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Be a Letter of Christ! Write a letter

Sometimes telling someone “I love you” or “You matter to me” is not enough. The best way to communicate feelings and convictions is by writing. Good words add up to strong connections.

In Fall 2009, St. Paul people revived the art of letter-writing. Letters went out to homebound members and people in Tanzania. Writers advocated for legislation to help hungry people. They wrote letters of love and forgiveness, kindness or gratitude.

It was all inspired by the words of scripture, declaring that we are “Letters of Christ.” We bear God’s message of love for the world.

Write it on your heart | Karin Hanson

Karin Hanson thumbs through her Bible: “Letters of Christ aren’t the kind written on paper but on our heart,” she says. “If you open up your heart to someone in a letter, maybe that’s what we’re looking for.”

On a recent Saturday, Karin scanned her to-do list. She had been meaning to write to a friend who now lives in Wisconsin. “Her mother had died. I had sent her an email at the time, but I finally wrote her this letter. I ended up with this whole single-spaced page on the computer. I wrote about her loss, and told her a little about my own mother dying a long, long time ago. I had tears in my eyes.”

Karin had to email her friend to get her address. She could sense the friend’s anticipation. “Then I got an email that the letter had come… on her mother’s birthday. Do you suppose God was there? I’m so glad I wrote it.”

Karin has some other letters in mind. “It seems like once you get the door open a crack, there are opportunities all over the place. If you just have time to do one letter, it’s a blessing to the person who gets it and to the person who writes it.”

Karin Hanson writes letters. She is a “Letter of Christ.”

Make a difference | Jerry Fisher

Letters of advocacy can make a difference. Even a few letters, strewn across a senator’s desk, carry power. They can change hearts and minds.

Handwritten letters? Even better, says Jerry Fisher. For years, Jerry has been involved in advocating for hungry people through Bread for the World (BFW). It’s an expression of his faith.
As Jesus says via Matthew’s Gospel: “For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink…”

“What we’re trying to accomplish” through Christian advocacy is to “change the mindset of decision-makers — to combat hunger, to purify water, to wipe out malaria,” says Jerry. This year’s BFW letter-writing focuses on streamlining the delivery of U.S. assistance to poor and hungry people around the world.

“It’s important to write letters from our heart,” says Jerry. We can be a voice for the voiceless. “We don’t know these people who struggle in ways that we can’t comprehend. But we’re all God’s children.”

Sure, you can click on an online petition. That can be effective in numbers. But a heartfelt letter, in words, can change a person’s mind.

Jerry Fisher writes letters. He is a “Letter of Christ.”

Good! Zoom! Spark!

The newly-released Spark Story Bible brings God’s Word to life through colorful images and an imaginative retelling of 150 of the most popular Bible stories. It’s just right for two-year-olds through early-elementary children.

It’s just right, too, for mailing to a granddaughter who lives in Alaska. The postage is worth every penny when this message comes via email from Sarah Hahn Brooks:

“Mom, the Story Bible arrived in the mail today. TK (short for Mitike, age 2½) was so excited. I love the book. Thank you so much. We read the creation story tonight — I LOVE all the sound effects! When God creates each piece of creation, there are these great onomatopoeic sounds: GLIMMER! SHIMMER! SHINE!”

“After I finish reading, TK always likes to ‘read.’ So this was her translation of the creation story as she paged through the new Story Bible from Nana and Gerry: ‘And God said, GOOD! GLIMMER! ZOOM! BOOM! Good job!’”

We have received a letter. It’s the living Word of God. “Good job!” God’s Word helps us to live as “Letters of Christ.”

To Joshua in prison | Bill Osborne

Bill Osborne had a “squirming, energetic, brilliant kid” in his second-grade classroom. It was 22 years ago, early in his teaching career.

Three years ago, Bill heard that the boy-now-adult, Joshua, was incarcerated on gang-related murder and drug charges.

“It haunted me. I wondered how he could survive being locked up in a cell, knowing his energy level.” Bill found a greeting card and wrote a note that said something like, “Boy, if I knew then what I know now, things might have been different.”

On lined school paper, Joshua penciled a four-page reply. Student assured teacher that he took respon-sibility for his own bad choices. And thus began a correspondence of mutual respect that now fills two binders.

Behind bars, that once-second-grade kid earned his GED, the equivalent of a high school diploma. In his letters, Joshua shares quotes from Greek philosophers and perspectives grounded in his Buddhist faith. The friendship has taken Bill inside prison walls for personal visits.

Bill Osborne writes letters. He is a “Letter of Christ.”

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"Whatever your heart clings to and confides in, that is really your God." ~Martin Luther