Welcome Our New Staff!

The elders are pleased to announce that we have hired not one, but two new staff members! One you are very familiar with 🙂 and one is brand new. Here is a summary of who they are, what they will do, and how we came to this decision…

Stu Modrzejewski is returning to First Free’s staff in a bivocational ministry role as our new Director of Community Life. We are so excited to have him back! This announcement may come as a surprise to you, since this is a different title from the jobs we had posted in our search. As we went through the interview process, continued to pray over our church, and asked the Lord to shine his light on our path, we sensed a clear leading that we need to intentionally build into the community life – the fellowship of believers – at First Free as we come out of the pandemic. The elders have had many conversations with Stu over the last year, even before we launched the search for new staff, and we affirm his giftings in leadership, shepherding, hospitality, and his heart for worship. Stu’s bivocational ministry role will be 10 hours per week, and he will focus half of his time on relaunching the welcome ministry at First Free and the other half on shepherding and developing leaders, specifically focused on those involved in Sunday morning services. His first day will be July 19, 2021.

• You can be praying for Stu as he will be starting a certification program at Loyola this fall to pursue a career change to HR. This bivocational ministry role at First Free both uses his gifts and knowledge of our congregation to meet some urgent needs for our church family and it allows him to have time for his studies and find other work to provide for his family. His program at Loyola will last only a year, so he/we will be re-evaluating next summer and make a mutual decision at that point about his role continuing or ending. We don’t know what the future holds, but we are so glad that Stu will be joining us again in ministry in an official capacity!

Maggie Johnson is joining First Free’s staff for the first time as our Director of Worship Arts and Youth Ministry. This is the original job description that we posted and interviewed for, although we have adjusted the hours and responsibilities since she is unable to move into church housing (at least not for this year). It is now a 20-hour per week job, with 10 hours going to each ministry area. We have been in close communication with lay leaders in both worship and youth ministries, and they have confirmed that 10 hours each will be enough staff time to keep these ministries thriving. Her first day was this week! (July 12, 2021)

• With youth ministry, Maggie will work closely with Andrea Korte who will continue to be the youth deacon. She’ll have some time to get to know people this summer and make plans before the fall kick off of regular youth events. The youth program intends to keep their weekly meetings on Sunday nights so the youth remain in the service on Sunday mornings and available to participate/serve as they are willing and are trained to do so. This is hands-on discipleship!
• With worship arts, Maggie will work closely with the worship leaders we have and she will collaborate with Stu in building up other leaders. She will take on scheduling service volunteers and coordinating service planning.

• Other adjustments to the original job descriptions: the “Welcome coordinator” was part of the original Worship Director job posting, but is now part of Stu’s new job. The “Local outreach coordinator” role was part of the original Youth Director job posting, but will remain a deacon position that is dormant to be recruited for at a later date. For now, we will continue to encourage the whole body to be engaged in outreach as the Lord opens doors for each of us in compassion ministries, sharing words of hope, and loving on our neighbors.
  

Stu and Maggie will also work closely with each other, and in some ways Stu will be a mentor to Maggie, especially during the first 6 months. They are “peer level,” though, so they are equal in authority and both under Del’s leadership as Interim Pastor (and ultimately accountable to the elders, per our bylaws). Here are two versions of our org chart (one simple, one detailed):

We thank God for each and every one of our staff members. They work diligently for the Lord and serve our church family in so many ways that go unnoticed. If you can drop them a note of encouragement, it would lift their spirits! We will share an update on our search for our next senior pastor in a separate post. So as it stands now, here is a snapshot of First Free’s staff: