Farewell Blessings

Dear Friends,

After two blessed years serving as your Vermont Conference Ministries Coordinator, I have been called to serve as the Community Relations Manager for Stagecoach Transportation, a nonprofit transportation service for Orange and northern Windsor Counties (stagecoach-rides.org).

It has been a privilege to work with all of the churches seeking new pastors, our Members in Discernment, authorized ministers and everyone involved with the Vermont Conference Annual Meeting. What I have learned from all of you will serve me well in my new role and I am grateful for the support you have given me as I worked to serve you the best ways I could.

I will be finishing my time at the Vermont Conference on Wednesday, November 1st, but my new office will be just a couple blocks down Main Street in Randolph so look me up if you're in town!

Thank you for your work and ministry to bring the love and peace of Christ to Vermont and the world, a world very sorely in need of such divine grace. You will continue to be in my prayers in the time to come.

Your brother in Christ,

Jesse

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We will be sorry to see Jesse leave our staff but happy that he has found a full-time job with benefits in his field. Jesse has done excellent work for the Vermont Conference and often went the extra mile. He has helped us to better arrange the dissemination of Church Profiles to candidates and Ministerial Profiles to Search Committees. He has served as staff support to the Annual Meeting Planning Committee and also Ministerial Standing and Standards. If you attended an Annual Meeting or a Vitality Event within the past two years, you will have seen Jesse hard at work to make the event a success. Thank you Jesse and Godspeed! - Lynn, Pam and Charri

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As it is written in the Liturgy for Times of Farewell in the UCC Book of Worship:

Our church family is constantly changing.

People come and go.

Babies are born.

Children grow up.

People commit themselves to one another.

Loved ones and friends among us come to the end of their lives.

Individuals move into our community and church life.

Others leave us, moving away to new places, new experiences, and new

opportunities.

It is important and right that we recognize these times of passage, of endings

and beginnings.

By now most of you have read the news that Rev. Jim Thomas has accepted a call to become the Pastor of the Atkinson Congregational Church, UCC in Atkinson, NH. This is an exciting time for Jim and Lynn as they follow God’s call to this new place of mission and ministry.

We offer Jim our heartfelt best wishes in his time of transition. We are grateful for the light and leadership, laughter and challenge, expertise and encouragement that he has contributed to the life and ministry of our conference. We know he will make a great senior pastor because he has coached so many of our pastors and churches to be more responsive to God’s call.