"What Next?"

I have now been blessed to be your pastor for a little over three months. It has been a wild ride through an Annual Meeting, the election of church officers, my Installation service, Lent and Easter, a wedding and two funerals, with nine new members joining, four baptisms, Confirmation, Children’s Day, and a 275^th Anniversary Celebration all coming at us in the near future. I’ve enjoyed learning more about you individually and as a church family: I have discovered that you are a very easy people to love.

One of the hallmarks of the Old Greenwich Presbyterian Church is its welcoming warmth. Not just to me, but to all who come through its doors. I believe that this is simply part of OGPC’s cultural identity. A belief that all who show up are part of God’s family and should be made to feel at home. 275 years of welcoming all who enter; not a bad reputation to have!

Now as I have come to shepherd this beloved flock, I have been asking myself: who is God calling us to be at this time? What is God calling us to do now? We are at an historic crossroads. We have 275 years of worship, and service, and presence in this community, and I am excited to see what God will do with us next. Maybe not for the next 275 years, but certainly into the more immediate future.

1 John 3:2 tells us “Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed.” The “what we will be” has not yet been revealed, but the “who” has been. The “who” is YOU, the people of Old Greenwich along with those who will come to join us in the days, weeks, months, and even years ahead. The “how” has been partially determined at our most recent session meeting. They voted to begin a process that will help us to discern what God is calling us to do next.

We want you, the people of OGPC, to engage in this decision-making process. A process through which we will explore the needs in our community and perhaps beyond, as well as the skills and gifts and talents that we bring to bear in responding to it. Like the good Presbyterians we are, we want to know your opinion! What are you passionate about? What do you see as an important missional need in our area? Is it hunger? Is it homelessness? Is it poverty? Is it education? Is it elder care or childcare or youth in transition? What are our strengths, our weaknesses, or a little bit of both? What critical resources do we have that we can use to bring Christ’s light into our community and our world?

This is such an important time in the life of the Old Greenwich Presbyterian Church as we celebrate the 275 years that we have been a steadfast and faithful congregation and as we look with joy, thanksgiving, and excitement into the future towards which God calls us. Please join us in worship, in fellowship, and in the coming process of discernment that we may truly become the people God imagines us to be – that “what we will be” may be revealed, and revealed in ways that allow the kingdom of God to break into this community, this area, this world NOW.