by Linda Macqueen

‘A very moving experience. It brought me even closer to my Maker’, said Brian Thiele after visiting Immanuel Lutheran Church’s prayer stations.

‘Thanks for such a wonderful, sensory way to connect us to Jesus and to each other, and to bring us into his presence’, said Anne Dohnt.

‘Wonderful! We need this in Rundle Mall!’ enthused Robyn Clasohm, who described the experience as ‘so beautiful … both spiritually and aesthetically’.

For the eleven evenings preceding Maundy Thursday, members of Immanuel Lutheran Church, Novar Gardens, Adelaide ¬— as well as friends, community members and visitors from near and far — were able to take a Lenten journey inside their own church. People entered the front doors of the chapel between 6.30 and 8.00 pm. On arrival they viewed a five-minute instructional movie, before moving through a series of 27 prayer stations set up in the foyer and chapel. The whole experience was done in silence.

Along the journey participants were invited to reflect upon their relationships with people and with God. A wide variety of multi-sensory experiences were used to help them engage with God’s word. They could acknowledge the brokenness of their relationships, explore how Jesus’ death and resurrection restores their relationship with God, and focus on how they can love others because God has first loved them.

Pastor Nigel Rosenzweig explained, ‘In the first months of 2011 the Immanuel family of faith was led to focus on valuing and strengthening relationships. We have celebrated that God has made us for relationships and that life is all about our relationship with God and each other. Our pre-Easter prayer stations helped us to focus on this theme.’

Virginia Klemm was one of many Immanuel members who helped to prepare the prayer stations. Admitting to not being the most creative person on earth, she was ‘surprised by what the Lord put into [her] head on the odd occasion!’ Later, when she progressed through the stations herself, she found that each one allowed her ‘the quiet time to reflect on God’s love and what that means for me’.

Last year someone close to Virginia was going through a stressful situation. That person ‘took the journey through the prayer stations and was deeply moved and able to trust God again and hand over the problem to him’.

‘We never know how God will use what we do.’

Each station used symbols to point people to Christ and asked participants to reflect or to act: for example, dipping a finger in red paint and wiping it on a white cross, writing a love note to a loved one, making a play-dough figure of a person with whom a relationship needed mending, putting on a mask and looking into a mirror, writing one’s sins in sand and wiping them away, lighting a candle, and tasting something sweet and sour.

Alison Reidy, who worked on the planning team with her son Connor (14) and daughter Abbey (11), said that the experience made Easter more meaningful for them as a family. ‘It was also a wonderful way to get to know other members of the congregation and see how God is using the talents with which he has blessed each one of us.’

For Gwen Watson, who hadn’t been involved in church life for some time, the prayer stations were a homecoming of sorts. ‘I was worn out. I’d forgotten how to smile, on the inside and out’, she said. ‘There was so much stress in my life and I hadn’t been sleeping.’

She saw the advertisement for the prayer stations in a local paper. ‘I knew

I needed to go’, she said. ‘I needed to be reassured in my faith.’ Afterwards,

‘I went home with a big smile on my face and I had a good night’s sleep for the first time in a long time.’

Gwen subsequently joined the congregation’s small-group study program and has regularly been attending worship at Immanuel.

‘A lot of people have lost the joy of love’, she said. ‘I was one of them. I needed to feel peace again, to be nurtured and to be reassured. I needed to receive the comfort of being loved.

‘Jesus love is a living love. The people at Immanuel gave me the gift of that living love when I really needed it. That’s why I keep coming back here.’

David Boschma and his family shared the experience together, reflecting and praying at each station. He described the prayer stations as ‘a tangible expression of God’s love, combining Scripture, art, video, sound, candlelight and touch to lead us on a journey and guide us in our relationships with each other’.

‘Everyone craves to give and receive love’, he reflected. ‘The prayer stations helped us to feel the importance, pain and joys of relationships. Most importantly, they helped us to feel the hope Jesus offers us all as we strive to love each other better.

‘The prayer stations are a special accomplishment. In these days of ever-increasing technological wizardry and supposed interconnectedness via gadgets, it was most pleasing to see our church portray a profound topic in a way that included technology but was not dominated by it — and in a way that invited spiritual warmth.

‘I felt proud to belong to Immanuel Lutheran Church, who reached out to the community on the difficult yet pivotal issue of how we relate to each other. The prayer stations touched many.’

Nathan Klinge, whose involvement in preparations for the event included ‘climbing dangerous ladders, lifting heavy things and herding cats’, said, ‘It was remarkable to see how the Lord worked through the prayer stations to meet people where they were at. While everybody completed the same activities, I think it’s fair to say that no two people shared the exact same experience.’

Led by Pastor Nigel, dozens of members of Immanuel were involved in developing the ideas for and the construction of the prayer stations — which was a spiritual journey of sorts, too.

‘The prayer stations generated an important opportunity for the members of Immanuel to come together and serve God, as was seen by the many and varied talents that were drawn upon to make the event a success’, explained Nathan. ‘Literally hundreds of volunteer hours were consumed in preparing for and running the prayer stations, and this certainly proved to be a unifying undertaking for our congregation.

‘The whole process was a magnificent testimony to what can be achieved when we gather in Christ’s name.’

The congregation advertised the event widely, via mail-outs to church and community groups, emails to Lutheran connections, advertisements in local newspapers and radio interviews. Over the eleven evenings nearly 300 people passed through the prayer stations. They came from neighbouring suburbs and from across Adelaide, South Australia and Australia, as far away as Cairns. International visitors were represented, too: from Indonesia, Russia, Germany and the United States. One visitor came all the way from ‘Mum’s place’.

‘Those people who didn’t attend missed out on something very special’, enthused Gwen Watson.

This is the second year that Immanuel has prepared and hosted this innovative style of multisensory worship to help people prepare for Easter. ‘But the prayer-station experience doesn’t have to be restricted to Lent’, says Pastor Nigel. ‘Multisensory worship can be experienced at any time of the year.’

Extending the theme of the prayer stations, the congregation participated in a program called ‘40 Days of Love’ during May and June. This was a spiritual-growth campaign celebrating that God made us to live in relationship with him and with each other. Through a series of themed sermons, weekly small group gatherings, daily personal readings and practical projects, participants explored what it means to love like Jesus loves.

More information: Immanuel Lutheran Church
www.ilc.org.au
phone 08 8375 1755

PRAYER STATION 18

ACTION:

Take a grape and eat it.
Notice how sweet and refreshing grapes are … They are another gift from our creator God.
Grapes taste sweet and make us glad when we eat them.
May we help others to be glad, too.
If we are to do this, we need to remain joined to Jesus and his words must remain in us.

ACTION:

Take a leaf. Write your name on the leaf and tie it to the vine.

PRAY:

Lord Jesus, help us to remain connected to you so that we may love others as you love us.
Amen.