Chapel Hill Church

Years ago, when Jeremy was in college, his best friend Peter Herzog was the Youth Pastor at Chapel Hill Church in Eagan. Jeremy and a few of his buddies volunteered as leaders for the Junior and Senior High ministries for a couple of seasons.

He has kept in contact, through Peter, with the church over the years. As a young married couple, we used to meet with Peter and his wife Joy, and another older couple from Chapel Hill - Randy and Sandy Thiele, semi-regularly for fellowship. The Theile's have become the adopted parents we see about twice a year, but never have to worry about the long intervals in between those times. When we started at Faith Covenant and would have long Sundays planned, we would call Randy and Sandy to spend the afternoons at their house, napping on the couches because it was comfortable enough to become almost like home to us. We even used their house to watch one of the big Vikings games this year.

Also through Peter, we met Paul McVety and his family. Paul replaced Peter as the Youth Pastor a few years back, and we have run into him regularly at different youth gatherings and sponsored weekends, as well as at Herzog family functions. Paul is wired very much like Jer - he seeks to teach students to intentionally seek the Lord, and doesn't engage in the 'shiny happy program' method of youth ministry. Several times (including this January) Jeremy has commented on how he wished that he could be like Paul and have the freedom to run a Jesus-shaped ministry.

Since God has such a great sense of humor, along with the STORM opportunity, he has also popped open a door at Chapel Hill. Paul McVety has been called to serve as the Senior Pastor at Chapel Hill and needs to (and gets to) find a replacement to lead the Student Ministry. Since Paul has already done the hard work of turning the ministry into a Jesus-centered, discipleship model, and that's the direction he wants for the church, he wants someone with that same focus to step in. And he thought of Jeremy.

Jer got the call when we were up at my folks house a few weekends back. Paul said he couldn't stop thinking that Jeremy would be the perfect person to fill the role. He also said he desired to serve alongside brothers - the exact wording and phrasing that Jer has mentioned he needs in his next season. AND - the staff at the church is pretty small - it would be Paul, Jer, and Peter, who is the Worship Pastor, and an administrative assistant. AND - Randy Thiele is on the Elder Board, who would be 'calling' the next Pastor for this role. God is pretty funny.