If you were in worship on Sunday, then you had a chance to meet David and Marlene Ssebulime. If you were not able to be here, let me tell you a little bit about this wonderful couple that is becoming part of our congregation.

 

David is beginning his first year of study at Vanderbilt Divinity School. He is one of eight incoming students chosen to receive the Turner Leadership award, which is a full-tuition scholarship given to students who are preparing for pastoral ministry in the United Methodist Church. As part of the Turner program, each student is assigned to a congregation in the Nashville area, where he or she will serve and worship for three years. And, guess what? David has been assigned to Christ UMC!

 

What that means is that he will be spending roughly ten hours a week as part of our staff. He and Marlene will worship here on Sundays and participate in Wednesday night fellowship. In these first few weeks, David will attend meetings of various committees; he’ll accompany me and other staff members on pastoral visits; he’ll be part of fellowship groups and classes; and he’ll begin to discern specific areas of ministry where God might be calling him.

 

Although you may have had a chance already to meet them, I thought it might be helpful to share a little bit of their story with you. David and Marlene met in California, where she was serving as the children’s minister at her church and where he was working for Citigroup. They have been married five years and have just made the big move to Nashville this summer.

 

David grew up in Uganda with a large family and a father who was a pastor. At the age of eight he joined the African Children’s Choir, which took him around the world singing and performing. (He insists that he’s not a very good singer, but Anne Hook is working on him.) He literally had a global childhood. He went to college in India and settled as an adult in California. There is so much of his story that I have yet to hear, and he will be sharing more with us over the next weeks and months.

 

One of the things I’ve learned about David and Marlene is that, no matter where they are and no matter what their “day jobs” have been, they have always been in ministry. They have worked to connect people with ministries in Africa, they have worked with foster families and children—they are always looking for ways to serve God and their neighbors.

 

I am so excited about the next few years of ministry with the Ssebulimes, and I hope you have a chance, if you haven’t already, to welcome them to our community of faith.

 

Carol