Warning! This is long.
With about eight weeks left before our last Sunday in Flint, we were still without a ministry to go to. What was up? The District Superintendent in East Michigan suggested to us that he had a small church that needed a solo pastor. I went home and told Pam and we discussed the possibilities. This was a major step that up until this point, I had not discovered. Was God calling me toward ordination and being a pastor? As Pam and I talked and prayed about it, we decided that if it was possible to take a small church in Michigan, would it be possible to pastor a small church elsewhere? I emailed several District Superintendents who already had my resume and asked if they had any pastoral positions available. All of a sudden, there were a number of opportunities. My former pastor, told me to call him right away. Several others had positions available as well. About a week later I had a conference call with that church. They arranged for us to come and visit on Father’s Day. We made the twelve hour journey to Fort Edward to visit the church and preach my first sermon. The voted 15 to 0 to call us as their pastor. Several weeks later, we loaded the big yellow truck again and headed to New York.

One nice thing is we were only about 30 minutes from the district center. The DS at the time was one of my former pastors. Pam and his wife were very good friends. Dr. Berry and Shelly helped us as I got used to being a pastor. It was a bi-vocational position, so I had to find a job to help pay the bills. This is where RadioShack came into play. Seven years later, I’m still there. That fall for our ministerial, I was asked to lead worship for one of the sessions. I was introduced to Glenn Bozak. This pastor became a major influence in my life. He was a bi-vocational pastor about 40 miles from us. He started as a music major, so our paths were similar. During the fall, one of the younger men at our church was interesting in playing guitars together. So we put some things together and in the spring played at his home church’s Pentecost celebration. We played guitars and sang with backup tracks we had made. I still have some of those tracks and they aren’t too bad. About that time I was asked to lead worship at Teen Camp. That would be something different. I spent several weeks preparing for that, learning new songs like Hungry, Better Is One Day, You Are My King, and others. The first night I led worship solo with my guitar and tracks. The next two nights I led worship with a band from Houghton College. It was very cool. The last night I led worship with my electric and the tracks. It was a great event. I would return to FLAME for a second time, by now morning chapel included a time of worship. I asked if I could join playing piano and they said yes. It seemed that even though I had thought I had given up leading worship, I now had even more opportunities.

That fall, my friend Glenn contacted me about teaching music at the Christian school where he was teaching Phys Ed. I interviewed and a few days later I was teaching. Talk about a challenge. I taught from Kindergarten and 1st grade music; directed a 1st through 3rd grade chorus and 4th through 6th grade chorus, Jr. High Chorus, Sr. High Chorus, and select chorus and taught 7th and 8th grade music. All in two days a week. It was a great experience. I did that for three years while at Fort Edward. The last year, I was also in charge of the praise team for chapel. All of this kept me on my toes…It also provided a mentoring time. For three years Glenn and I met at least once a week if not twice to discuss ministry…I owe a great debt of gratitude to Glenn for his friendship over the five years at Fort Miller.

We did not have a Sunday evening service, so we had an open invitation to attend Glenn’s church and join in the worship. I never knew what instrument I might play; bass, electric, acoustic, piano, vocals, or even drums. I enjoyed the several times when I went to Glenn’s church and he needed an electric guitar. I enjoyed the more contemporary worship of his church.

When we arrived at Fort Miller a familar hymnal greeted us. It was the Praise & Worship hymnal from my childhood. We had a wonderful classically trained pianist. In addition to the hymnal, they were using The Master Chorus Book for additional songs. The Master Chorus Book was published in the late 80′s so it didn’t include any of the more contemporary worship music. I began teaching the congregation some of the newer, congregationally friendly music; Lord, I Lift Your Name on High, Shout to the Lord and others. We started by using bulletin inserts and then someone donated us an overhead projector. Not long after that someone donated us a pull-down screen. Up till then we used a large window blind. The congregation was very accepting of the “new” music. Most of the time, I played my bass along with Jerry, our pianist. Rebecca flipped the transparencies and Anna started playing her flute. We even had guitar from time to time.

While at Fort Miller, I went from supply pastor to licensed minister to ordained minister. Most of my preparation was done through FLAME, but I also took classes through our district and two classes at Houghton College. It was my third visit to FLAME in Vassar, MI that became life changing. Up to this point, I had never really gotten to know Wayne, the director of FLAME. It was here at Vassar, I found a new friend. Wayne approached me on Monday morning about leading worship for chapel. In the process two other FLAME students who were also musicians arrived. We spent some time jamming and before we knew it we had a worship set for the morning. This would mark the first time I would lead worship primarily from guitar. Bernie and I traded off leading worship the rest of the week. Besides worship being awesome, the classes that week, set a new tone I had never experienced. My family would all go with me to Frankfort for the first “family camp” FLAME. Worship was great (I played a supporting role on bass and vocals) and God did an amazing work in me that week. I would return to FLAME a third time that year, when FLAME came to the Northeast for the first time. By now, Wayne and I had become friends and he asked me to lead worship there. I took 7 classes that year and it set me up to take just two the next year to complete my ordination requirements.

The next year, I asked my good friend Glenn and his worship team to come help me lead worshp the first morning at FLAME. It was great. The band that followed wasn’t too shabby either. That’s is an amazing thing about FLAME. It has attracted some incredible musicians through the years. Because FLAME is about academics, there is not alot of time to rehearse, usually about an hour or so. To watch how God pulls the bands together is simply amazing. I completed my requirements for ordination and in June of 2005, I was ordained as a minister in The Wesleyan Church.

One more influence at Fort Miller was my association with community clergy. I was part of two groups. The first was a group including two Baptist pastors, a Presbyterian pastor, and a Reformed pastor and myself. We would get together bi-monthly for a concert of prayer. These were great times together which included times of worship.

The other was the Greater Schuylerville Ecumenical Clergy Association. This group was primarily female but was based in the community where my children went to school. While we didn’t always agree, they were a great source of encouragement. I didn’t meet most of them until two years before we left. Even though we knew each other a short time, they gave us a wonderful send off party. It was my association with this group, that I started to develop an appreciation for liturgy and the lectionary readings.

As you can see, Fort Miller was a great influence on me as a musician and a pastor. To think that only a few months before we moved there, I had never even thought of being a pastor or being ordained. It was quite a change and a change that happened quickly. As I completed my requirements for ordination, we began to feel that God was about to do something different in our lives. Where was He about to lead us now? While I attended that final FLAME, the answer started to become clear. I share that process next week.