Oak Harbor Lutheran Church, Oak Harbor, Washington
by Jennifer Vasquez
I first experienced a pull towards ministry at a Good Friday service at my home congregation during my junior year of high school. As a new church-goer, I was very interested in developing my faith and serving God, and I felt that ministry would provide me the opportunity to use many of my unrelated gifts all within one vocation. I went straight to college and then attended Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary, where I wanted to pursue a career as an Associate in Ministry. When I described my compassionate nature and my zeal for helping people in need, a pastor at the seminary told me to research diaconal ministry, as it seemed that my interests would match that roster perfectly. He was correct. As I read about diaconal ministry, I felt that I had finally "come home." Here was a vocation that matched my gifts and interests - what a reassuring feeling, to know that there were others out there "like me!" I pursued a diaconal track and finished my two-year Master of Arts in Religion degree in May of 2003.
It gives me the freedom to meet needs within the community using the gifts that God has given to people within the congregation.
I currently have a non-stipendiary call from the Northwest Washington Synod to serve the community, based out of Oak Harbor Lutheran Church on Whidbey Island in the Puget Sound of Washington. My call involves a wide variety of congregational and community responsibilities: helping to lead our congregation's social concerns ministry; leading service project opportunities for middle school and high school youth; starting new programs that reach out to the community (two that I've started already are a weekly hot meal program for people who are struggling and an after-school program for middle school students); raising awareness of justice issues (for example, I started an annual Alternative Giving Fair, and we now sell fair trade coffee and other food items - members of other churches in town even stop by to pick up coffee!); participating in worship in the historic roles of the diaconate; creating a new "Volunteer Call Ministry," a group of people that teaches the congregation to identify their gifts and then uses them to create new ministries; teaching adult ministry classes about a variety of subjects; representing the Lutheran church in ecumenical endeavors in the community; and representing the churches in several community meetings of social service organizations, just to name some of the basics.
My diaconal specialization is education, which I use when teaching about social justice issues particularly, but also in my work with youth. I thoroughly enjoy working within the life of a wonderful congregation, as it allows me to have a very wide variety of experiences (from worship leadership to starting a hot meal program to leading youth mission trips!) and gives me the freedom to meet needs within the community using the gifts that God has given to people within the congregation.
I will be moving in August of 2005 to Okinawa, Japan (my husband is a US Marine), and I am looking forward to seeing how God will provide me with ministry opportunities in that overseas military community.