George & Linda Renner and Duane & Sandy Berry

DECADE of DISCOVERY: Trinity ’76-’86

by Dr. George Renner

DISCOVERING NEW LEADERSHIP CALLED BY GOD

Duane Berry was Trinity’s pastor from 1971 to 1976 and a gifted evangelist. God used Duane to restore the unity and vision of the church. The Spirit brought many new believers to faith. I came as a seminary student intern on weekends to be mentored by Duane. But God had another plan, and Duane was called to go home to Canada, where the need for well-equipped pastors was great. Trinity took a big risk on me (I was really young!). But the church discerned that God had called me to be the next pastor and therefore ordained me in 1976.  Trinity also called Mike Rowe, who was particularly gifted for reaching youth. A hallmark of Trinity’s life in this era was raising up new leadership. The church later discerned that a member working as an engineer, Bill Bickmore, was gifted by the Spirit to be a pastor. Trinity took a big leap and embraced Bill as a “mentee” so he could be prepared to serve. Bill was “hired” as an “apprentice.”

DISCOVERING WORSHIP

One particularly beautiful dimension of Trinity’s life was learning fresh ways (old and new) through which a community of God’s people can “with one heart and voice” express their awe and delight and submission to God. Prior to this awakening season, the previous mindset actually saw the singing and reading, etc., as “the preliminaries” – stuff that was traditionally done in preparation for the sermon. Increasingly, expressing directly to God our love and awe became a powerful and delightful experience. We even experimented with a three-hour worship format – making time for worship + teaching + community prayer.


DISCOVERING INNOVATIVE WAYS TO SHARE JESUS’ LOVE

The Spirit was working in a variety of ways to energize Trinity for outreach. Mike Rowe was leading an excellent student ministry. Growing numbers of students were coming and meeting Jesus. The “D House” was buzzing with activity. The youth ministry was the best in the region (a real magnet). Trinity used the Evangelism Explosion strategy to spur many on in sharing the faith. A special outreach developed during the Holy Week period, including a choir performance at the city library and holding our Easter services at Nashua High Auditorium. This helped us grasp the potential for growth and also made innovation fun. Creative Christian Living was an amazing outreach program for women, facilitated by women. God’s Word was studied in depth along with a wide variety of learning opportunities that specifically empowered women. Toward the end of this period, it was clear that God was leading us to plant a daughter church in Pepperell, MA.


DISCOVERING THE PRESENCE OF THE HOLY SPIRIT

During the late 1970s, the “Charismatic movement” was sweeping through many parts of New England. This fresh work of God created a positive tension in our life together. We dug deeply into scripture to discover what the New Testament tells us about the Spirit’s work. Many churches were polarized and divided, but Trinity’s identity was grounded in 1 Corinthians 12-14. We determined (following the apostle Paul) to be “both/and” people: Word-centered but not Pentecostal, with freedom of expression and all Charismata enjoyed. We were led to develop a Sunday evening all-church prayer service that was “on fire.”


DISCOVERING OUR CONTRIBUTION TO GOD’S GLOBAL MISSION

Participating in God’s global mission was huge. Trinity had a long history of supporting missionaries, but God gave us a new vibrancy as we developed close ties with long-term missionaries like Judy Gay, the Bothwells, and the Spruances. We also sent out our own – the Wendels, Kim and Nora Gay. God directed us to a season of struggling with biblical “simplicity” in a materialistic culture. Our joy was to find ways to free up as much money as possible for God’s global mission.


DISCOVERING THE ADVENTURE OF BEING CHRIST’S BODY

Ephesians 4:1-15 was a corporate guide to our life together, with its stress on unity, love, every-member giftedness, and a pastor’s assignment being to equip and empower. We attempted to demonstrate that every spiritual gift is highly valued and that it is only when each part does its job that we grow up and (corporately) become a manifestation of Jesus. Trinity was committed to respecting the Spirit-given capacities of women. Marguerite Gay and Velma Durgin were models of Spirit-inspired wisdom and love.


DISCOVERING THE JOY (and agony) OF BEING A LOVING FAMILY

We were a family – camping together, eating dinners together, helping each other in a thousand ways, serving one another. Ephesians 4:1-3 was our “trademark.” We worked on living out the “one another” texts. We frequently sang “They will know we are Christians by our love” – and we asked the Spirit to make it so. Small groups were essential for growth and deepening our life together. The Sunday evening prayer service nurtured deep bonds of love.

DISCOVERING HOW TO TRUST GOD FOR A BIG CHALLENGE

We struggled to undertake a BIG “paradigm shift” in our self-understanding (for both pastor and people) when God sent significant growth in our numbers – from 150 to 275 – and I (still kind of a rookie) had to discover a new model for shepherding. The people and the pastor had to embrace the idea that a pastor serves every person by empowering/equipping other gifted “ministers.” We reluctantly accepted the challenge of building new facilities. The transformation of the Diakonia House was phase one, with a focus on a dedicated space for youth. There were already some rumblings about the need for a new building going back to the time of Duane Berry. Because Duane was a gifted evangelist, there were many new believers. [Trinity actually purchased a property on St. Laurent Street with an eye to relocating.] Those Easter services at Nashua High showed us the potential. God moved our hearts and changed our attitudes, and opened our checkbooks so that with remarkable unity we undertook the challenge of constructing the new worship facility in the early 1980s.

DISCOVERING GOD

The Holy Spirit unleashed among the community a fresh desire to know (experientially) the Father, Son, and Spirit. The Spirit had many strategies to shape God’s people: a sermon series called “The Thirst” based on Exodus 33, where we read that Moses would enjoy God “face to face as a man speaks with his friend”; lectures by J. Edwin Orr (video) on prayer and revival; attending the Evangelistic Association of New England annual renewal conference as a group; discovering spiritual disciplines; hosting a “School of Prayer”; meditating on the writings of A.W. Tozer and J.I. Packer. Together we were thirsting, meandering, leaning into, stumbling, and pursuing the joy of loving Jesus. The Ephesians 3 prayer was our watchword:


“I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.  Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”