m not a fan of ANY sports team. But I like my jacket, pricey though it was. 

A Wonderful Trip

I was more than a tad skeptical, given the amount of activities and traveling that the VanUlfts had planned: but it was truly an awesome experience. We flew to Amsterdam arriving on Monday, August 25th and leaving again from there on September 3rd. We visited all around the Netherlands, a trip to Brugge in Belgium, and to Germany (lovely Monschau and then visiting the Moselle river valley and a wine festival and also Aachen); we spent four nights in a castle in the Limberg province of the Netherlands; I got to drive a new BMW on the Autobahn and do outrageous speeds; we forsook our carnivore diet and ate whatever tasty treat Carlo introduced us to; and I enjoyed numerous drafts of Swinkel beer. We visited Delft, Kinderdijk, Maastricht, Aachen, Het Loo and too many other spots to name. William of Orange seemed to be everywhere (yes, he’s the William of Williamburg and the College of William and Mary in VA). The men lost spectacularly at four-handed pinochle. And we arrived home safely last evening about 8 p.m. A few pics: 

Old and Dear Friends

I’ll never forget when I first met Robert and Candy Esch. They came to St. Paul’s in the 1990’s, and I think our mutual friend, Charlie Grinstead, had more than a little hand in that. Candy had been raised in Chile (her dad a diplomat) and she still has that fascinating Latin reserve about her; Robert, well, not so much. Give him the impossible to do first, then he’ll tackle the extremely difficult. 

He wasn’t at St. Paul’s long before he informed me that if we wanted to have a decent musical program we had to expand the balcony. I was thinking to myself: uh-huh. The congregation dearly loved their building, and I just couldn’t see them allowing some newbie to monkey with it. His response? “Watch.” So he drew up an architectural scheme to expand the balcony by anchoring an I-beam in the two forward buttresses and then cantilevering out to it. It all sounded sketchy to me, but what do I know about architecture? He and Candy also donated not a little bit of the cost. The long and short of it, he convinced the congregation! We have a spacious balcony (well, spacious compared to what it was!). The musical program look off. Soon we had timpani in the balcony (courtesy of Robert and Candy)  and room for all sorts of accompanying musicians. He ended up being choir director for some time and taught the choir to sing “Joy to the Heart” (still one of my favorites). He loved to do what he called “production numbers” like that. 

Charlie, Bob and I also played a bit of racquet ball together. Charlie and I mostly just ran after the balls as Bob consistently sent them into impossible positions to return. His specialty was having the ball land right at the front wall and simply roll back. He’d twirl his racquet in his hand and laugh every time he nailed that shot, and Charlie and I would look at each other and sigh in exasperation. After Charlie’s untimely death, Robert and I played on for a bit. But him and against only one of us was rather impossible. I remember one day when I was boring him to death with my ineptitude and he decided to give me a particularly challenging shot and said: “See Bill run. Run, Bill, run.” (You have to have been old enough to learn to read from those books: “See Spot run. Run, Spot, run.”) I was laughing so hard there was no way I could get to the ball. And there was the time I returned the ball so hard, it hit Bob in the back of the head. Yikes. He turned to me, his eyes closed, and he slumped down against the wall. He passed out! I was ready to call an ambulance, but when he came to, he opened up his eyes, got back on his feet, and insisted we finish the game. Which, of course, he won. He always won. Like always.

The man over the years had a landscaping business, a financial planning business (Cindi was his office manager for more than 20 years with that), a stone business, he flew hot air balloons, and he piloted airplanes. In fact, his last airplane he built from a kit in his garage. He wanted to take me up in it, and I flatly refused. He is generous to a fault. I remember when he moved his business to Troy, he purchased a year’s worth of box seats at the Fox Theatre, and whenever he didn’t need them for business associates, he generously let us use them. So Cindi, the kids, and I got to see numerous productions. It was way out of our league, but we sure enjoyed ourselves that year! 

On the 20th anniversary of my ordination, the congregation surprised me by inviting Dr. Norman Nagel to preach. Dr. Nagel so charmed Bob and Candy, that they insisted we all go out to together to Bob’s favorite restaurant over in St. Louis: Al’s. What a delightful evening that was! The good Dr. and Betsy held forth royally and even when Dr. Nagel ordered an Australian favorite, they readily prepared for him, and he said it was excellent. Of course, we finished off the evening with Al’s famous Banana’s Foster! We were all grateful to Robert and Candy for the great memory.

And then there are his exploits with his long-suffering wife. Like when he decided she needed to get licensed for scuba diving, or needed to learn to play bag pipes, or whatever he happened to think up next! Candy came home one day to find all of her spices rearranged, put in alphabetical order! (Seriously?) And then there was the time she came home to find that he’d emptied her refrigerator (and right before a Christmas dinner) because he decided that the fridge needed to go to his mother! Life with Robert Esch is many things, but it is always an adventure and never a bore. It’s sort of “buckle your seatbelts!”

Candy was a popular teacher in our school: she loved literature and the kids she taught ended up loving literature too. She was one of those teachers that the kids just WANTED to please. They learned from her and respected her and she opened up new vistas to them. I personally loved the times we got to visit at the school after class. Love that lady so, so much. 

In recent years both have had some significant health issues, and they finally decided it was time to move down to South Carolina to be with their daughter Liz and granddaughter Bella. So we went out for lunch, to remember all the crazy and joyous times, and to remind them that we have a guest room ready for whenever they come back this way. 

Bob and Candy, we love you both more than words can say. And we’re really, really going to miss you both!

The Rev. Henry Gerike+

Word reached today that Henry fell asleep in Jesus last night. We became friends when we were both at seminary together. He had in earlier years served as a teacher, and of course, always as a musician, but the Spirit tugged at his heart to follow his father’s path into the Office of the Holy Ministry. I remember in my fourth year right before graduation, he took Cindi and me out to visit his brother-in-law and sister at St. Paul’s, Wood River, and he gave me Neuhaus’ Freedom for Ministry, which truly was the greatest gift that could be given to a man about to embark on his first call. 

When I ended up coming back to Hamel (where I had been fieldworker) as pastor, Henry and I got to work together again on Lutheran Musician Enrichment. I remember he and I had a delightful disagreement at one of the sessions. I wanted the Alleluia sung with zip and joy; Henry insisted that joy could be slow and solemn too. He wasn’t wrong, of course, (but neither was I). The exchange sticks with me because it so characterized the man. He MOVED slowly. He MOVED deliberately. He didn’t gulp, he savored. And this also showed in his tendency to savor music. Whether he was conducting or composing, he most often mirrored that intention to go slow and to milk delight out of every last note and nuance. 

When I started at the IC as Chaplain and Director of Worship, Henry became my unofficial watchdog. He never quite trusted, I don’t think, my lack of musical training, and so he was always there to offer a musician’s perspective on the doing of things. Yes, sometimes he irritated the daylights out of me, but mostly he was invaluable and right. I can’t count the number of times he served us as organist at the IC; he was always ready to lend a hand. And he was inventive! We were to sing LSB 471, “O Sons and Daughters of the King.” He decided it MUST have some percussion. He sent me scurrying down to Missions in the hope of a tambourine. Alas, nothing. Did that stop him? Oh, no. He found some change, put it in the metal pencil holder on the organ, and instructed me in the rhythm I was to rattle it! It sounds crazy, but (as usual) it worked. 

SO if Henry had an idea, well, he knew how to just keep hammering away until you gave in. And you were usually glad in the end that you did. It was really cute. He’d bring the idea up like for the first time and invite your buy-in. Even it you’d said “no” twenty times before. You see, if you didn’t buy-in, he didn’t give up. He’d just wait. And then he’d suggest it anew, and always as a fresh brand new idea. He was giving you ample opportunity to repent of rejecting the idea! That was what it was like to work with him: a man markedly humble, and yet doggedly stubborn about what he thought was best. Thanks be to God that he mostly got his way! He was the guiding spirit of both of the liturgical institutes I was privileged to work on with him. 

When our mutual friend and mentor, Dr. Norman Nagel was incapacitated with a stroke, Henry was such a faithful visitor. He stopped in regularly and read him some Kretzmann, some Lewis, some Luther. Dr. Nagel might nod off, and Henry would pause and wait for him to wake up and then continue. He was a good and faithful friend. 

A few years ago, I got to put together a service of celebration of the music and ministry of our dear Henry. It was held at Village Lutheran Church in Ladue and Jonathan Kohrs served as the organist. It featured much of Henry’s music, and the whole was woven together via a letter that Henry’s sainted father had sent him when he was in college. Pr. Scott Schilbe would read a section from the letter, and I’d comment briefly to connect the words to some piece of Henry’s music. It will always be a highlight of my life being able to participate in that celebration of my dear friend’s music and service. 

I wonder if the dear Lord Jesus had his holy angels sing “Up through Endless Ranks” for Henry as he made his homecoming, to await in the Lord’s presence the great fulfillment of all His promises in the resurrection of the dead and the life everlasting? Thank you, Lord, for the gift of your servant. For his music. For his life and now for his death. Soli Deo Gloria!