Senior Pastor Search

On September 13, 2020, Senior Pastor, Marty Berglund announced that he will step down as the senior pastor in June 2021. He and the other members of the Elder Board had made plans for this transition for many months. One component of the “transition plan” was to execute a search process to find the next senior pastor. To do this, the elders organized the Search Team for the task of identifying candidates. This webpage is presented for describing the team’s process.

If you have any questions that are not answered by the content that has been provided on this page, please feel free to email the team at [searchteam@myfac.org].

2014–2015

The Elder Board had meaningful discussions with Pastor Marty regarding his transition plan.

2016–2018

Pastor Marty and Laurie met with trusted friends and elders to discuss Pastor Marty’s transition plan in greater detail.

2019

Chuck Pederson was commissioned to be the Chairman of the Pastor Search Team and Matt Miller serving as a liaison between the Search Team and Elder Board.  Estimated duration 2 years.

2020

January | Chuck began to seek potential candidates, with the help of FAC’s Elder Board to participate on the Pastor Search Team.

February | Chuck Pederson and Phil Morgan engaged District Superintendent Kelvin Walker, who adds input into this process and Pastor Profile.

April | Chuck and the Elder Board began the selection process and prayed over potential Pastor Search Team candidates.

May | Candidates were invited by Chuck Pederson to serve on the Search Team and all accepted the responsibility.

June–August | Search Team met weekly for prayer and planning to prepare for the search.

September | Pastor Marty together with the Elder Board announced his departure to the congregation and introduced the Pastor Search Team.

October | The Search Team conducted focus groups with a subset of engaged volunteer leaders. Approximately 120 volunteers were asked to participate to help define the Pastor Profile for the next senior pastor of FAC. Approximately 31% accepted the invitation to participate.

November | The Search Team started to actively promote FAC’s senior pastor opening using several platforms, reach out to seminaries, and ask FAC’s congregation to share the Pastor Profile

2021

February–April | The Search Team team evaluated over 100 candidates.

April 3 | The Search Team completed their evaluation. The Elder Board was provided one recommended candidate and three other candidates for consideration.

April 13 | The Elder Board decided to interview the one recommended candidate and decided not to move forward with the three other candidates that were offered for consideration.

April 17–24 | The Elder Board conducted two interviews with the recommended candidate.

May 3 | The Elder Board made a formal offer to Seth McCoy through DS Kelvin Walker. Seth accepted the invitation to be the next senior pastor of FAC.

May 9 | Pastor Marty, Chuck Pederson, and Phil Morgan announced Seth McCoy to the congregation as the next senior pastor of FAC.

May 31 | Pastor Marty’s last day as senior pastor of FAC.

June 7 | Seth Mccoy’s first day as senior pastor of FAC.

(PDF)

Fellowship Alliance Chapel (FAC) is seeking its next Senior Pastor who, with God’s direction, will lead us into the next season of ministry in southern New Jersey.

Our current Senior Pastor (and founding pastor) of many years, Marty Berglund, is retiring in 2021 after 40 years of service to our congregation. 

The role of Senior Pastor at FAC is accountable to our elders and helps give leadership to over 20 staff. We currently have one executive pastor to share the leadership of the church. Our church is a member of the Christian and Missionary Alliance, elder-governed, and staff-led with a mix of ages, represented across all levels of our ministry. The average weekend attendance is over 1,800. 

In work with our Elders, the staff leadership team, the pastor search team, and engaged volunteers, we have established the following as key roles we expect the next Senior Pastor to play: 

Lead Teaching Pastor 

We desire someone who will be the primary teaching pastor. They will plan the weekend preaching/teaching series and guide the congregation in methods for applying God’s word to our lives.  

We seek “someone that has learned in their own brokenness the grace of Christ. We want to be abounding in grace in our vision for the future.”  

Chief Explorer and Future Thinker 

A person who will serve the congregation by seeking new territory to share the gospel, finding new methods, and innovations that equip the congregation for effective service in the future. 

“Engaged, involved to take on new challenges. Working closely with other leaders, not in a tower of study.” 

The Leader 

Our expectation is that the Senior Pastor will be the prime leader of the congregation. We want him to cast vision, shape direction, and make appropriate decisions.  

“We are not seeking a Senior Pastor to do everything but one who can empower others.” 

Evangelist 

In addition to the above, we expect the Senior Pastor to model the role of evangelist, communicating the Gospel in a personal way to unreached people.   He will prioritize this task personally and train others to do likewise. 

“One thing we would really love to hear preached and taught to the church is that it doesn’t matter who you are or what your background is, you can come in here with a totally messed up life… willing to take a step toward Jesus. ”  

Education: Master of Divinity or Master of Theology is preferred.  

Directional Themes 

Many of FAC’s ministry activities of today and plans for the future arise from the following directional themes. Directionally, over the next three years, we desire to pursue: 

• Evangelism – proclaiming Christ’s love through each participant, and watch God grow his church. 
• Small groups – a key to strengthening our love and unity in a faith-based community, “making a big church smaller.”
• The next generation – through ministries with students, middle school age through college. 

The Church 

While Fellowship Alliance Chapel recently celebrated its 40th year of ministry it is more excited about its future than its past.  

The church is a single-site, multigenerational congregation committed to a mission that more and more people would live a Jesus-centered and missionally engaged life.  

Within the last five years, the church completed a new building project, located on the same property with its original building in Medford, NJ.  

The church is committed to faithfulness, sharing the gospel with others locally and beyond while trusting God to grow his church. We desire to see hundreds of faith decisions, baptisms and invest thousands of volunteer hours both locally and globally. 

Our current ministry program includes family support ministries, extensive programs for adults, children, and youth, as well as care and recovery ministries, and missions. 

Our theological tradition is evangelical. While our church is solidly committed to the Christian and Missionary Alliance as our denominational family, we would consider those candidates with theological beliefs compatible with our Alliance heritage but serving in other independent or other evangelical fellowships. 

The church has pastors on staff that will teach periodically during the year.  Historically this has been done to allow the Senior Pastor time to invest in the task of leading the staff and developing them to be great co-laborers of the gospel in our mission field.   

Communities 

Our church building is in a very desirable township in Medford, New Jersey. Located 30 minutes from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and 45 minutes from the Jersey shore, Medford serves as a hub of business and culture for this region.   

With an average enrollment of 1,800 students, there are five high schools within a 15-minute drive from the church, demonstrating the church’s central location to the surrounding townships of Marlton, Medford, Mount Holly, Mount Laurel, and Tabernacle.  Members of the congregation live in these communities as well as many other townships beyond a 15-minute commute.  

There is great variety in neighborhoods when choosing where to live, with many amenities that appeal to families.   The public schools are very good, reporting strong graduation rates and college admission.  In addition, there are some private, Christian schools in the surrounding area. 

[ Click here ] to download a PDF version of the Senior Pastor Profile.

Lindsay McClure

Prayer was the foundation on which this process was built. As believers, we know the power of prayer, but something Chuck led our group in, was to consider how we pray. One of the first practices Chuck instilled in our time together, was the importance of magnifying the Lord before anything else. And that was it.

We would be sure that each time we bowed our heads, pleading with God to make His way known for our church, crying out for wisdom, asking for discernment as we navigated unknown territories—before it all, we would worship God. We would meditate on all of who He is, sometimes in prayer and sometimes with our eight voices raised in song. We would dwell on His character, His majesty, and sit there for a while together.  Then we’d bring our need.

This was so significant because it reminded us that the Lord was the source. We didn’t have to have all the answers or get a discernible view of the outcome or even hold the belief that there would be an incredible pastor at the end of this process. Those factors ebb and flow with circumstances and even our emotions. But what we did have, was the assurance of Jesus’ faithfulness to His people, the knowledge that He has a plan at work for our church, and that He was the sustaining power of all things.

Jackie Schaefer

Ephesians 4:1-6 really speaks to my experience of seeing God move in the team and the overall search process:

Therefore I, the prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk worthy of the calling you have received, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, accepting one another in love, diligently keeping the unity of the Spirit with the peace that binds us. There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to one hope at your calling—one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all.

One of the most amazing ways I personally saw God at work during the search process was through witnessing His Holy Spirit move so clearly and uniquely through the eight of us. Whether it was during the initial sifting of candidates, listening to sermons, or conducting the interviews; He spoke to and through each of us in a different way to bring about our shared outcome. I was fascinated by how we could all have contrasting yet vital perspectives that seemed to complete the whole picture as we narrowed down the search. It was beautifully evident to me that we were operating as distinctive parts of Christ’s body to accomplish our goal through the empowerment of the Holy Spirit working in us.

I also marveled at the unity in the Spirit we experienced throughout the process. We worked collectively, listened to each other if our opinions differed, and always felt peace yielding to the group with a shared heart for togetherness. There was a wonderful sentiment of harmony and consensus amongst the group and it was clear God used that unity to guide and propel us forward. Agreement like we had just does not exist in this fallen world without the Lord’s enabling—it was a magnificent thing to be a part of!