Welcome to Kairos for Fall 2025

Sunday Mornings, 10:15 a.m., Fireside Room

December 7, 2025: Parents Letting Go
Jack Stoltzfus, Clinical Psychologist, author, and America’s Launch Coach™

Parents are more challenged to let go of adult children than in past generations. We need to learn how to let go, whether the young adult is living at home or not. Letting go in love is foundational and has its roots in our experience of God’s love in Christ. Stoltzfus counsels parents and writes about young adult parenting challenges in his recent book, “The Parent’s Launch Code: Loving and Letting Go of Our Adult Children.” His website: parentslettinggo.com

December 14, 2025:  Foundations of Hope: Ruth and David
Kathryn Schifferdecker, Professor of Old Testament at Luther Seminary

Advent is about hopeful waiting, but we’re not the first ones to wait and hope for a Redeemer. The Bible is filled with stories of hope, including the stories of two particular ancestors of Jesus: Ruth and David. Come study anew the stories of the Moabite widow and the flawed Israelite king, her great-grandson, who helped lay the foundation for the story of Jesus the Messiah, the center of our Advent hope. Schifferdecker co-hosts the podcast, “Everything you wanted to know about the Bible but were afraid to ask” at EntertheBible.org. She is also a frequent contributor to WorkingPreacher.org.

January 11 and 18, 2026
Learning from Both the Tender and the Harsh Words of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew
Presenter: Matt Skinner, Asher O. and Carrie Nasby Professor of New Testament, Luther Seminary

All four Gospels present Jesus as a teacher with both reassuring and unsettling things to say. The contrast is most striking in Matthew’s Gospel, where you can read a passage full of grace and comfort, then turn the page and be taken aback by threats of judgment. How do Jesus’s promises of mercy relate to his warnings?

This overview of some of the main themes in Matthew will offer a clearer view of how the Gospels remember Jesus’s teachings, what those teachings mean, and how we might sort through them ourselves to make better sense of Jesus’s message to us.

Skinner, also Scholar for Adult Education at Westminster Presbyterian Church, is a longtime cohost of Sermon Brainwave, a weekly podcast that helps preachers work with biblical passages as they prepare their sermons. One of his recently published books is Matthew: The Gospel of Promised Blessings, which explores the Gospel of Matthew and its most important themes.

January 25, 2025
Religion & Politics: Like Oil & Water?
Presenter: Gary Anderson, Retired Senior Pastor, Incarnation Lutheran Church

There is a great deal of confusion and disinformation about the relationship between religion and politics today. There are also worrisome, if not dangerous, associations between them being advanced by some churches and politicians. In this session, we will attempt to explore the complex relationship and the challenges flowing from it.

Anderson sees this subject as especially difficult for many Lutherans, given a historic disassociation of the two and a basic Lutheran attitude to simply stay out of politics.

Following his retirement in 2004, Anderson became interim seminary pastor at Luther Seminary for two years, then worked for the Saint Paul Area Synod ELCA as director of “Crossing Bridges,” a three-year, $2 million mission appeal. His alma mater, Gustavus Adolphus College, honored him with its 2009 Covenant Award for his significant contributions to the life and growth of both Gustavus and the Church.

Questions about Kairos? Contact The Kairos Committee.