Rachel Wrenn
Pastor, Prairie Star Ministries, southwestern Minnesota Age: 30
Rachel Wrenn grew up in Washington, Minnesota
and Alaska—but never in a rural setting. When she was called as a pastor of Prairie Star Ministries, a parish of fi ve ELCA congregations on the prairie of southwestern Minnesota, “it felt like coming home in a new and dif- ferent way,” she said. Wrenn is inspired by the way the parish decided nine
years ago to join together in what she calls “less a meld- ing of identities and more a melding of mission.” Citing the verse from Matthew about two or three gathered together in Jesus’ name, she said, “So where fi ve are gathered, Jesus must even more be there!” T e pastor is now in her fourth
“I’m learning that God calls all of who we are to a certain place at a certain time,” Rachel Wrenn said. “Gifts and talents, weak- nesses and scars, are all tools God uses to do ministry. How do you
lead at fi ve congregations? It calls a pastor to be an equipper. … It is both as simple and as complicated as being vigilant to where God is working.”
Bianca Vazquez
Experiential learning coordinator, Steinbruck Center, Luther Place Memorial Church, Washington, D.C. Age: 26
If you’ve ever pondered an urban immersion experience to
Washington, D.C., for a high school mission trip or alternative spring break, you’ve probably talked to Bianca Vazquez. Four years ago, Vazquez, Roman Catholic by background,
was seeking a post-college volunteer experience that was “GLBT- friendly, anti-racist and anti-[oppressive].” Lutheran Volunteer Corps fi t the bill, matching her with the Steinbruck Center, a ministry of Luther Place Memorial Church, where she now remains as coordinator. Vazquez’s vision for the center’s work is to help visitors—oſt en
from largely Caucasian, middle-class contexts—to “see service diff erently.” “A lot of people want to see tangible results from their time,
but the purpose of a trip is not to change the context you’re going to,” she said. “It’s to listen, learn to critically analyze, so you can go back equipped to be a leader in your own context where you’re the expert. … Sometimes people say ‘I didn’t do anything,’ but the ministry of presence is important.”
Author bio: Johnston Aelabouni, 36, is a freelance writer and pastor, along with her husband Gabi Aelabouni, of Trinity Lutheran Church in Fort Collins, Colo. Together they parent two children, soon to be three.
“The Community Craft Collective (a ministry of Luther Place), a group
of women, youth and men
committed to each other who by every measure of our world shouldn’t be in relationship,” Bianca Vazquez said. “The church can also be a place of unlikely relationships where we do life together.”
June 2015 21
year at Prairie Star Ministries, which also includes Shalom Hill Farm, a retreat and continu- ing education center for rural ministry.
your call- ing?
What’s
inspires you?
What
SARAH BAKALYAR
EMMA WILLIAMS
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