When you retire — Retirement provides new opportunities to share your faith seven days a week, 365 days a year.

by Amy Gage | photography by Tamara Reynolds

A decade after retiring, Bill Wehman, 72, has hardly stopped working. Ask how he’s doing, and instead of getting the typical one-word answer (“fine”), you’ll hear a more reflective one: “Blessed.”

The former photo engraver and chrome-plating expert is serving as president, “again,” of St. John Lutheran Church in Burns, Tennessee. He’s the congregational service team director for the West Central Tennessee Chapter of Thrivent Financial for Lutherans. And, as if that weren’t enough, as a Korean War veteran, he serves as secretary and chaplain of his local veterans’ organization.

Wehman is busy, to be sure, but his activities have a larger purpose. He describes his work—in a union printing plant for decades and, now, as a lay leader and volunteer—in the context of his deep religious faith.

“Let’s put it this way,” says Wehman, an affable man who loves to wind up and tell a good story. “The Lord Jesus Christ, God, family and country: Those are my priorities. I believe it, and I try to live it.”

In varying degrees, all Lutheran churches call upon their members to demonstrate their faith, in words, actions and deeds. For many churchgoers, that may feel awkward or risky—particularly in a society that stereotypes Christians and aggressively pushes images in the media that run contrary to Christian practices and values.

“The interface that Christians have with non-believers is fascinating to me,” says the Rev. Stephen Hower, author of the book Contrary to Popular Belief and pastor of St. John Lutheran Church in Ellisville, Missouri.

Churchgoing people, he contends, live in a separate world from their secular neighbors, who put their faith in popular culture and short-term personal gain. “They prefer positive thinking to the power of prayer,” he says. “They ask, ‘Are there such things as miracles? How could Jesus be the Son of God and the Son of man?’ All those things that require faith.”

Living by Example
Living the Christian life means teaching by example, making every move of every day a God-felt action, says the Rev. Peter Marty, pastor of St. Paul Lutheran Church in Davenport, Iowa. Treat others as you would want them to treat you. In the Christian faith, it’s called the Golden Rule.

“When I go outside to pick up the mail and I see Bob outside working on his lawn, I try to make the exchange between Bob and me count,” says Marty, describing how he likes to greet his neighbors and inquire after their well-being. “I make everything an act of devotion.”

While he was in the workforce, Wehman always went the extra mile. He figured that Jesus Christ called him to do so. A union man, he occasionally faced taunts from his brethren.“‘You’re killing the job,’ they’d say. ‘You’re working too hard.’” Wehman sighs. “As a Christian, I felt it was my duty to do the best job possible.”

Before serving in the U.S. Army during the mid-1950s, Wehman kept mum at work about his faith. Like many Christians, he was reluctant to talk about his beliefs beyond the comfortable confines of his church. Then he was stationed in Japan, a largely Buddhist country, and was called upon by Lutheran missionaries to teach English-language Bible classes to Japanese college students who “went through hardships” to practice Christianity.

The experience changed his life. A churchgoer as a child, Wehman had regarded his religious faith as a routine, “just something you did, like eating breakfast.” Once a “Christian of environment,” someone who merely goes through the motions, he returned home from active duty as a fully realized “Christian of conviction.”

Integrating his faith into all aspects of his life no longer was a question—or an option. “You want to be there, want to be involved, do witnessing, serve your church until you die,” Wehman explains. “You go and do, and you go and tell.”

Faithful Servants
Donald, 81, and Eleanor Swanson, 77, have served their church so faithfully that St. Matthew Lutheran Church in Avon, Connecticut, named them Mr. and Mrs. Parishioner of the Year in 2003. Eleanor works on the memorials committee and the social ministry committee, with Vacation Bible School and with making handcrafts for babies and children from impoverished homes.

While retirement has allowed the couple to become more deeply involved in their church, they always have been churchgoing people. That faith sustains Eleanor now as she struggles with her husband’s failing health. “Now that Donald is so ill, I asked the pastor, ‘What do people do who don’t have faith?’” she says.

Perhaps more pertinent to Lutheran pastors is this question: How do you share your faith? How do you live it?

Asked if his parishioners have an obligation to witness, the Rev. Donald Patterson laughs. “The Gospel is freedom, and you share out of joy, not out of guilt,” says Patterson, who serves Holy Word Lutheran in Austin, Texas. “The word ‘obligation’ doesn’t go far with our members. It makes them sad. A sad Christian is not going to witness very well.”IT

Northfield, Minnesota, writer Amy Gage writes the “Seeker’s Diary” column for the “Faith and Values” section of the Minneapolis StarTribune.

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