I
want to begin by saying that it has been a great privilege to found and
pastor Youngstown Metro Church. It has been the most joy filled and
challenging experience of my life. Over the seven years of our journey
together, it has been great to see the church grow in their love for God
and one another.
In
the summer of 2009 Aimee and I began sensing that God was leading us to
step back from our role at Metro in order to let the church grow up.
We have had an incredible sense of peace about this decision.
Nevertheless, this has been incredibly difficult to do because we love
our church family so much and want to protect them at all costs. We
talked to Erik and Phil (the other elders) about this over a year ago,
but concluded that it was not the right time. Odd enough the “right
time” came at the worst possible time (at least in my mind). In June,
Erik moved to Washington State to start a church, in July Phil’s job
moved him to Cleveland, and in August God told us it was the time for us
to step back. It was crazy to lose all three pastors of Metro in the
course of a couple of months, but God’s timing is not always our timing.
I wanted to continue to provide leadership at Metro until a new pastor was found and so I operated in that role until December. However, this proved to be more difficult than originally anticipated. Due to our long held role, it was difficult for us to fully release the burden of responsibility while maintaining our role and presence within the church. In December it became apparent to us that the right thing was to completely step down from my position as lead pastor and step away from ongoing involvement and participation with Metro. This has been one of the hardest things we have had to do, but we have already seen the Metro family stepping up and growing in new ways because of it.
Many people have asked us what is next. In short, we are not sure. Right now I feel that my primary job is to pastor my family. Before rushing into anything, we are taking time to deepen our relationship with God and each other.
In September, I began working as the Creative Director at Drund. Drund is a web operating system that gives users access to their operating system in their browser using any computer. You can check it out at drund.com. It has been great to become part of the Drund family and I am having fun taking this new product to market. I guess no matter how hard I try, I can’t get out of the “start-up” business. I am having a great time and learning a lot in the process.
In the coming years, we look forward to hearing stories of how the Youngstown Metro Church community is living ordinary life with gospel intentionality. We are so proud of “our kids” and the people they are becoming. Metro will always have a special place our hearts.
None of this could have happened without the support of so many people over the years. Thank you to all who helped this dream become a reality. Though this list could be pages long, I wanted to especially thank some of those:
The Summit Church
The North American Mission Board
The State Convention of Baptist in Ohio
The Steel Valley Baptist Association
The Acts29 Network
First Baptist Church of Newton Falls
Living Water Baptist Church
Rising Star Baptist Church
Old North Church
Tabernacle Evangelical Presbyterian Church
Selah Cafe & Brian Palumbo
Youngstown Christian School
The Oakland Center for the Performing Arts
J.D. Greear
Rick Langston
Brad O’Brien
Rick Stauffer
Bob Stauffer
Ken Donaldson
David Bennett
Bill Cochenour
Brent Alen
Winfield Bevins
Aaron Coe
Shannon & Elijah Stambaugh
Scott & Brooke Sailor
Erik & Nicole Bennett
Phil & Deanna Patrick
Cecelia Edwards Gallagan
Rob & Lauren Maine
Jim & Dianne Millard
Tom & Robyn Shank
And especially the current group gathered as Metro. You all mean so much to Aimee and I. We are so grateful for all of the time, money, and effort you continue to give in order to see the gospel go out from Youngstown. You are family to us. We love you and we are so encouraged as we continue to see you grow in Christ.
And soooooo many more. Thank you all! We love you.
With much gratitude,
- Josh, Aimee, Ella and Willow
“Now may the God of peace, who brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, the great shepherd of the sheep, by the blood of the eternal covenant, make you complete in everything good so that you may do his will, working among us that which is pleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen.” Hebrews 13:20
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