As I write, outside there are a lot of changes happening. The temps are cooling, the trees are displaying vibrant shades of red, yellow, and orange and my lawn is finally green from all of the rain. Changes are also happening at Zion. Our Call Committee has spent the summer preparing documents for the Synod describing our church, and our community as well as interviewing and evaluating candidates for Zion’s Associate Pastor. I am happy to announce they have unanimously selected a final candidate and presented him to the Council at the October meeting. He is fresh out of seminary but has been preparing for this vocation all his life. As each of the Call Committee members provided explanations for their decision to the council, I wrote down the adjectives that were used to describe him: personable, energizing, welcoming, intellectual, inspiring, socially aware, professional, mature, and a natural connector. As you can tell, there was a lot of excitement and enthusiasm surrounding the final candidate and the call process. The next steps are a series of notifications to the congregation regarding calling an Associate Pastor. We will hold a special congregational meeting following the annual meeting on Sunday, December 3rd at 12:30pm. At the meeting, members will have the opportunity to vote to Call the candidate as our Associate Pastor. A huge thank you to our Call Committee for their faithful work in carrying out their task of identifying a final candidate in our Associate Pastor search.
