Executive / Associate Pastor Update | September 2024
As you may recall, our community has spent most of this calendar year seeking an Executive / Associate Pastor to join our staff team.
We began this process in earnest back in February with a day of discernment and discussion amongst our Vestry. In April, we approved the position and embarked on a search for an experienced pastoral leader — someone who shares our community’s heartbeat and values while embodying a unique combination of organizational skill and pastoral presence.
A Hiring Discernment team was formed, led by John Ott and including representatives from the Vestry, staff, and our community at large. All told, we received 30+ applications from 11 states.
Our hope was to walk through a thorough and transparent process while paying attention to God’s direction in each step. After many coffees and conversations, interviews and assessments, the hiring team reached a unanimous conclusion and shared it with the Vestry and staff. I then presented a job offer, which was accepted.
I’m excited to share that we have hired Noel Bryant to join our team!
Please mark your calendars for Sunday, October 6, when we’ll introduce Noel to the community and you’ll have a chance to meet him over coffee between services.
You may recognize Noel’s name — after all that searching, Noel and his family were already a part of our Parish community, having stepped into the church earlier this year after moving from Oregon. Noel and his wife Kate have two daughters, Lucy and Mollie. Noel is a former Senior Pastor and brings prior experience in both business and civic leadership. Additionally, he has formal seminary/theological training and is in the final stages of completing a master’s degree in Organizational Leadership from Western Oregon University.
Noel will serve our team as a chief of staff, overseeing ministry operations and staff coordination and development. This will free me up to have greater margin for pastoral presence and spiritual leadership. While Noel’s role will be primarily organizational in nature, you’ll experience his pastoral leadership in an array of places as well — guiding volunteer teams, playing music alongside the band, occasionally preaching, leading prayer practices or serving Communion, and offering pastoral care.
We are truly grateful for Noel’s varied gifts and the humble manner in which he holds them. We’re thankful for the meaningful and much-needed margin this will create for our existing staff team, allowing us to focus new energy on important areas like spiritual formation, deeper community, outward care, church membership, and Family Ministry curriculum/catechism. Most of all, we’re thrilled for the Bryants to be a part of the leadership of our community.
In the video above, I share more about our hiring process and details about Noel’s experience and family. I encourage you to take ten minutes to watch it, then make plans to join us on October 6 as we formally welcome Noel.
If you have questions or would like to learn more, don’t hesitate to reach out. In the meantime, I’m grateful for this community, for the ways so many of you participate and contribute to it, and how we’ll experience life with God together in the season ahead.
Jordan
to hear some of my remarks on the process and hire, listen below:
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