Meet Pastor Garrett
Grace to you and peace from God our creator, Jesus Christ our redeemer and the Holy Spirit our sustainer in all things,
A brief introduction ... I grew up in Columbia, Missouri where I attended St. Andrews Lutheran Church since before I can remember, where Pastors Ralph Anderson and Paul Moessner were my childhood Pastors. This background may answer the question: Why does Pastor Garrett follow the Missouri Tigers Football and Basketball games? I went to college at Luther College in Decorah Iowa graduating in May 1993 with a BA in Psychology and a minor in Biology. I worked as a youth director in Fort Collins Colorado at Shepherd of the Hills Lutheran Church from 1993-1996 and appreciate, among many friends and colleagues, the mentoring of Pastor Gary McCluskey still. I married Stacey in 1995 before going to seminary at Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary in Berkeley California, graduating in May 2000. We moved back to Denver and I served as Associate Pastor at Holy Trinity in Littleton from 2000-2002 while Stacey completed her Master’s in Social Work from Denver Univserity. I was installed as pastor of Resurrection Lutheran Church on August 11th. 2002.
What is so exciting about Resurrection Lutheran Church in Lakewood Colorado? Why, you may ask, would I want to attend this church over any other church? For starters, we strive to follow Jesus Christ, not in a strictly traditional, dogmatic way, but with the confession that we are “Simultaneously Saint and Sinner”; capable of tremendous goodness and the equivalent evil. And just as you may find in our worship service, that’s the starting place, the confession of our status before God.
When someone enters Resurrection Lutheran Church for the first time, the first thought might be that this is a traditional church with a non-traditional worship space. It may take some time to love it, but the worship space is unique and contemplative (some say too dark and some say just right-compliments to goldilocks). We are un-apologetic in our Lutheran heritage, sensing the great challenges of the 21st century and the great gifts of the 15th Century Reformation and the great challenges of the Reformation and the great gifts of the 21st century. We strive to hold these two contexts in tension through the witness of God’s love through Jesus Christ found in the Holy Scriptures. We share in a great history of seminary education and trust in the teachings of the great church patriarchs and matriarchs who have influenced us.
As a Pastor, I recognize and preach to people of all stripes and political leanings, as did Jesus Christ. I preach a challenge to us all to recognize how Jesus welcomed the outcasts, the sinners, the self-righteous and sin broken people of his day; a challenge to us too in our day and age. As a matter of fact, to the charge that the message of Jesus Christ is not “relevant to my life”, I would suggest a closer reading of what Jesus teaches and what we learn in the Holy Scriptures about ourselves and about God our creator. Being relevant is not the problem; the problem is that we have dismissed the Bible as a source text for learning about ourselves and about God.
We all have different stories to share and different influences in our lives, of which we had little choice most often. Thus we may be left or right politically or socially; we may have varying educational achievements or interests; we may find our views in the majority or minority. All of these are distinctions, of which Jesus is keenly aware and which are not nearly as important as living as disciples of Jesus Christ. There is one whom we worship, who brings us together despite our varied attempts to dissect or separate; Jesus Christ, the one who calls us into relationship in ways that may only happen in church and very few other places in our world.
Our Holy Communion Liturgy states: “Holy, mighty, and merciful Lord…In great love you sent to us Jesus, your Son, who reached out to heal the sick and suffering, who preached good news to the poor, and who on the cross opened his arms to all.”
In a paraphrase of Martin Luther, we are all beggars for the scraps of mercy which come only from the Lord. We attend worship at our church in thanksgiving, not as consumers, but as consumers transformed into servants of the Living Loving God, who seek out the same ones Jesus sought, who serve the least as Jesus served the least, who respond when our call comes to us through Baptism, who give back our time, talents, and money in service to the one who first gave to us.
As a Pastor in community and in the Larger Church of Jesus Christ, I have served on the Rocky Mountain Synod Youth Committee and the Lutheran Campus Ministry Committee of the Rocky Mountain Synod, ELCA; I have been a member of “The Network for Inclusive Vision” which works to include qualified candidates for ordained ministry in the ELCA, leading to changes in practices and policies in the ELCA concerning human sexuality and the diversity of God’s created sexual orientation. I have been outspoken about welcoming and serving young children in Holy Communion, basing the welcome on Jesus’ invitation to children and others deemed unqualified in his day.
I am a keen observer of people and culture and sense an ever growing need and ever growing confusion about what Jesus Christ is teaching and asking from those who confess faith in him. And because of that confusion there are no questions that are “off-limits”, no concerns that must remain “unspoken” in regards to faith and life. I hope that with the guidance of the Holy Spirit we can remain unified in Jesus Christ and pursue a life of faithful worship, service and sharing in the abundant grace of God. Won’t you please give us a try and let us introduce ourselves a little more in person.
Peace and Potatoes, Pastor Garrett Struessel
Updated September 2010.
