It’s Wednesday evening, a foggy mist hanging heavy in the air, and about 25 people have gathered in the chapel of Fort Wayne’s First Presbyterian Church for a service designed for those who are grieving as Christmas approaches.

From the pulpit, the church’s new pastor, the Rev. Jeffrey T. Lehn, reads Scripture about how God shines light into darkness and renews the spirit.

Hymns are sung, and congregants, some sobbing softly, come forward to light candles in memory of their loved ones.

Lehn says he hopes the service will aid those who attend to go forward with confidence in God’s healing. Some congregation members say they hope their recently called 30-year-old minister will do the same for the downtown landmark church, which for the last several years has struggled with a graying membership and pastoral difficulties.

A native Midwesterner from Minneapolis-St. Paul, Lehn began serving at First Pres, as the church is affectionately known, on Nov. 28 after being ordained the previous day.

He says his main goal is to attract more young families to the city’s oldest continuously active congregation.

“I realize it’s a sacrifice – there’s no bones about that,” he says of the choice of driving downtown from homes in the suburbs for worship and church activities.

“But I think personally that attending a downtown church keeps us close to the human needs that we’re called to fill as followers of Christ.”

Re-imagining a mission

Lehn says he sees First Presbyterian as “a vibrant and thoughtful church” in the midst of “re-imagining its mission.”

He says he doesn’t anticipate changes in many of the things the church is known for, including its long-standing theater program and as a site for musical and artistic events. Nor does he see the congregation pulling back from multi-denominational community involvement.

But he says the congregation needs to change to combat a difficulty facing many large, mainline Protestant churches in urban areas in recent years: depopulation as committed, long-standing members die and younger people choose to attend churches based not so much on denominational ties as on a congregation’s ambience, location and programming or mission work.

“It’s something our denomination has been struggling with on many levels,” he says, noting that, after a recent scouring of its rolls, First Presbyterian’s membership has dropped to 850 from the 1,200 reported by a pastor two years ago.

“Our denomination’s heyday was in the 1950s and 1960s, and we need to rethink what church needs to be,” Lehn says.

He adds that he shares the faith journey of many younger Americans who find that the Christianity in which they were raised no longer fits their beliefs.

Changing course

Indeed, he says, he joined Presbyterianism only recently, after nearly graduating from a conservative Baptist seminary.

“It was a gradual thing. It’s hard to isolate a pivotal moment when I threw up my hands,” he says of his decision to switch denominations.

But he says he couldn’t support his previous denomination’s belief in biblical inerrancy or its stand on “gender issues,” including not ordaining women or allowing them to teach men once they reached their teens.

He also was put off by what he considered an isolationist stance on denominational cooperation.

“I realized I would be disingenuous as a pastor. I couldn’t say the things I wanted to say and do the things I wanted to do as a minister of Gospel. I couldn’t leave my mind at the door,” he says.

So, Lehn transferred to the divinity school at the University of Chicago, a liberal-leaning, multi-denominational institution. There, he found small classes where he says he could have “lively but thoughtful discussions” and “rub elbows” with well-educated clergy from traditions as diverse as Catholicism, Lutheranism and the Disciples of Christ and came to appreciate Presbyterianism.

“It was faithful to the Gospel and tied to tradition but open-minded and flexible in what it means to be faithful to the call in this time and place,” he says.

Moving forward

Lehn, who previously served as director of Christian education at Highland Park Presbyterian Church in a northern Chicago suburb, says he hopes to strengthen First Presbyterian children’s ministry.

A long-standing day school was recently state-certified, and a new Sunday’s School program was begun in which children and their parents learn about the same concepts in separate classes at the same time. The church also recently started a once-a-month family night.

“I think young adults are looking for a church that is going to give them an experience of God and is going to give them an experience of community and give them an opportunity to grow in faith,” he says.

“I want to help people think theologically in all of life – how to be a Christian in the workplace, as a parent, in cooking on vacation. If worship doesn’t impact our lives on the day-to-day level, why do it?”

Saying he is “still figuring that out,” Lehn declined to comment on First Presbyterian’s recent ministerial difficulties, except to say the church “has had a rocky few years” and plans to continue with three pastors instead of four.

Most recently, the congregation has been led by an interim pastor, the Rev. Edwin Dykstra, and an interim associate, the Rev. Ann Pittman. The associate’s position, however, is open, and Lehn’s wife, Arianne, is one of several candidates, online church newsletter reports say. The Rev. Youngsoo An, who leads Korean worship at the church, is continuing.

“I’ve heard a lot of renditions (about what happened with other ministers), but it sounds to me like First Presbyterian got into a rut of calling someone of a certain age and of a certain temperament, and that wasn’t the best fit going forward,” he says.

“I think in calling me they were consciously doing something different – I’m much younger than the previous few pastors. … There’s no magic formula or silver bullet, but I think they realized that the status quo was not sustainable.”

rsalter@jg.net