{"id":148,"date":"2013-03-28T15:39:55","date_gmt":"2013-03-28T19:39:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/?p=148"},"modified":"2015-02-16T13:51:25","modified_gmt":"2015-02-16T18:51:25","slug":"a-year-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/a-year-on\/","title":{"rendered":"A Year On"},"content":{"rendered":"

The months have flown by since my last post. I elected not to write as the winds of change made their mark on the landscape of my soul. <\/p>\n

In June last year I was called by First Church of Christ<\/a>, Congregational, 1652 in Farmington, Connecticut, to become their Pastor and Teacher. It meant saying goodbye to the dear people of The Congregational Church of West Medford, where I had just entered my fifth year of ministry. What was in many respects a sad time gave rise to an opportunity to celebrate the progress the congregation had made, a capstone of which was a mission trip last August to Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota. <\/p>\n

A testament to the faithfulness of the folks in West Medford, the congregation had been transformed during my pastorate among them into an outwardly focused, mission-driven church that sought in new and exciting ways to rise to the challenges of a new day. I hold them dearly in my prayers as I now minister at First Church in Farmington.<\/p>\n

My ministry here is also one of peacebuilding and congregational transformation after years of tumult. Again I have been met by God\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s grace every step of the way and am blessed by a community striving toward greater faithfulness and a true Christian identity. God has prepared me well for the challenges I face here and the congregation has offered an amazingly gracious welcome. The progress we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve made in just a few months is enormous and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m grateful for the ways God has blessed us.<\/p>\n

After goodbyes, changes, and transitions, I am grateful to be able to echo the words of that great hymn written by Horatio Spafford: It is well with my soul! It is well, it is well, with my soul!
\n

\"First<\/a>

First Church of Christ, Congregational, 1652 in Farmington, CT<\/p><\/div><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The months have flown by since my last post. I elected not to write as the winds of change made their mark on the landscape of my soul. In June last year I was called by First Church of Christ, Congregational, 1652 in Farmington, Connecticut, to become their Pastor and Teacher. It meant saying goodbye […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[34,33,31,32],"class_list":["post-148","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church","tag-congregational-church-of-west-medford","tag-first-church-in-farmington","tag-move","tag-transition","post-preview"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thesavides.com\/steven\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}