When Calvary Wesleyan Church in Fredonia, Kansas, hired Amy Booth as its children’s pastor, the congregation had about 25 people — and just one child. Yet the small church was willing to invest in children’s ministry, and Rev. Roger Freed, the interim pastor brought in to help revitalize the church, would eventually recognize Amy as the person who could lead it into its next season. Their work together began as Amy was still finding her footing after a painful season.
A couple from Calvary Wesleyan had seen something Amy shared on Facebook and wondered whether she might help their congregation start a preschool. When they invited her to interview, Amy was candid: “I’m not sure I want to start a preschool; I love being a children’s pastor.” That conversation led the board to consider hiring her for children’s ministry instead. With only one child in the church, the decision required faith in what God might do beyond their existing congregation.
Amy was amazed. “I thought, ‘the faith of these people!’” Amy recalled. “God’s going to do something.”
Pastor Amy & Pastor Roger
As Amy found her footing, she drew strength from the congregation’s faith. A painful division in her previous church had left her grieving relationships and a ministry placement she loved, so entering a new congregation meant learning to trust again. Roger’s steady care and confidence in her calling became an important part of that healing. By helping the church move forward, he also recognized and nurtured the gifts of the leader already serving among them.
“Pastor Roger just surrounded me with such love and believed in me,” she said.
In his office, Amy experienced a sense of safety that she associated with the presence of the Holy Spirit. As district leadership became involved in her ministry, she found that same willingness to receive her and recognize what God was doing in her life. Their trust helped her begin imagining a future at Calvary and serving the families there through the children’s ministry.
During that season, her prayers became a place to surrender herself to God, asking what the Spirit wanted to form in her character. She remembers raising her hands and asking, “What do I need to learn, Lord?” The question opened her to the possibility that joys, celebrations and hardships could become part of her ministry preparation.
As Amy settled into children’s ministry, new families began coming. Eventually, about 15 children were attending on Sundays, with as many as 30 participating on Wednesdays. Alongside that growth, she began sensing a call that surprised her: God seemed to be inviting her to pastor the congregation.
Children’s ministry had been her vocation for 15 years and she loved it. The prospect of preaching to adults and carrying responsibility for an entire church felt overwhelming, especially while her own healing was still unfolding. For months, the thought kept returning until she began asking God whether it was his voice she was hearing.
One evening after youth group, Amy was sitting with her father when he mentioned that her grandmother had dreamed about her. Before he could explain the dream, her eyes filled with tears.
“Was it that I was a pastor?” she asked.
Her father explained that Amy’s grandmother had dreamed she would someday serve as pastor of that very church. Amy began to cry because the dream gave voice to a possibility she had been carrying privately. “She’s a very prayerful person, but God usually didn’t speak to my grandmother in dreams,” Amy reflected.
Roger was also encouraging her to consider pastoring, gather a team around her and begin the courses that would help prepare her. As the possibility became more concrete, Amy studied Scripture and invited trusted friends into her discernment.
For Amy, discerning the call required trust in God’s leading and a willingness to invite others into the process. In her rural farming community, many people associated leadership with men and some key church leaders had misgivings about women in pastoral ministry. As Amy studied and prepared, Roger advocated for her and helped the congregation consider the leader he had come to know. She understood that following her calling would also require the church to undertake its own process of discernment.
After Roger’s departure, Amy served a year as interim pastor, and she and the church learned together. She remembers looking up parliamentary procedure as she prepared to lead board meetings, then discovering how graciously the board could help her learn while receiving her leadership. The people she had been called to shepherd were also helping her grow into the responsibilities of their pastor.
In the congregation’s response to preaching, she began seeing another kind of preparation. Adults were receptive to the Holy Spirit and their willingness to respond changed her own heart toward the ministry God had given her. “There was a harvest ready for more,” she said.
As she continued serving Calvary, Amy found herself growing in love for the congregation and in confidence that she belonged in this work. Sermon preparation and the demands of leading a church brought fresh challenges. Through them, she experienced a deepening sense of God’s presence as she moved forward in obedience.
At the end of the interim year, a church leader suggested extending the arrangement. Amy explained that clarity about her future would allow her to move forward with ideas she believed could strengthened the congregation’s health. The church proceeded toward a vote, and after a year of hearing her preach and experiencing her pastoral care, the members unanimously affirmed her as pastor. Their shared life with Amy had allowed them to recognize the calling Roger had seen in her.
“We have been truly blessed with Amy becoming our shepherd,” said Carl Hayes, board member. “She is filled with God’s Spirit, and you can see how the Lord is leading her journey.”
“God has blessed our church family and our congregation has been growing,” said Dennis Heckerman, board member. “Pastor Amy’s messages and church activities continue to show her love for God and that filters into the rest of us.”
For Calvary Wesleyan, that vote marked another step in the renewal that had brought Roger to the church. A congregation that had hired a children’s pastor with one child in attendance had welcomed more families, nurtured a future pastor and grown in its responsiveness to the Holy Spirit. Amy describes the transformation she witnessed during her interim year as part of the way God confirmed her calling to love and lead these people.
Much of that preparation has taken place in the ordinary rhythm of mornings Amy has spent with God. She describes lingering over small portions of Scripture, allowing the words to take root as she prays. Those habits sustained her through children’s ministry and continue to sustain her through the coursework and responsibilities of pastoring.
“I have known Amy Booth for approximately 25 years. The road that she has traveled has had mountains as well as valleys. Through it all, she has remained faithful to Christ, obedient to God and the leading of the Holy Spirit,” said Jim Eden, secretary of Fredonia’s board.
“With the help of the Holy Spirit, Amy is blending people from various denominational and life backgrounds into a church that lifts up Christ and glorifies God. I am so thankful that God has allowed me to witness what he is doing in Pastor Amy and his church.”
As Amy reflects on her calling, she returns to Jesus’ commission to go and make disciples of every nation. Her life with God, Roger’s encouragement and the church’s affirmation have taught her to hear that invitation with a fuller sense of who is called to participate in its work.
“It’s for all people,” she said. “Go and make disciples.”
For more stories of hope, holiness and calling, visit Wesleyan.org/news.
Rev. Ethan Linder is the pastor of discipleship at College Wesleyan Church in Marion, Indiana.
