Dear Friends in Christ, grace and peace to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  Amen.

Most American would be surprised to discover that Lincoln Logs, the classic children building set was not invented in America.  It was invented in Japan, somewhere around 1916-1917 by John Lloyd Wright, the son of the famous American architect Frank Lloyd Wright who was working with the senior Wright in Tokyo. The model for the building set was based on the Imperial Hotel and its foundation which consisted of interlocking log beams making the structure “earthquake-proof.”  John Wright was issued a patent for his “Toy-Cabin Construction” in 1920.

The original set in the 1920’s came with instructions on how to build Uncle Tom’s Cabin as well as Abraham Lincoln’s cabin. Having grown up in Illinois, the Land of Lincoln, Wright named his toy, Lincoln Logs to honor the American pioneers and the president who was born in a log cabin.  Truthfully, the wooden toys should have been called Swedish logs or even Finnish logs.  Why you may ask? Because Swedish and Finnish immigrants introduced the notched and locking form of wooden construction for building homes to the American colonies in Delaware in 1638, nearly 180 years before 16^th president was born. It all began with a small Scandinavian colony named New Sweden that survived for only 17 years, but some where along the way, developed a sense of hospitality and welcoming that can only be compared to -Jesus’ call to his disciples.

The story of the Swedish colonization in America is very brief. By the middle of the 17th century, Sweden had reached its greatest territorial extent, encompassing Finland and Estonia, as well as parts of the present day Russia, Poland, Germany, and Norway.  At the same time as other European nations were establishing colonies in the New World, Sweden sought to expand its own influence by creating a tobacco plantation and fur-trading colony. The Swedish South Company was founded in 1626 and sponsored 11 expeditions in 14 separate voyages to the Delaware River. In 1638, the former Dutch governor of New Netherlands, Peter Minuit was commissioned by the Swedish South Company to lead an expedition and sail deep into Delaware Bay aboard two ships named the Fogel Grip and Kalmar Nyckel. True, the territory had been claimed by the Dutch, but Minuit as the former governor knew that his countrymen had chosen to abandon the territory along the Delaware River and instead focus their efforts on Manhattan Island and the Hudson River. The ships anchored on March 1638 at a rocky point on the Minquas Kill that is known today as Swedes’ Landing. There, they built a fort at the confluence of the Christina River and Brandywine Creek which they named Fort Christina after their Queen.

Over the next 15 years, New Sweden expanded along the Delaware River. In 1642 Count Axel Oxenstierna, Royal Chancellor to Queen Christina, appointed Johan Björnsson Printz to be the third Governor of New Sweden. Count Oxenstierna wrote very specific instructions for the Governor to follow that included the following instructions:

Survey the land along the Delaware River as far as 90 miles from the Delaware Bay

Talk calmly with people from the Dutch West India Company. Tell them that we want to trade in peace. Only fight if the Dutch attack you.

Keep peace with all people, including English settlers and the native peoples.

Treat the Native Americans with humanity and respect. Sell them what they need, at a lower price than the Dutch are charging, so that they will be our friends. Tell them about Christianity.

In 1651, however, the Dutch West India Company abandoned its fort on the east side of the river and established Fort Casimir on the west side just a few miles south of Fort Christina. Three years later, in 1654, soldiers from New Sweden captured Fort Casimir and renamed it Fort Trinity (Trefaldigheten in Swedish). Months later, the directors of the Dutch West India Company ordered the Director-General of New Netherland, Peter Stuyvesant, to “drive” the Swedes from the river.

The next summer, Stuyvesant sailed from New Amsterdam to Delaware Bay with 7 ships and 317 soldiers and quickly retook the former Dutch fort and then proceeded further upriver to besiege Fort Christina which surrendered a month later. New Sweden was formally incorporated into New Netherland in 1655. The Swedish and Finnish settlers were, however, allowed local autonomy. They retained their own militia, religion, court, and lands. This lasted for 9 years until the English conquest of New Netherland in 1664, when New Sweden was brought under English rule. Still, most of the European population the Delaware Valley was Swedish. And the English, just as the Dutch before them, encouraged the Swedes and Finns to stay.  Relations with the Lenape Indians as well remained peaceful and so the settlers had spread along both sides of the Delaware River.

In 1682, William Penn, the Quaker proprietor of the newly established Province of Pennsylvania to the north, acquired leased the three lower counties on the Delaware from James the Duke of York, who went on to become King James II. This rapid succession of national religious traditions, first Lutheran, then Dutch Reformed, then Church of England and then Quaker made for a unique spiritual foundation for the Delaware Colony. The colonists were tolerant and accepted their neighbors’ faith and traditions.  So much so that in 1701, William Penn authored a Charter of Privileges for the colonists living in Pennsylvania and the lower counties of Delaware which would serve as a model for the future.

Under the Charter: Society was established based on the principle of “liberty of conscience” – the freedom to hold one’s own religious and moral beliefs. All monotheists were granted freedom to practice their religion. This covered Christians, both Protestants and Roman Catholic, Jews and dissenting non-conformists.  Though the Charter promised liberty of conscience, it did not grant complete religious freedom. Participation in government was limited to Christians. Elected officials had to “profess to believe in Jesus Christ.”

The story of New Sweden is a remarkable witness to the immigrants who settled in Delaware.  The church in the colony at that time had no physical or monetary demand upon its neighbors. There was no legal requirement that people gather for Sunday worship as was regulated in the other colonies. The right to vote was not defined by Church membership.  The faithful colonists of Delaware understand that they were personally called and sent into the world to be God’s loving presence.

The Swedes of the former colony continued to look to Sweden to sustain their cultural traditions, especially their religion. In 1693, they petitioned Sweden’s King Karl XI to send Lutheran pastors from Sweden and Swedish hymnals and catechisms to help them keep their religion and language alive. The pastors kept coming until the last Swedish clergyman arrived in 1770.

The history of New Sweden reminds me that even though not all Christians are sent to the far corners of the world to be missionaries, you and I haven’t been left off the hook. The early Swedish and Finnish colonists took their responsibility seriously. They understood that all the  baptized are sent into the world to tell and embody the good news of Jesus Christ. And not just the organized church clergy. All are sent into the world to welcome the stranger.

My friends, what would happen if we as a church stopped expecting people to come simply on their own initiative through our church doors, and instead, we took seriously our calling to bring the gospel to them? What would happen if we truly believed that in our welcoming of the stranger that we bear the presence of Christ to every person we encounter, in every home, in the workplace, or the neighborhood we enter? What would happen if we saw every conversation as an opportunity to speak words of grace, every interaction as an opportunity to embody Christ’s love for the neighbor? Wouldn’t it be as comforting as offering a drink of water to the thirsty?

The gospel teaches us that Jesus in inviting you and me in our smallest gestures of charity and love, to be his welcoming presence. I cannot tell you how important you are, as God’s instrument for sharing the Christian faith with the little ones of this world- including the strangers and foreigners. You are preparing the world’s little ones to have faith.   Every act of charity to your neighbor, no matter the color of his or her skin, or the confession on his or her lips, is an act of godly love.  “For no one who does a deed of power in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of you.”

My friends, the early settlers of New Sweden left us to with Lincoln Logs to build a solid foundation of faith that cannot be shaken.  Even today, the carved, overlapping corners hold the structure in place.  With that solid foundation, may you confidently share your gifts, and receive the reward of the righteous trusting that “Whoever gives even a cup of water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple-Truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward.” Amen.

May the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.  Amen.