Opportunity to Share

00:00
Pastor Dave Brezina
When that word is put in the language that I learned at my mother’s knee that I grew up with, that I understand to my core, and I hear God’s word coming to me, that’s my God. 

00:22
Rich Rudowske
Welcome to the essentially translatable podcast brought to you by Lutheran Bible translators. I’m Richardowski. 

00:27
Emily Wilson
And I’m Emily Wilson. 

00:28
Rich Rudowske
Today we are going to talk with our good friend Dave Brazina from Boston. But before we do that, what if the folks in Boston want to be sure after they’ve heard this, they never miss another episode? How are they going to make that happen? 

00:39
Emily Wilson
Right? So you’re definitely going to want to see us on lbt.org slash podcast there. You’re going to be able to see all of the different options. 

00:47
Rich Rudowske
Absolutely. 

00:48
Emily Wilson
But for convenience sake, all of your apps out there, iHeartRadio, Spotify, Google podcasts, Audible, they’re all out there. 

00:59
Rich Rudowske
The original and still best. 

01:03
Emily Wilson
No bias there, correct. 

01:05
Rich Rudowske
Paid any extra for that? 

01:06
Emily Wilson
That’s true. We are not sponsored by Apple, but definitely want to check us out one of those apps because consistency, that’s just helpful. Convenient. 

01:18
Rich Rudowske
Absolutely. Yeah. There’s no reason to make life any harder than possible. Just have the essentially translatable podcast ready on your device whenever you’re ready. It’s just there and we’re ready to roll. Speaking of ready to roll, let’s talk with Dave Brazina. Pastor Dave Brazina is pastor in a little place called Linfield, Massachusetts, outside of Boston, and he’s got a great story. His congregation was one of the congregations that participated in Lutheran Bible translators Bible translation Sunday last year. So we had the chance to talk with him about his experience and just his work in ministry in New England and all that stuff going on. 

01:55
Emily Wilson
Yeah, and if you are just new to Bible translation Sunday and not sure what that is, you can find out more information at slash bts and get some information on how you can get involved and your congregation can get involved in the Bible translation movement. 

02:13
Rich Rudowske
That’s lbt.org slash bts for Bible translation Sunday. I’m pretty excited about this year’s Bible translation Sunday content. Tell us a little bit about what’s going to be happening this year and what’s available to the congregations. 

02:25
Emily Wilson
So Dr. Reed Lessing, as you had heard last month on the podcast, he wrote this sermon for Bible Translation Sunday 2021. And so that’s a sermon for pastors to use and sharing about the good news available in the Bible translation ministry into minority languages. But there’s also children’s sermon as well as Sunday school materials and PowerPoint and some suggestions for your worship schedule. Whether it’s contemporary or traditional. It’s all out there. 

03:01
Rich Rudowske
Yeah. Everything you need to have your congregation recognize and participate in Bible translation Sunday. And more than that, the ministry of Bible translation around the world. And we suggest the last Sunday in September. It’s close to the day on the traditional church calendar that remembers Jerome, the patron saint of Bible translation, if we can talk in those terms. And it’s also known as World Bible Translation Day or World Translation Day. So pretty excited to be able to offer all those things for you. Everything you need to put a service together, all of the assets, print assets, video assets, everything available@lbt.org. BTS let’s get into it. Talking with Dave from Boston. We are here today with Pastor Dave Brazina, pastor at Messiah Lutheran Church in Linfield, Massachusetts, about 12 miles north of Boston, as they say. Welcome to the podcast today. 

03:58
Pastor Dave Brezina
Thank you. 

03:59
Emily Wilson
Rich, good morning. 

04:01
Pastor Dave Brezina
Good morning, Emily. 

04:02
Emily Wilson
Well, thank you so much for joining us, Pastor Dave. And we are wanting our listeners to learn a little bit about your story. So would you be willing to share a little bit on that? 

04:14
Pastor Dave Brezina
Sure. When people ask a pastor to share his story, generally they’re kind of asking, how did you become a pastor? What path did you take? That sort of thing. And a lot of guys I know will tell you that they’ve known most of their life that they were being led to it or that they wanted to be a pastor. And they were able to follow that path right through all of their schooling and right on through into seminary and into a call. I think that for me, I pretty much always felt I wanted to be a pastor from time I was about twelve years old. But I know that I did not receive a heck of a lot of encouragement. I think the most encouragement I got was from one pastor who, oh, that’s mean. 

05:11
Pastor Dave Brezina
I was born and raised in the Missouri syndrome congregations. My mom and dad always made sure that no matter where we moved into a neighborhood that had access to an LCMS congregation. But without any positive encouragement, I went on to college. I got a bachelor of science in fine arts with my major was in painting and printmaking. And when I graduated, I had a minor in secondary education. And when I graduated 50 years ago, there were no teaching jobs available. And so I had a nice summer job and got to be August. My boss offered me a full time position and I stayed there working in supply chain management for 40 years and then always been active in my congregation, Sunday school teaching and leadership roles in the Sunday school and in the congregation. And then 2005, our pastor died very suddenly, very unexpectedly. 

06:17
Pastor Dave Brezina
We went through a long and difficult two year vacancy, and Pastor Picari answered the call that we extended and worked pretty close with him. And after about a year, were on a trip to visit a young man, and he kind of looked at me and he says, so, have you ever considered being a pastor? And I panicked. Absolutely. It was an out of body experience. And everything about me is screaming, tell him no. Tell him no. And my mouth goes, yeah, for most of my life. But I had tons of excuses. I mean, yes, so many reasons why you can’t do it, especially when you’re older, man. I was quick to tell him all the reasons I couldn’t consider it. But when you think you’re running away from God, you find out that’s impossible to do. 

07:20
Pastor Dave Brezina
There’s a biblical story about a guy who got swallowed up by a whale. He thought he was going to run away from God. I didn’t get swallowed up by a whale, but my excuses certainly did. So Jeremy started mentoring me and doing a little bit of teaching and helping and talked to me about the St. Louis seminary’s SMP program. It was distance learning, primarily. Distance learning dashed all of my excuses. I was ordained in 2012 and have been in team ministry with Jeremy here at Messiah ever since. How’s that sound? 

08:01
Rich Rudowske
Sounds really good. Talk a little bit about the context where you service pastor in New England. What’s unique about that context? 

08:09
Pastor Dave Brezina
I think when I travel around, I think for a lot of people, the most unique thing about our context here is that nobody around here knows what a Lutheran is. And Lutherans in New England are definite minorities. There are some areas in New England that do have a good, healthy population of traditional lutheran people. But here in eastern New England, we’re far, few and far between. Our congregation is very small congregation, and there’s a lot of great things about being small. But we draw from 27 different communities in our congregation, and people love to get together. But coming from that many different communities, sometimes it’s hard to develop a relationship with each other. That’s where being so small is so helpful, because we are able to spend time with each other and get to know each other. 

09:15
Pastor Dave Brezina
But the building itself is in a residential area. It’s not on a main street, it’s at a fairly busy intersection. But there’s no reason for anyone to be stopping here unless this is their a suburban area. Linfield itself is a relatively wealthy community. Many of the surrounding communities, I’d call them all middle class. So I think the most unique thing is the location north of Boston. And our small size. We may be small, but we have been able to do some powerful things. 

09:57
Emily Wilson
Right? Yeah. I’m thinking, too, about what you’ve said about having a small congregation and 27 communities. That’s quite a lot. Think about where I grew up in southwest suburbs of Chicago, and you would have a different lutheran church per town, maybe certainly not the majority, but generally speaking, people went where it was most convenient, what was closest to home. But thinking about how you have representation from those different communities in your congregation, that’s pretty unique, pretty special to be able to sharpen one another, that in that area, it’s not just everyone from a single mindset, but coming together and learning from one another and being able to spread out and shine a light to their different communities. I mean, missionaries right where they are, you’ve got 27 communities of mission field right there. It’s pretty awesome. 

10:56
Pastor Dave Brezina
And I think that’s what we try to teach, too, is Jesus said, follow me, and that should make it easy. So when we send people out, as we encourage them to share their savior with other people, the feedback that we get when we do get it is that there are an awful lot of opportunities. And when they do share those opportunities with one another, they’re all encouraged at all the different ways that are available to them. And having people come from so many different communities, it also highlights the different gifts that people seem to have, some of it directly related to where they live. 

11:42
Rich Rudowske
So during the COVID pandemic, which this will mark, I don’t know how many episodes in a row we had to talk about COVID because it’s just part of the deal right now. But how does this look in your context? What challenges have you faced as a pastor in the COVID era? 

11:58
Pastor Dave Brezina
Well, I think the biggest overall challenges have come out to be technology. For me, Covid as an illness, as a social problem, has isolated all of us, and technology offers huge opportunities to be able to come back together. All around the country, our city, state, county governments have all handled it differently. And here in New England, the New England district of the Lutheran Church Missouri synod has. How many states are there in? The New England district has a whole bunch of different states that have different governors who are putting together different. So, you know, our district leadership is. There’s very little that they can do on the district level to help all the different congregations in the different states. So we’re all operating under different restrictions. 

13:10
Pastor Dave Brezina
It’s allowed us to pull in some of our leadership in expanding roles and in different roles as we plan each week and as we plan ahead for the months to come. Jeremy and I have both gotten much better acquainted with the use of technology. Since last fall, we’ve been Facebook live streaming our worship services. And he does a devotion Wednesday nights, and I do another devotion on Sunday nights that we live stream on Facebook. One of the coolest things, if you want to say that we have something like Covid, we have disease and viruses as a result of the fallen world. Well, one of the great things with technology is that we can reach out further into that fallen world than we ever could before. Our little congregation in Linfield has people from as far away as know, Missouri, Kansas, Spokane. 

14:12
Pastor Dave Brezina
There’s a lady in know who are watching us, who we’re able to reach, and we’ve been able to develop a little bit of a digital relationship with some of these people that we never have before. And then that’s led us to contact some big shots in Senate who have the resources and have the understanding and knowledges for some guidance on how we can take advantage of that even further. So we have to distance every Sunday. We were closed completely from the second week of March until the first week of June last year. Initially, our use of technology was just the telephone. We knew how to handle that. So we’ve been kind of in school for over a year, learning that we do a live communion by appointment one Saturday a month outdoors, as well as private communion. 

15:16
Pastor Dave Brezina
If somebody wants know if they can’t make that, then contact. Jeremy and I are always available for private communion here in the building and just being careful. Masks are worn and distances are kept and things are sanitized and just try our best to keep on going. Certainly look forward to it being over. 

15:40
Emily Wilson
Right. I really appreciated how you were saying that your reach has been expanded. So, I mean, even with the 27 communities expanding even further out west, and how people have been really enriched by being able to be in community with other congregations that maybe they’ve never set foot in the building, but maybe their family worships there, or maybe they’re friends with the pastor, or just that they were looking for a church home to supplement the fact that they can’t go in person. And that’s really awesome that you’ve been able to make those connections across the US. It’s very cool. So, speaking of connections, wanted to ask you, how did you first hear about Lutheran Bible translators and getting involved with us? 

16:35
Pastor Dave Brezina
I’m not absolutely sure. My involvement with Bible translation goes back to about 2006 or seven. I think it was just about the time that Jeremy came here, but I think it was actually a little bit before I was contacted by an organization called Faith comes by hearing. And it was just the videos that they sent me. And seeing people hearing God’s word in their heart, language in their own language for the first time. There were just a whole bunch of revelations for me in that it had never struck me before how perhaps a missionary coming into an area, say an english speaking missionary coming into an area, teaches somebody to speak English and then is able to give them God’s word in English, how that person can hear it. 

17:35
Pastor Dave Brezina
Well, really, I feel like he’s not really hearing God’s word, he’s hearing the words of the missionary about the missionary’s God. And when that word is put in the language that I learned at my mother’s knee that I grew up with, that I understand to my core, and I hear God’s word coming to me in that language, I made a huge, even emotional connection to that. We did a few fundraisers for faith comes by hearing. We were the first lutheran congregation that they had who did a fundraiser for them. And I thought that we might be able to raise enough money to get ten of their proclaimers. And we actually raised enough to do 50 proclaimers. And then short time after that, talking with them again, they were introducing little Bible sticks, mp3 layers with the New Testament in it. 

18:45
Pastor Dave Brezina
And then I started hearing about a lutheran organization, LBT. And I just moved my interests from faith comes by hearing to our organization. Faith comes by hearing was providing devices that people could listen to, and it had involved technology. And technology, as we know, has its limitations, as I truly know has its limitations. But the limitation with translating something onto a page, the only limitation there is literacy. And there’s something about when I can hold my Bible in my hands and open it up and read words that talk to my heart, that’s my God, and that makes it more real. And I’m holding on to it, and I’m hearing it a whole lot deeper than just through my ears, but it comes in through my eyes and it comes into my brain and it comes into my heart. 

20:00
Pastor Dave Brezina
And so I found LBT to be like the source for an organization like faith comes by hearing. LBT. If we haven’t translated it, then we can’t speak it. We can’t speak and read it into a device so others can hear it. And LLBt made it more important to me. The other thing about Bible translation is the impact it had on me in the importance of my own devotional life. To have it in my heart, to know in my heart that there are so many people in the world who don’t have God’s word, who can’t hear it, who can’t read it, who don’t never heard it. It just made it more important to me to take advantage of that gift and to try not to miss it. 

21:03
Pastor Dave Brezina
I’d be lying if I said I was every day in his word, because I miss it some days. But when I miss it. 

21:14
Rich Rudowske
Yeah. 

21:15
Pastor Dave Brezina
And when coming back to it, I recognize how much I missed it. So I just can’t imagine. Not know when I read a passage that tells me that God knows my name, I can’t imagine reading that in a language that would not be so clear and truthful to me. 

21:42
Emily Wilson
Jumping off of the aspect of literacy you were mentioning about, the only barrier of being able to engage in God’s word when it is in that physical print is whether people have literacy. And that is definitely part of Lutheran Bible translators ministry of being able to have those literacy curriculum right alongside Bible translation programs. And the impact has just been amazing for me to witness over the past seven years of hearing how people who maybe would otherwise not have engaged with scripture are hungry to learn to read and write in their own language. And in that, then they’re exposed to scripture and they get to ask questions and to engage and then learn to read God’s word and how faith can grow in that process, what seemed like, okay, it was just about literacy. 

22:43
Emily Wilson
It was about learning to read and write in their own language. It just grows, it blossoms into more. And how God’s word takes root and just causes growth at the Holy Spirit that work in all of that. So, yeah, just that reminder of, like, yeah, we have this phrase in their hands and on their hearts and, yeah, I really see that, too with that physical print Bible. And for those who are able to engage with audio, too, sometimes it’s great to have both going at the same time of God’s word, not only reading it, but also hearing it, too. 

23:21
Rich Rudowske
Absolutely. And we’ve been blessed by several strategic partnerships with organizations that specialize in the recording of translated text. So it’s kind of a privilege to be there on the front end doing the translation. Partnering with organizations like faith comes by hearing and then to follow up as people start to listen to that and they say, I want to go deeper. I want to learn to read this, too, to be back again and catch that? So, yeah, it’s a privilege to be in that kind of ministry. Your congregation last year was even in the COVID year, one of the 60 congregations that celebrated Bible translation Sunday in 2020. Tell us a little bit about what that looked like and how your congregation responded. What encouraged you in that observing Bible translation Sunday? 

24:05
Pastor Dave Brezina
I’d have to say that we handled it in kind of a low key way. Generally, each month we have, some people call them door offerings or special offerings. We usually have two organizations or two things that we’re concentrating on each month. And Bible translation Sunday was in addition to what we traditionally do on a monthly basis. But we didn’t do it just one Sunday. I think we emphasized it for the month, and we had a bulletin insert, and then at the end of the service, with our announcements, I believe that I stood up and reminded people that we have been active a little bit in supporting LBT’s efforts. 

24:59
Pastor Dave Brezina
We had kind of a unique situation with LBT that our senior pastor was on the board of directors for a couple of terms, and I think the congregation engaged on a deeper level because of that. Is it wrong to say that they were proud to be able to share him with the organization? I’m not sure, but I think were. I think were proud to be involved even at that level. It was low key, but the congregation’s response was not low key. And I think one thing that I have to say is that when I get up in front of the congregation, I talk about Bible translation, and I start talking. 

25:51
Pastor Dave Brezina
If I get around to talking about some of the first videos that I ever saw, it was people in Peru who spoke multiple languages, Spanish and a native tongue, and then a merchant tongue. Their whole knowledge of scripture, their whole knowledge of the Bible was from spanish priests who would read them scripture in Spanish. And when their dialect or their heart language was first translated and read to them, the look on their face, the change in their eyes, the astonishment, just the change in their whole person, I get choked up thinking about that. And I make those announcements to the congregation. And no matter how many times I make them, I still react the same way. No matter how many times I see those videos or show those videos, I react the same way. 

27:08
Pastor Dave Brezina
And I think it’s an emotional reaction to the blessing that I have to the blessing that this congregation has, and a true opportunity to share that blessing in a simple way, and the congregation responds well. And then usually Jeremy and I both after worship for a period of time, maybe it’s a couple of weeks, it’ll be on their minds and their hearts, and they’ll be asking questions about translation. We have LBT and some of LBT’s missionaries and a few other missionaries listed on our prayer list every week in the bulletin. And over time, congregation feels that they have a relationship with those names in our bulletin, and those are the guys who are doing the work. And like I said, I think we promoted Bible translation Sunday in a low key way, and we’re very encouraged by the generosity of our congregation. 

28:23
Pastor Dave Brezina
But it was simple. That doesn’t have to be a big deal, doesn’t have to be any bigger a deal than God’s word is. 

28:30
Emily Wilson
So I think that when you had shared after the fact, because were asking about different pastors, what the response had been, you had mentioned, I think that there was a great impact on your grandchildren as they had interacted with some of the materials as well. And just wondering what kind of inspiration you had from that. 

28:56
Pastor Dave Brezina
When my grandkids ask me about God, when there’s any opportunity for me to share him with them, I don’t have the words to say how important that is to me. There’s a whole lot behind it. Understand that just because I’m a pastor doesn’t mean that everything is just fantastic in my life. But there have been challenges, and there are challenges within my daughter’s family. I thank God morning, noon and night that my daughter is a believer, but unfortunately, she’s married to a man who is not. And in a way, it’s wonderful to see how God’s word, how God’s name challenges people who don’t believe, how just the mention of Jesus can be a challenge to a non believer. And I. 

29:57
Pastor Dave Brezina
And I think that there’s no better sign of the power of his word, the power of his name, than how the ones that the devil thinks he’s got a stronghold of squirm in his bonds when the name of Jesus is mentioned. And so I am limited in how I can talk to my grandkids, just so that my daughter’s marriage is peaceful. But that doesn’t mean that my grandkids are limited when they talk to me. Just like in the public schools, people wrongly proclaim the separation of church and state. But when in the public schools, I’m asked a question, I can answer that question. And when my grandkids, we gave them some of the LBT stuff, and the questions just start, and kids ask great questions. 

31:00
Pastor Dave Brezina
I don’t remember specifically what any of them are or what any of them were, but kids ask great questions. 

31:08
Emily Wilson
Definitely. So in 2021, we’re actually hoping to double up on those numbers that we had in 2020. So the first year that we started out, in 2019, we had about 30 congregations, and then 2020 we had about 60. And we’re like, you know, let’s double up again. Let’s see what God is doing here. So we’re encouraging, we’re challenging, making a goal for ourselves of 120 congregations involved in Bible translation Sunday of 2021. So, Pastor Dave, what words of encouragement would you share with people who might be interested in getting involved in Bible translation Sunday? 

31:54
Pastor Dave Brezina
The first thing that comes to mind is I say, put on your Nike sweatshirt and then read what it says. What’s Nike’s tagline? 

32:02
Emily Wilson
Just do it. 

32:03
Pastor Dave Brezina
Do it. Just do it. It’s not hard. Just do it again. Jesus said, follow me. Nothing is easier than following. Being in the position of following is the best position to be in because you don’t have to lead and decide which course you follow. Perhaps. It certainly might take some courage, because my experience is Jesus never takes me in places that I’m comfortable, secure in going to, but he is always leading. And so I think I do it. Open up your heart to be able to share this gift that you’ve been given in other congregations. Is it the pastor who is setting these things up? Is it an evangelism council position? Is it a missions and ministry position? Is it a staff position? We’re such a small congregation that we just really don’t have any of those staff positions. 

33:20
Pastor Dave Brezina
And so Jeremy and I are the ones who are kind of taking the lead on some of those things. But we’ve got a congregation that is open to taking the ideas that we give them and running with them. And so find someone in your congregation. If it’s not the thing that you want to lead on, find someone in your congregation that you know has a heart for that. Maybe it’s something for your Sunday school to do. This is what we’ve learned, and we’re sharing God’s word. It’s an easy thing to introduce to your congregation, especially if you’re a congregation that has no familiarity with LBT or has no historical connection to Bible translation. It’s a great privilege. It’s very satisfying. The blessings come back to you and it’s just not difficult. And it’s so rewarding. And then make it your tradition. 

34:24
Pastor Dave Brezina
Don’t we love our traditions? 

34:26
Rich Rudowske
I love that. That’s true. Yeah. If we’re going to have traditions, let’s have some good ones. Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much for sharing your heart and your experience with ministry, your experience with Bible translation and Bible translation Sunday, how can we be praying for you in your ministry? 

34:42
Pastor Dave Brezina
Well, I didn’t know how to answer that until just a minute ago. You asked about words of encouragement and I said, the first thing I think of is Nike sweatshirt and just do it and it’s easy and maybe it takes a little courage to follow. It occurs to me that’s how you can pray for me, that I’d overcome my fears and that I would be a bold follower of Jesus wherever and whenever he leads. We, we use the Lord’s prayer all the time and in that we pray thy will be done. Let me that part of my prayer. I think that’s what I need. 

35:23
Emily Wilson
Absolutely. 

35:24
Rich Rudowske
It is a privilege to do so to pray for you. And we thank you so much for your time with us today and sharing. And we’re praying for you and for all the folks at Messiah and Linfield and Pastor Jeremy, too. We miss him. So we’ll be looking forward to seeing you all soon. And again, thanks for being with us today. 

35:42
Pastor Dave Brezina
You’re welcome. 

35:47
Rich Rudowske
Just what a great story. Pastor Dave Brazina, just a guy who felt God’s calling in his life, knows God, pursuing him throughout life and able to serve in ministry. Just really love what he had to say. 

36:01
Emily Wilson
Yeah. When I first contacted Pastor Dave, he was just, you know, this humble heart of are, you know, and you can just hear it in his words and just in the posture that he has towards ministry. But what a heart for reaching people with the gospel and how Bible translation is really a priority in his heart and his mind and focus, and that it is a privilege to bring other people into the Bible translation story that everyone should know and celebrate together and make God’s word available to people who don’t have it yet. 

36:40
Rich Rudowske
Yeah. And just as he said, that experience of having God’s word just get straight to your heart without barriers. So important in the life of any christian person and to be hopefully experiencing that yourself in your own walk of faith and then the real privilege of getting to participate in making that even a possibility for other people around the world. That’s what being part of the Bible translation movement is. And we certainly invite you to honestly, to be like Pastor Dave, get your congregation involved in Bible translation ministry. If you’re an elder in the congregation or in leadership, or if you’re just listening to the podcast and think, hey, this sounds interesting, talk to your pastor and let them know about LBT’s Bible translation Sunday. You can find out more@lbt.org. Slash Bts together we can put God’s. 

37:31
Emily Wilson
Word in their hands, and we’re just excited for people to join the Bible translation movement together. 

37:36
Rich Rudowske
Thank you for listening to the essentially translatable podcast brought to you by Lutheran Bible translators. You can find past episodes of the podcast@lbt.org Slash podcast or subscribe on audible, Apple, iheartRadio, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Follow Lutheran Bible translator social media channels on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter. Or go to lbt.org to find out how you can get involved in the Bible translation movement and put God’s word in their hands. This episode of essentially translatable was produced and edited by Andrew Olsen and distributed by Sarah Lyons. The executive producer is Emily Wilson. Podcast artwork was designed by Caleb Bogenwald. Music written and performed by Rob White. I’m Rich Rudowski. So long. For now, it’s.