
For what? Winter Carnival of course! In 2025 this event takes place on February 5-8. It has been going on since 1922. And beginning in 1934, one of the biggest attractions has been the snow sculptures that student organizations build. The most massive are the month-long statues. Dozens more on a smaller scale are done overnight.
Countless hours of planning go into these creations. Every aspect needs to be carefully designed. And the success of the project begins with how well the statue syncs itself into the overall annual carnival theme.
Then comes the construction. Forms need to be built. Snow gathered. (If needed, students go into the community and get permission to harvest snow from rooftops!) And that snow needs to be white, clean, pristine. Not smudged or stained with dirt. Also, water needs to be used. Gallons of it to help freeze snow into solid blocks. (Good luck keeping the hoses from freezing up in frigid weather!)
And the details that set apart the winning statues! I was shocked to watch steady-handed students sculpting the tiniest of details ever-so meticulously. Or using an iron to smooth lines and make surfaces look like glass. (Yes, a clothes iron). For finer details, a soldering stick. Or making chain-link fences out of ice.
And then comes the only colored item allowed anywhere on the statue. Those are the brightly-colored three-dimensional letters that form the descriptive signs that grace snow-podiums or low block-like snow-walls in front of the statues. I was astounded to learn that student groups spend hours working on recipes for the sharpest, brightest colored letters. And these treasured recipes, once perfected, are zealously guarded and passed on only to following generations of that student group.
Each snow sculpture is also allowed to have a placard in front of it, with a brief typed message explaining the statue. Since thousands of onlookers will view these statues (students, faculty, staff, community, tourists), this makes Winter Carnival a great opportunity for our WELS student group, Lutheran Collegians, to do some creative outreach. Usually students consulted with me to develop a brief law/gospel witness that fit on an 8 ½ x 11 piece of paper sealed in plastic and ice-glued into place on a snow-podium in front of our statue.
What follows is what we shared back in 2016, when the Winter Carnival theme was “As Snow Accumulates at Alarming Rates, We Show Our Love for The 50 States.”
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Snow came down at alarming rates over the east coast in the “Blizzard of 2016.” Thousands of flights were canceled. Travel ground to a halt in Washington DC, New York City, Philadelphia, and across an area that stretched from Georgia to Maryland. CNN, the Weather Channel, and others rang out the alarming news!
40 inches in Glengary, West Virginia! A veritable Tsnownami!
38 inches in Redhouse, Maryland. Yikes! It’s Snowzilla!
But in the Keweenaw? Meh. Snow comes down at alarming rates most every winter. Armed with
Yooper-Scoopers we clear our sidewalks--morning, mid-morning, noon, afternoon tea-time, and once
more at night. Snow-Gos cut back towering drifts so cars can pass each other again on country roads
and side-streets. Roofs get shoveled, lest buildings collapse. We are used to snow. We deal with it.
Maybe we can deal with snow, but we can’t deal with our sin. Why? According to the Bible, it, too,
piles up at alarming rates. The Prophet Ezra once prayed, “Our sinful deeds have risen above our heads, and our guilt is so great that it reaches to the heavens.” (Ezra 9:6) There’s no way we can dig our way out of this sin-mess and climb our way up and over our sin-mountain to God.
So God came to us in the person of His Son. And through His Son, God Showed His Love for Our 50 States and Beyond--To The Ends of the Earth!
“Proclaim Liberty Throughout All the Land unto All the Inhabitants thereof." (Leviticus 25:10 KJV)
That verse is inscribed on the Liberty Bell which is displayed at 526 Market St., Philadelphia. The
bell has long been cracked, so it rings no more. Yet the message of liberty is one that still rings
throughout our land!
For the message of liberty, of freedom from sin, still rings out from Christian churches and groups like ours. This liberty is ours only through Jesus. It is yours, too. Jesus himself once said, “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." (Luke 4:18-19)
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Please pray for our WELS student group at MTU, Lutheran Collegians, as they plan and build another snow sculpture that serves as a freedom-ringing Christian Witness for Winter Carnival, 2025!
Privileged to serve,
Rev. Glenn Schwanke