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My First Month at FGUCC

I’m so pleased to at the Forest Grove United Church of Christ. It’s quite a break from my usual day in business. I’ve spent the last few years, since leaving the Presbyterian Church in 2001, developing martial arts studios in Hillsboro and Sherwood. And while I’ve enjoyed the teaching—at one point, we had children’s karate programs in six Hillsboro elementary schools as well as a full-time studio—it’s great to be back in the church doing what I was first felt called to do.

I say “called,” because Christians have a sense that some aspect (or many) of their lives has been directed or selected by something greater than themselves. Over the years of pastoral ministry—I count 35 years this past June—I’ve heard church folks talk about their marriages that way, their vocations, and sometimes even the smaller and at first glance less significant aspects of their lives too. While I’m not always certain that what poses for the mystery of God in our daily lives isn’t just the garbage of trying to make sense of the delirious details of what it means to be alive, I do know that the larger circles and concerns of our lives sometimes have a sense of sacredness to them. It’s in that sense that I say pastoral ministry is my calling.

Being a part of the Forest Grove United Church of Christ—Nancy and I have been members there for two years—has made me sure of that. Even more, just being there in the office for the last couple of weeks.

Early on, Pastor Angela said to me that returning to ministry full-time would be just like getting back on a bike—God, I was such a bad bike rider compared to she and her husband, who compete regularly and nationally—but her thinking was right on the mark. It took only a couple of weeks in the office, conversations out among people, standing in the pulpit or on the platform to prove that God’s first calling in my life is God’s current calling as well.

So what will I be doing while I’m serving on the pastoral staff? Given our church’s vision of ministry— “shared ministry” is FGUCC’s term for it—the question might be better put, “what will the church and I be doing together while I’m there?” The pastor, moderators and I have agreed to do five things and are flirting with a sixth:

1) We’ll be working on the church’s finance and stewardship efforts, particularly some of the congregation’s capital dreams. More recently referred to as the “Hope Of” campaign,” we’re now calling it the church’s “Have To” campaign!”

2) We’ll be practicing how we welcome visitors to the Forest Grove church, on Sunday mornings and during the week, working toward Pastor Angela’s vision of “an extravagant welcome!”

3) We’ll be having fun in worship together—so many serious things can be said when people are laughing, don’t you think? I just love the sacred moments we’re sharing there, generally twice a month, when I’m scheduled to lead or to preach.

4) We’ll give some special attention to those who have moved away from the church in recent months, with the hope of helping them find a meaningful home here again.

5) We’ll be hanging out in the church office, Tuesdays through Fridays, attempting to solidify some of the church’s policies and procedures and seeing what other kinds of trouble we can get into.

6) We’ll be working on some of the tensions that the congregation and its ministries are experiencing, helping to solve them where we’re able and healing them where we can.

I think it’s going to be fun! I hope they do, too. And when the fall rolls around—be it September, or October or November when the more permanent gal or guy arrives, we’ll be able to take a breath and say, “Gosh, that was a good time!”