A Special Gift for A Very Special Person

W and I went back down to our church in our previous city to wish farewell to a very special person.  The associate pastor of our church is leaving to become a senior pastor at another church.  It is such an exciting opportunity for her and her new church is going to be very blessed to have her as their pastor.  Just as he did at our church, I have every confidence that God will work through Pastor L's many talents to accomplish great things for her new congregation.

Pastor L is a very special person to our family.  She has been both pastor and friend to me for the past two years.  I have learned so much from her as she led our women's book group and a class on John Wesley.   We also worked together on vacation bible school.  She has inspired in fellowship, study, from the pulpit and through her activism work. When W was three months old, she baptized him and welcomed me as a member of the congregation during a church service that she planned around his baptism.  Our entire family was so touched and the memories of that day are right up there with our wedding and the day that W was born.  It meant all that much more that this special heartfelt service came from a friend.

In some ways find it hard to go back to that church now without becoming extremely emotional.  So many of the people there have written on my heart and nurtured and helped to grow my faith.  They have been a village around my son and have cared for and loved him as they watched him grow during his first two years of life.  It is a dear, dear place in deed and I miss it terribly, though I think we have found a church in our new community, I still feel like that is our church home.  So, today W and I went to send off our pastor and friend. I am so glad that I did.  I cried all the way through the service and wished I had remembered a handkerchief or tissues.  I am confident that though she and I are both moving forward in our faith journeys and being taken to new places, that while she is no longer my pastor, she will continue to be a friend for years to come.

One thing that I loved about our women's book group at the church was that while we were discussing our readings and our lives and faith, many of us also had our hands busy with some sort of handwork projects.  I often worked on knitting, but I also worked on many felting projects during our discussions.  As a group we decided that we wanted to put together a gift bag of items we made for Pastor L as she moves to her next church.

And so, I created this doll especially for her.  The figure of a female pastor, baptizing a baby for a woman who baptized my son and who had a special gift of love for all the youngest members of our congregation.

I wish her, and her dear family all the best in their new church and want her to know how blessed our family has been by her presence in our lives!