Our New Associate Pastor of Community Life!
Dear Sanctuary,
You may remember that at the beginning of 2020, we announced a job opening for an associate pastor of community life. Our dearly beloved Kathleen had just moved to California to be closer to her family; Frances had graciously stepped in, increasing her hours here at the church to temporarily fill in some of the gaps left by Kathleen’s departure, and we formed an associate pastor search committee to fill this new position.
Then, 2020 happened—COVID, shutdowns, racial injustice, riots, forest fires, Frances effectively exiled to Cape Cod, and hyper-sanitary communion cups! One morning several weeks ago, Susan came into my office at home and said, “Peter, I was praying, and I heard God say, ‘Tell Peter: “You feel like you’re making bricks without straw. I am the straw.”’” That is just what 2020 has felt like for me. I lie in bed unable to sleep thinking, “I should call this person. I should call that person. I don’t know how to hold the church together.” It’s such good news to hear that our Lord builds his church—the True Church—and he holds it together; he’s the straw (ref. Exodus 5 if confused). Of course, the cooperate entity we call the Sanctuary is just part of our Lord’s Church, and yet, I do believe God has been holding us together and laying the foundation for our future.
For the past nine months, several members of our body appointed by our church board have been faithfully working to find an associate pastor of community life. They are Carin Knickel, Tim Ryckman, Jolene Miller, and Matt Kinner, accompanied by Susan and me. We had approximately eighty folks apply. Twenty-four read a small book I wrote and responded with essay questions. We interviewed nine candidates, about four of whom are already a part of our fellowship. I was utterly amazed that so many applied and even more amazed at the quality of our candidates. The entire process took longer than anticipated due to COVID, but in the end the entire committee happily agreed to recommend one particular candidate to our church board. Fully aware that these are challenging times, that giving is down relative to last year (yet surprisingly good for the situation), and with a sense of conviction that the Lord wants us to move forward, the board voted unanimously to offer this position to Chris Lindenmeyer.
Chris Lindenmeyer
Associate Pastor of Community Life
If you were around on Sunday, September 20, or watched the service online, he’s that guy—the guy that preached and gave you an envelope with an invitation that he’d like to help you fulfill. He’s that guy and father to Paxton, who just turned one and likes to roar, as well as husband to Kara, whom the references seemed to like more than Chris. Just recently, the Lindenmeyers moved to Colorado from the Kansas City area, where Chris served as Assistant University Chaplain at MidAmerican Nazarene University and College Age Pastor at College Church of the Nazarene. In 2017, Chris graduated from Nazarene Theological Seminary with a master’s degree in Christian Formation and Discipleship. I’m pretty sure Chris will solve all our problems, raise the dead, and increase giving by 850%, but mostly we like Chris’s vulnerability, heart for nurturing authentic Christian Community, and his love for the calling on our church—to manifest the beautiful news of God’s Relentless Love in Jesus Christ, our Lord.
We had a slew of marvelous candidates with great gifts for teaching and leading in various capacities but felt that Chris was best equipped to equip the rest of us in living out our particular callings in the community that is our church. But that cannot fully happen without you!
So, I, Peter Hiett, your old friend, pastor—back before COVID; remember me?—am imploring you:
Chris, Kara, and Paxton
Thank God for Chris and Kara and Paxton.
Pray for Chris, Kara, Paxton, and all of us as we walk into this new season.
Make every effort to introduce yourself to Chris. Chris is young and respects his elders (he called me “pastor” at first… Kinda scared me). So, take the initiative, take him to lunch, tell him all about yourself, how you’ve been involved, how you’d like to be involved, and how you might help him meet others.
Consider how God may be calling you to intentionally live out your faith in community, and how you can help Chris help all of us. Is the Lord calling you to teach, start a group, serve with “helping hands” or the deacons, be a part of a local mission, take Chris to a Broncos game and try to convert him, etc. etc.?
This is an incredibly strange time to initiate a new Pastor of Community Life—when everyone’s scared to meet as a community—and yet, it may be just the perfect time. As we begin to come out of this season of isolation and deconstruction, we are wonderfully positioned to walk into a new creation and greater depth of communion. What exactly our programs and procedures will look like as we come out of this “shut down,” we do not know. I’m sure that we will be re-thinking several areas, including youth, local missions, and midweek groups and classes. Initially, Chris will be leading a mid-week Zoom class/group, accompanied by Frances and myself, as he begins to learn about all of us. But over time, I imagine that this will metamorphose into something new, or all sorts of things new.
This weekend we plan to introduce Chris in our worship service and commission him. I’ll also preach a bit on this thing we call “church”, and how we hope Jesus uses Chris and all of us to make it happen. Normally we’d have food, hugging, holy kisses, and all manor of social non-distance, but even in this time of COVID, maybe you could give Chris an elbow-bump and then show up Wednesday night on-line (Chris will begin leading on the 28th).
Lastly, let me say thanks to all of you. For many years, I’ve felt that pastoral ministry in a church is comprised of at least three things: pastoring through preaching, pastoring groups, and pastoring individuals. I’ve felt very called to the first and third, but not-so-called to, and rather inadequate at, the second. I’m so grateful to have a partner that feels called to this second task as a career, and grateful to our board and all of you for making it happen.
God is better than you thought.
The Love of Jesus is deeper than you know.
And the Spirit is everywhere working the wonders of Mercy.
Thanks for believing this and proclaiming it together to the world,
Peter
Email Chris at chris@thesanctuarydowntown.org
Watch Chris’s message from three weeks ago:
A Generous Invitation - Chris Lindenmeyer