The month of July reminds me that it will soon be the 5th anniversay of the day you called  me to be your Pastor, August 1, 2021.  After months of trusting the process, when we all knew God had put us together for a reason, the day finally came when the people of St. John’s, the Synod, and I all said yes!  I am typically not a person who spends much time looking back, but rather I tend to look at what’s happening now and hope for what will happen in the future.  But this anniversary has me reflecting on these past 5 years. 

Those 5 years have brought forth: 26 baptisms/affirmation of baptims, 9 Confirmands, 10 weddings, 46 funerals, 815 visits, and 238 worship services.  These may seem like a lot, but numbers don’t really tell the whole story.  They don’t tell you fully about the young boy who had questions about God and after spending several months as part of our community, said yes to baptism.  They don’t express the struggles of getting 9 young people with various activity schedules and a pandemic to the point of confirmation.  They don’t speak of the extreme joy I experienced when the first wedding I presided at was my oldest son and his lovely bride.   I’ve had the honor and privilege of walking with people in the most challenging moments of their lives, as they grieved the loss of loved ones, experienced serious health issues, relived past traumas, and seeking reassurance of their faith.

These past five years together we’ve worshiped, prayed, taught, navigated some challenging situations, and brought forth new and revitalized ways to do ministry together.    Our worship life has brought back the Easter Sunrise service with a new twist of being at the local park, the restart of the Home Communion Teams, and the introduction of monthly Multi-generational Sunday School.  Additionally faith formation has been taking place with mid week Advent and Lent series, Women’s Retreat, Youth Mission Trip, Bible Study, and 5 years of Vacation Bible School. 

New programs have included a monthly MomCo group, Sunbuy City Band Concerts, Disaster Relief Supplies delivered to NC after the hurricane, new Scout Adventure Crew and restart of our Scout Troup, movie nights, the Blessing Shed, and the Born Again Boutique (opening in the fall).  Our new digital sign helps us keep our community informed of all of these events and even announced the Baptism this past Sunday!   

Throughout these five years, we have also navigated some challenging financial constraints.  The first being the decreased funding for KK, but the members of St. John’s and the community came through and we did not need to close this important ministry down.  Developing a partnership with the PA Food Bank helped us to keep the costs of the ministry reasonable and make it sustainable for the future while also adding fresh produce for clients.  An even larger constraint was the realization that we’d been dipping into savings funds for far too long and they were going to run out at the rate we were spending.  Much hard work went into looking at our spending and developing solutions to decrease our overall monthly costs to align with our income.  This work included decreasing my time at St. John’s to ¾ time and asking the synod to increase my time with the synod to ¼ time. 

Throughout these past five years, I have engaged with my favorite verse often, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding,” Proverbs 3:5.  It was trust in the Lord that brought me to St. John’s almost 8 years ago, trust in the Lord that brought me back as your Pastor, and trust in the Lord that keeps me looking forward to the mininstry that God calls us to do together! 

 

Blessings,

Pastor Karla

 

 

 

May we acknowledge God in all our ways and allow God alone to direct our paths, (Proverbs 3:6, paraprased).