A Big Loss

The Thursday after Easter I got a phone call I never wanted.  It was late in the evening and the kids were in bed and my friend called me.  I knew it couldn’t be good because we usually text each other and rarely call each other unless there is an emergency.  So when I saw her number on my phone I thought there was going to be something wrong with one of her dogs.  That would have been easier.  She was calling to tell me that our beloved Pastor, Patrick, passed away earlier that evening.  I knew he had been having health issues, I didn’t realize how serious they were and he actually stopped by our house the night before to pick up papers for a meeting.  He told me he wasn’t feeling well, but that we was looking forward to a doctor appointment at Mayo in a couple weeks. 

Brad is an elder at church so she wanted me to pass the info on to him so that we could start letting the congregation know.  I called Brad who was in Farmer City and told him what I knew.  He asked if I was sure and I told him I was pretty sure.  I was in shock and sent my friend a text just to confirm what she had told me before I called more people.  I only had to call family and some close friends from church to pass on the info and it was not fun to do that.

The passing of Patrick left us all shocked and left our church grieving.  We lost a friend and a leader.  The grieving process was different because I personally was grieving for a lost friend, but also for our church as a whole.  He did so much for our church, a lot of which few people knew about until he wasn’t there to take care of things.

I am happy to say that our church has pulled together and after a beautiful funeral service we have been able to slowly move forward.  Things that were in progress before Patrick passed away are still being worked on and a few new things as well.  It hasn’t been easy, but we have been blessed as a congregation to have a retired reverend in our mist that has done her best to fill holes and help us all heal.  It turns out it is a 2 year process to find a new pastor and I don’t think anyone is looking forward to that.  I know many of us know that we will never be able to replace Patrick, but the next pastor to come to our church has big shoes to fill.