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December

"My eyes have seen your Saviour, the salvation you have prepared for all nations."
Luke 2, 30-31

Christmas is the time of great words: love, peace, joy ... However, these words do not trigger the corresponding feelings in everyone - depending on experiences and expectations, reluctance and disappointment can also prevail, but if there is a joyful expectation as an underlying mood, it is often replaced by pre-Christmas and Christmas stress. The motto for December acts as a remedy. The word comes from the hymn of praise of the old Simeon, who recognises the Saviour of Israel and the whole world in the helpless child in Mary's arms. Simeon would have had reason to be bitter and frustrated. He had been waiting all his life for the Messiah, the consolation of Israel, and had grown old and grey over it. The opposite is the case: Simeon waits with a persistent hope and inner strength through the Spirit of God. His expectation is rewarded, his hope is fulfilled. Now he can end his life in peace. This encounter with Jesus, the Christ, is the highlight of his life. We are also invited to this encounter with Jesus, the child in the manger. At Christmas, we celebrate the birth of our Saviour, Jesus Christ. He can heal what is broken within us, he can lift us out of sadness and fear. He wants to be our comforter. Love, peace, joy and all the other great Christmas words have their meaning because Jesus, the Saviour, is their author. Like Simeon, we can make our way to the temple when we worship, sing, pray, read the Bible, etc., and not just at Christmas time. HE wants to enrich our lives every day.
"Come and let us honour Christ" - let us join in with this cheerful Christmas song by Paul Gerhardt, it can guide our steps in the right direction.

I wish you a blessed Advent and Christmas season,
God's blessing for the New Year.
With best regards,
Your sister Heidi

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October and November

"All good gifts come from the Lord God!"
Protestant hymnal 508

Christians celebrate Thanksgiving in autumn. During the service, they thank God for his gifts. The harvest and the fruits of the field take centre stage, but also the daily bread and everything that people need to live. In the parishes, altars are decorated with the fruits of the field. With this festival, Christians express their gratitude for the yield from agriculture and gardens. The harvest festival is a reminder of man's responsibility for the sustainable use of resources and the protection of nature, which was created by God and entrusted to man to preserve (Genesis 1:28 and 2:15). In doing so, they emphasise that humans are integrated into natural cycles and remain dependent on them despite technological progress.
The date of Thanksgiving depends on local customs and traditions. After the Reformation, Thanksgiving was initially celebrated on different dates. Eventually, the celebration became customary on Michaelmas Day (29 September) or on the Sunday after Michaelmas. In the meantime, the first Sunday in October has largely become established in the Protestant churches and also in the Roman Catholic Church in Germany. This date is recommended to parishes, but is not binding.
"Thanksgiving" is the name of the harvest festival celebrated in the United States on the fourth Sunday in November. Thanksgiving was originally intended to commemorate the pioneer life of the Pilgrim Fathers and thus has a certain national character. The day is a bank holiday and is considered the most important family celebration in the United States, to which friends are often invited. The centrepiece is a meal together, often a dinner.

With best wishes from the Motherhouse,
Your sister Heidi

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God give thee abundance of the dew of heaven, and of the fatness of the earth, and of corn, and of wine.

1. Genesis 27, 28

This blessing is great, a blessing with a future and for the future. A beautiful picture: In the morning sun the dew, the wheat in bright green, the flowers and blossoms, birds chirping and butterflies. The month of June celebrates a festival of fertility, growth and the dawning of all living things.

This word is a good blessing from ancient times. From a time when people lived with nature, not against it. From a time when flour and wine were still a gift from heaven and not always in bags and bottles on the supermarket shelf.

God grant you abundance of the dew of heaven and the fat of the earth and grain and wine.
Thus an aged father once blessed his eldest son. At that time, he was not only passing on his worldly possessions, but also his faith to his heir. The faith in a special God who had chosen the family.

This blessing unfolded its power! He blasted Jacob out of his comfortable home where there was grain and wine in abundance. That very evening he found himself alone in the desert, fleeing from his angry brother.

Our monthly verse is a prayer of blessing. God's faithfulness to his promises stands firm.

May God also bless you with his everlasting goodness.

I wish you a blessed Pentecost and greet you warmly from the Motherhouse, your Sister Heidi

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God give thee abundance of the dew of heaven, and of the fatness of the earth, and of corn, and of wine.

1. Genesis 27, 28

This blessing is great, a blessing with a future and for the future. A beautiful picture: In the morning sun the dew, the wheat in bright green, the flowers and blossoms, birds chirping and butterflies. The month of June celebrates a festival of fertility, growth and the dawning of all living things.

This word is a good blessing from ancient times. From a time when people lived with nature, not against it. From a time when flour and wine were still a gift from heaven and not always in bags and bottles on the supermarket shelf.

God grant you abundance of the dew of heaven and the fat of the earth and grain and wine.
Thus an aged father once blessed his eldest son. At that time, he was not only passing on his worldly possessions, but also his faith to his heir. The faith in a special God who had chosen the family.

This blessing unfolded its power! He blasted Jacob out of his comfortable home where there was grain and wine in abundance. That very evening he found himself alone in the desert, fleeing from his angry brother.

Our monthly verse is a prayer of blessing. God's faithfulness to his promises stands firm.

May God also bless you with his everlasting goodness.

I wish you a blessed Pentecost and greet you warmly from the Motherhouse, your Sister Heidi

You can find the whole newsletter here

God give thee abundance of the dew of heaven, and of the fatness of the earth, and of corn, and of wine.

1. Genesis 27, 28

This blessing is great, a blessing with a future and for the future. A beautiful picture: In the morning sun the dew, the wheat in bright green, the flowers and blossoms, birds chirping and butterflies. The month of June celebrates a festival of fertility, growth and the dawning of all living things.

This word is a good blessing from ancient times. From a time when people lived with nature, not against it. From a time when flour and wine were still a gift from heaven and not always in bags and bottles on the supermarket shelf.

God grant you abundance of the dew of heaven and the fat of the earth and grain and wine.
Thus an aged father once blessed his eldest son. At that time, he was not only passing on his worldly possessions, but also his faith to his heir. The faith in a special God who had chosen the family.

This blessing unfolded its power! He blasted Jacob out of his comfortable home where there was grain and wine in abundance. That very evening he found himself alone in the desert, fleeing from his angry brother.

Our monthly verse is a prayer of blessing. God's faithfulness to his promises stands firm.

May God also bless you with his everlasting goodness.

I wish you a blessed Pentecost and greet you warmly from the Motherhouse, your Sister Heidi

You can find the whole newsletter here.

Monthly verse May 2023

Do not refuse to do good to the needy, if your hand is able. Proverbs 3:27

This month's verse contains an exhortation to generosity. This verse is based on the reality of life in ancient times; those who could not earn their living through work were dependent on charitable help. There was no pension, health or unemployment insurance. One's own family was obliged to provide support, but if this also failed, then begging was the only way to survive.

In the Bible we read again and again about widows and orphans, strangers who were the typical representatives of poverty.

The God of Israel, however, repeatedly proves to be the father and advocate of these widows and orphans (e.g. Psalm 68:6) and the protector of strangers (e.g. Exodus 19:33f). He made it his people's duty to protect the rights of the poorest in society and to provide them with what they needed to live, thus heartlessness and refusal to help were antithetical to any genuine piety.
Today, all groups affected by poverty in the welfare state have a legal claim to
elementary care by the community of taxpayers.

There are people who think that they have already fulfilled their duty to help through their social security contributions and tax payments.

However, the monthly saying does not ask how much has already been given, but what could still be given - in money - in time - in strength... What competences do I have? That is decisive.

What could I do today? That is the question that drives me.

No one can solve all the needs of this world. But I can look around me to see who needs my help today.

Warm greetings from the Motherhouse,

Yours, Sister Heidi

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Monthly verse April

Christ died and became alive to be Lord over the dead and the living.

(Romans 14:9)

Lord over the dead and the living? What a claim to make with these words! I can think of some of our hymns in which Jesus is sung about as the King of all honour, to whom everything is subservient. To some this may seem strange, and the rulers of this world seem to have heard little of the fact that Jesus is Lord. Otherwise they would stop spreading fear and terror and become humble instead of acting as lords over life and death.

In the Letter to the Romans, the Apostle Paul speaks of Jesus as Lord over the living and the dead. He points out that we all belong to Christ and are united with him. In baptism we were promised this connection with Jesus, in the Lord's Supper we celebrate it, in faith we live it. No one has the right to deny us our connection to Jesus, not even death can do that. "If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or die, we are the Lord's. For to this end Christ died and came to life again, that he might be Lord over both the dead and the living." (Romans 14:8,9)

This promise applies to us: we belong to him to whom everything belongs. He is Lord over the dead and the living. This gives us support and confidence in everything that attacks or threatens me. We belong to him in life as well as in death. Jesus took away death's power on Easter morning. This Easter event can only be believed - and that is what I wish us all.

A blessed Holy Week and a joyful Easter time, your sister Heidi

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Monthly verse March 2023

What can separate us from the love of Christ? Romans 8, 35

How great is your certainty that nothing can separate you from the love of God? Could you speak like this with Paul?
Sometimes life throws people off course. In the encounter with death, with powers and forces, with ups and downs, so much happens that people cannot plan for. We should speak carefully and cautiously of certainty of faith.

In recent weeks, the terrible war in Ukraine has been compounded by the unbearable images of suffering from the earthquake catastrophe in Turkey and Syria. The certainty that God is at work in this world has been shaken by too many events in the last year.
So how does Paul come to this certainty? He had experienced much horror in his own body.

Nevertheless, he says: There is a certainty that carries people even when they lose the ground under their feet. Paul is quite sure: Nothing can separate us from God's love; no power, however dark, no thought, however dark, within me.

Our rock is Jesus Christ!
This enables us not to close our eyes in bad moments. But it also allows us to remember and enjoy what makes us happy. They are God's gifts, expressions of his love. Whoever looks at his or her life in this way, things change for him or her. He or she can then say: I have been guided here and there, preserved - or people have helped me. In any case, it will be important to come before God again and again in prayer, to adore Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit.

I wish you a blessed Passion season, Yours, S. Heidi

Monthly verse February 2023

And Sarah said, God made me laugh. Genesis 21:6

Do you also know people who have an infectious laugh? When you hear them, you can't help but laugh. This laugh, is a joyful laugh. However, there are many different types of laughter, not all of which are happy: laughing at someone, laughing with glee, laughing at a joke or laughing to make fun of someone. Not all laughter is associated with joy.

Sara laughs, she cheers as she holds her child in her arms. Finally, no one had expected it, but now he is here, Isaac, this child she is so happy about.

At the end of January, with the last Sunday after Epiphany, the Christmas festival cycle came to an end.

With Sara's child, it is again about a person who is born and turns everything upside down. Sara has another child in her old age - once again, God makes the impossible possible. Sara laughs at first when this child is promised to her.

I can understand Sara. I admire this woman who has been through so much, who has had to listen to so much that she never became pregnant. Where was God in her tearful nights, her desperate days? Now all is well. Now Sara says: God made me laugh, rejoice. She is completely with herself, holds her child in her arms and thinks of God and thanks him, attributes her incredible happiness to him.
Let us rejoice with Sara - perhaps unexpected moments also await us in February? Let us enjoy them and celebrate God's nearness. We can learn from Sara that God is always the reason for us to rejoice.

With warm greetings from the Motherhouse, Yours S. Heidi

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Dear readers

for the New Year I greet you with an old song written for New Year. In the Motherhouse we sisters always sing it on 1 January. I got to know and love it here; it speaks for itself. You are welcome to read and meditate on it. You will find the melody in the Evangelisches Kirchengesangbuch, which was published in 1950.

Jesu, now be praised/ for this new year/

for your goodness proves to us/ in all adversity and danger,/

that we have experienced/ the new joyful time,/

full of grace/ and eternal bliss,/

that we have fulfilled/ the old year in good silence

We want to surrender to you/ now and forever./

Protect us body and life/ from now on through the whole year.

Let us complete the year/ in praise of your name,/

that we sing to the same/ in the Christian community./

May you give us life by your almighty hand:/

preserve your dear Christians/ and our fatherland;/

turn thy blessing upon us,/ give peace to all ends;/

give unadulterated in the land/ thy saving word;/

the devils to shame/ here and in all places.

Thine alone is the honour,/ thine alone is the glory./

Teach us patience in the cross,/ govern all our doings,/

until we depart confidently/ into the eternal Father's kingdom/

to true peace and joy,/ like the saints of God./

Meanwhile, do with us all/ according to your good pleasure./

This is what the Christian faithful sing today without jesting

and wishes with mouth and heart/ a blessed new year.

Johannes Hermann 1593

I wish you a blessed New Year 2023, Your Sister Heidi

"Behold, your king is coming to you, a righteous man and a helper." Zechariah 9:9b

This year we celebrate Advent in November

1. Advent, and look forward to a long period of preparation for the feast of Christ. From the beginning, Advent has had the character of a penitential season in preparation for the feast of Christ, the "birthday" of Jesus Christ.
In Advent, we not only look at the coming of the Lord as it is handed down to us in the Bible as the "Christmas story", but we also look at the future coming of the Lord as the ruler of this world and founder of the New Jerusalem.

In the tension between the two, we experience the Lord in Advent as the one who comes towards us, who turns to us again and again and invites us to repentance, i.e. to conversion towards him.
On the evening before the 1st of Advent, we welcome the new church year in our closing week service with the entry into Jerusalem, the coming of Jesus into this world.

We celebrate the church year as a cycle that wants to lead us forward, further along a path that is our life's journey. So Advent as a new beginning will not seem like a repetition, but really like a new experience in our lives, if we allow it to be. In this way we can approach Christmas consciously and joyfully.

I wish you a blessed Advent and Christmas season, Yours S. Heidi

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Monthly Proverb November

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who turn darkness into light and light into darkness, who turn sour into sweet and sweet into sour!
sour! Isaiah 5:20

I greet you with the monthly verse for November, which is found in the Book of Isaiah. We are dealing here with seven lamentations. Isaiah accuses the upper class of Israel in the name of God. They do not keep the law, they do not fulfil the commandments of God. Isaiah holds up a mirror to Israel, threatening retribution and ruin if the behaviour of the people does not change. This lament is about justice and righteousness. Isaiah addresses the corruptibility of judges and kings who are only concerned about their own advantage, who do not consider the rights of the poor, women and children.
These people make their own law, they spread lies. Isaiah reproaches them for their self-centredness and he fears that lawlessness will set in.

A stable society lives from the fact that laws are obeyed. - What does this word mean for us today? In our world, too, there is venality, abuse of power, denial of facts. - Isaiah tried to bring the people to repentance through threats and lamentations.

People must change their lives out of their own insight and responsibility, face facts. - We can only ever start with ourselves, and may God help us to do so.

With warm greetings from the Motherhouse, S. Heidi Steinmetz

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Monthly Verse October 2022

"Great and marvellous are your deeds, O Lord and God, you ruler over all creation. Just and trustworthy are your ways, O King of the nations." Revelation 15:3

I greet you with this wonderful monthly verse for October. What mighty sentences are written in the last book of the Bible!

Great and wonderful are the deeds of God who rules over creation. - Images come to mind of devastation by flood, forests ablaze with fire, Corona patients doomed to die, wars in the world... - God's good creation?

We live here on earth, not yet in paradise. I realise this every day when I listen to the news or open the newspaper. But there are also many other examples where people in need are helped, where people donate time to others, listen to them and are creative on the way. If we are sensitive to the world around us, then this is also God's creation, which we perceive when we are patient with each other, when we treat each other with kindness. - God gives us infinite things in his creation; and perhaps you can think of many more..

Often it is the little things that enrich our everyday life and

enrich our everyday life and cheer us and our fellow human beings up.

Just and reliable are your ways, you King of the nations. It is we who must ensure that more justice and reliability prevail among us. God has no hands - except our own. We know this saying and we know that we can only start with ourselves. I cannot change others, only myself, my attitude, my thinking, my actions.

Yes, let us be creative - make a surprise visit, smile at a stranger - just like that, delight the neighbour with a little flower, have time for a conversation.

May God grant us the trust in His creative power and the courage to live our daily lives.

Best wishes from the Motherhouse, S. Heidi

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Monthly verse September 2022

To love God is the most beautiful wisdom. Jesus Sirach 1,10

A friend wished me a happy birthday a few years ago, wished me God's blessing and health, and said: "You know, health is the most important thing." This statement occupied me for a long time. Is health really the most important thing in life?
Psalm 63:4-6 says: "Your goodness is better than life; my lips praise you. So will I praise thee all the days of my life, and lift up my hands in thy name. This is my heart's joy and delight, when I can praise you with a glad mouth."

By this the psalmist means that God's love is worth more to him than his life and thus also his health. If he were to lose the love of God, it would be terrible for him. For him, this love is like a bubbling spring in life, it gives strength and a sense of real life.

Where do I find this love of God in my life?

I have just come back from days of silence with the Cistercians and I think I have experienced this love especially in the silence of the monastery - in the prayers of the hours and the divine services.

My faith and the certainty of being surrounded by God's love is not the same every day. Sometimes my faith was also shaken. But mostly I realised afterwards how much God's love has carried me through difficult times. I know that I am surrounded by his loving hand and am safe in it, even if questions sometimes remain unanswered. - Love cannot and cannot be produced simply by pressing a button. It is about conscious behaviour with a loving attitude, it is about honest love that comes from the heart. This love must be practised daily, and then perhaps we will come to say: To love God, that is the most beautiful wisdom.

Best wishes from the Motherhouse, S. Heidi

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Go out my heart and seek joy in this dear summer time..."

In these summer months, this wonderful song by Paul Gerhardt has accompanied me for many decades. It has become dear to me with its many stanzas marvelling at nature and God's creation. The gardens are contemplated in all their beauty, individual plants are enumerated, the birds and other animals are highlighted in wonder. In everything, God's creation is referred to again and again, although God himself is not mentioned at first. In wonderful language, Paul Gerhardt makes us marvel at all the little things that we can observe when we walk attentively through "God's garden". - The stream, field and forest, shepherds, sheep, bees and much more are also mentioned.

Only in the 8th stanza is God mentioned, and when we think of him, praise and glorify him for all that he has created, then we can only fall into praise. The other verses speak of this... - all the way to thoughts of eternity, which is part of our life as long as we remain on earth.

I invite you to meditate, sing and contemplate this song - preferably in nature in everyday life or on holiday.

You will find it in the Evangelical Hymnal, No. 503.

Your sister Heidi

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Pentecost 2022
It shall not be by host or by might, but by my Spirit, saith the LORD of hosts. Zechariah 4:6 b

This word from Zechariah 4 fits the feast of Pentecost of this year 2022 better than any other feast of Pentecost that I can remember. Or does it just not fit today? For is it not the weapons, the money, the training and the global mental support that are helping the Ukrainians to withstand the assault of their big neighbour? Whatever the outcome of this war, weapons can win wars, but not peace! Peace, the precious commodity, can only be won by those who approach each other with a spirit, who confess and absolve guilt, who express fears and hopes and turn outwards what is inside. This requires courage and sincerity. Both are a spiritual gift - like so many other things that make people jump over their shadows. That is what we should pray for on Pentecost: That the war may come to an end and that peace inspired by the Spirit may begin! In Ukraine as well as around us.

Your Pastor A. Liermann

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Monthly Saying May 2022

"My beloved! I wish you to be well and healthy in every way, as I know this of your inner life." (3rd Epistle of John verse 2, translation according to the "Good News").

Isn't that a wonderful beginning for a letter? How pleased John was with Gaius and for Gaius! This short letter is a jewel from the everyday world of young Christianity and incidentally the connection between body and soul becomes clear here, because the spiritual well-being of Gaius is made the measure of the physical! This is no different with us than it was with our Christian pioneers back then: If you are inwardly on the right track, it will radiate to your whole being!
In the month of May, the month of Wonnemonat in the post-Easter period, I wish you and all of Europe what John gave his Gaius at the end of the letter:
"I wish you peace! Greet the friends here. Greet the friends there, each one personally!"

Your Rev. A. Liermann

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Monthly verse April 2022

Mary of Magdala came to the disciples and announced to them: I have seen the Lord. And she reported what he had said to her.

John 20:18

Thoughts on Easter: Mary Magdalene goes to the tomb, sees the stone rolled on its side, runs to the disciples and tells them about it. They all want to see it with their own eyes, find the tomb empty - and go home again. Mary remains alone, she weeps. She meets the two angels who ask her: "Woman, why are you weeping? Mary answers: "They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him. Mary is in despair. She was there when Jesus died on the cross, and now he is taken away from her once again. She turns around, sees someone standing - is it the gardener? Mary turns to this person and asks: Lord, if you have taken him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him. Jesus now addresses her directly: Mary! - Mary recognises Jesus through this "Mary". She addresses him in Hebrew: Rabbuni! - which means "Master". She recognises Jesus, wants to run to him and he says to her: "Do not touch me! For I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and tell them: I ascend to my Father and to your Father, to my God and to your God.

And Mary comes and proclaims to the disciples: I have seen the Lord. And she reported what he had told her.

We don't know what got mixed up in Mary Magdalene's head and heart in terms of feelings. In any case, she went to the disciples in this situation, firm in the belief that she had met Jesus.

We know such situations that need a firm faith to get through a situation. In easy times, believing in God does not demand so much of us, but in difficult ones it looks different, there faith in God can be a gift that comes with no return.

Your sister Heidi

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"Pray and ask at all times! Let the Holy Spirit guide you. In doing so, be ever watchful and do not cease to pray also for all the saints." Ephesians 6:18

An encouragement and an appeal: to listen to God and at the same time check whether we come to him with the right requests. The monthly verse for March does us all a double favour right now, because it encourages us not to sink into worry and self-pity, but to entrust ourselves to God. This is especially good in the special powerlessness we are experiencing as we look at the war in Ukraine. And we cannot look past it. We feel like spectators in a very dark film, and we are not quite sure whether we are not also in it. "In this, be ever watchful and never cease to pray also for all the saints" - doesn't that sound like: be good contemporaries, inform yourselves and inform others. And pray for one another! With the saints we mean our fellow Christians, but in these days before God we certainly also mean all those who fear for their lives in this war - whether Christians or not.

Your Rev. Alexander Liermann

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"If ye be angry, sin not: let not the sun go down on your wrath." (Ephesians 4:26)

Dear friends of the Diakonissenchurch, dear Diakonissen!

Lucky again: So you are allowed to get angry. I cannot imagine it any other way, because anger is part of being human and also happens in the Diakonissenhouse! Sometimes anger has its good side, because it makes us feel: Something is very wrong here. But how easy it is to put on your perceived anger like a tailor-made jacket in order to feel permanently comfortable in it. I "victim of others"! But this jacket quickly becomes a straitjacket that gradually feels tighter and tighter...

In the name of Jesus, we are to become free from bad feelings that gain the upper hand over us, and this is what this advice is for: to speak out quickly before it becomes increasingly difficult to free ourselves from anger and to reconcile. So that we can breathe freely again! May the Holy Spirit help us especially in February.

Your Rev. Alexander Liermann

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jesus Christ says: "Whoever comes to me, I will not turn away" John 6:37 (annual motto 2022)

The new year 2022 is not exactly a carefree start for us in and around the Diakonissenhaus. All the more beautiful is this unconditional promise of Jesus, this annual motto for the new year.
"Whoever comes to me...", that's what it's all about, that alone is enough to be given by Jesus. Each and every one of us can come to Jesus in different attitudes: Some consciously and solemnly, others more accidentally and unaware. All is well, he will not turn anyone away. May our church be an encounter space with Jesus for as many as possible: Through its music, the silence, the preaching or simply "just" by being noticed at the church café...

God bless you personally and us as a community of those from whom no one is turned away.

Your Rev. Alexander Liermann

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Spiritual impulse: "The Star of Bethlehem still illuminates the path of seekers today and offers discussion material for the dialogue between natural science and Christianity"

Dear readers of our newsletter,

Just a stone's throw from Frankfurt's Diakonissenhaus is the small Keplerstrasse, which commemorates the great astronomer and natural philosopher Johannes Kepler. The deeply religious scientist was born two days after Christmas in 1571, and so in the outgoing year 2021 we commemorate the 450th anniversary of Kepler's birth.
Johannes Kepler not only made great discoveries, such as the laws of planetary motion ("Kepler's Laws"), but as a devout Lutheran and scientist he also concerned himself with the Star of Bethlehem (cf. Matt.2, 1.9). While many explanations for this phenomenon have been found and are possible since ancient times - and the event can be interpreted not least as a symbolic motif - Kepler brought forth a new explanation through his own observations of the morning sky: the very rare Jupiter-Saturn conjunction. At the time of the astrologers, this might have looked to the human eye like a single large star - the "King Star". Whether the Star of Bethlehem was ultimately a comet or a supernova, a meeting of planets or a mixture of natural event and symbolic interpretation, Kepler's attempt to combine faith with natural science remains remarkable.
The 450th anniversary of Johannes Kepler's birth offers an opportunity to reflect on the relationship between theology and natural science - and to rediscover that truth is multi-layered - and ultimately - one. Especially for Advent 2021.
The most rewarding way, the deepest truth and the measure of all reality we see in Jesus Christ - "the way and the truth and the life" (John 14:6), who will come anew to his own at Christmas.
Wishing you a bright and blessed Christmas, also in the name of Pastor Liermann,
Your Reverend Jeffrey Myers

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Spiritual impulse: "The bright flip side of the dark month"

Dear readers of our newsletter,

At the end of September, one of the most renowned contemporary German theologians died: Eberhard Jüngel. He was 87 years old. At the end of the newspaper announcement of his death is the remarkable sentence:
"Before our eyes stands his unshakeable confidence that God has shown himself in Jesus Christ in such a way that all being moves towards the perfection willed by God."
This is roughly what is expressed somewhat more simply in 2 Corinthians thus:
"To all God's promises, in Jesus Christ is the Yes!"
How enviable is a person who takes leave of earthly life in this certainty!
In view of this, November, with its serious days of celebration and commemoration, need not be a dark month.
The bright side of these days is the hope with which Christians who are firm in their faith have been going through life and death for 2000 years.

With warm greetings from the Diakonissenhaus
Your Reverend Alexander Liermann

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Spiritual impulse: The joyful heart

Dear readers of our newsletter

september is a month in which the year says goodbye to summer. "Old summer" is a word that refers to stable fair weather, which the elderly and old people in particular find a blessing.
September, with its milder light, marks the beginning of the current year's growing old. And on the subject of getting older - but here of people - the following quote recently came to my attention: "Don't forget that we get older and older but not automatically (un)happier!" (Wolfgang Abendschön). The parenthesis around "(un)happy" is interesting. When growing older, it is also important to be an artist in life, so that the negative does not appear too big and the positive is always placed in the centre.

If you need special courage to do this, read how Jesus inspired people in times of need, or read the end of the 30th chapter of the Book of Jesus Sirach, where it says something about "the cheerful heart".

With warm greetings from the Diakonissenhaus
Your Reverend Alexander Liermann

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