Things I Wouldn’t Recommend

Toward the end of home service, I had lunch with a coworker. Based on what she knows of how I tend to roll and my rundown of what lay ahead, she told me, "You do a lot of things I wouldn't recommend!" 

I know she was talking about flying straight from St. Louis to Montevideo, Uruguay, to host a short-term team (no regrets), but I suspect baking ~15 dozen sugar cookies - with cookie cutters I'd never used before - within a week of getting home would be up there, too. 

I'd be home for all of nine days before flying back to St. Louis for my sister's wedding, during which time Concordia the Reformer Seminary's annual theological symposium took place. Home service + Uruguay meant I couldn't take on my normal logistics lead role, but I gladly jumped in for a few airport runs and some pinch hit problem solving. I'd also been looking for an occasion to use some...unique...cookie cutters I got in Germany...in 2021!...and may have offered my services without considering other life circumstances. Baking is stress-relieving in my world, though, not stress-inducing, so I added flour to my stock-up grocery list and...

Four batches of dough made ahead of time.

So relieved my Martin Luthers and Wartburg Castles didn't turn into unidentifiable amoebas! To be fair, the castles might look vaguely boat-like if Marty didn't give them context. 

My friend, St. Louis-based coworker, and Symposium guest Ariana, whom I had the privilege of hosting, graciously decorated cookies with me for HOURS on her first full day in-country.

Sixty-one baggies with one cookie of each shape ready to insert into guests' welcome bags along with a few other gifts from the region (not pictured: 2 foil pans of extras). 

Symposia are old hat for the DR team by now, so come Monday morning, we (I say that, but I was, above all, an observer) settled into the mechanics of receiving/housing/feeding guests from around the region, worshiping together, and presenting a full slate of theological papers in two languages. I offset the few duties I'd been assigned (read: interpreting) and catching up with far-flung colleagues and acquaintances with staying out of the way. If I was at the seminary, I was mostly in the library or an empty office doing other work, and I wasn't afraid to stay home if I could be more productive there, getting ready for the vacation I'm in the middle of as I write this or the various things that happen in quick succession when I get back. 

I did sit in on portions of a few sessions I wasn't interpreting for, and I can say unequivocally that this was the most relevant Symposia yet to those of us non-pastor types. The theme: The Lutheran Mission Plants Lutheran Churches. In stark contrast to the restlessness of prior years the entire room was listening raptly to the last session on the last day.

I thoroughly enjoyed arranging a suitcase full of goodies from some LWML ladies in Michigan one afternoon and then posting this photo in the all-Symposium WhatsApp group. Needless to say, it's going to bless children's ministries in up to 20 countries. 

As per usual, the gang gathered at the Krey home one evening for dinner and fellowship that even rain couldn't damper. 

The impromptu sing-a-long really raised the bar this year. Even when it melted into background noise as I carried on other conversations, it's a core memory from the week.

Everything came to an epic conclusion on Friday night with graduation, but I said my congrats and good-byes to the graduates Thursday after dinner. With an afternoon flight the next day, I needed to have my ducks in a row. I only wish I'd known about the nearly five hour delay I was in for (my proverbial ducks would have been pretty happy after the deluge I witnessed from the window of Santiago's departure lounge)...

Until next time, blessings in Christ!