My name is Gus Peterson, and I am a 2012 MDiv graduate of
the Fuller Seminary Northwest program. For me, seminary was a process of
reckoning with God about what is meant by personal "calling" and
ministry.
I started at Fuller in 2003, full of excitement and enthusiasm at my second
career choice. I had recently put aside an event management career and
returned to Seattle from a volunteer year at a youth reconciliation center
outside of Dublin, Ireland. I was excited to engage the task of
reconciliation in the context of the local church community. I had no
idea the plans God had in store, and the next several years shifted my
trajectory in many exciting ways.
I engaged in an ordination process, started an internship, joined the MDiv Cohort
Program, and began full-time classes all at the same time. Then a strange
thing happened. God brought Gretchen into my life. We were married
a year and a half later. We had the fortunate situation of living less
than a mile from Fuller, as well as a few blocks from my job and her work as
well. We were very much in our
neighborhood. I was working as a barista, and Gretchen as an artist and
teacher. As a barista, I was brought into daily contact with all of the
coffee-drinking personalities of our neighborhood. Alongside the studies
of Koine Greek, church history, and pastoral theology, people were in community
with one another, and I began to question whether ordained pulpit ministry was
the specific call that God had put on my life... or if there was something
different out there.
It turns out, there was something different. Gretchen is a survivor of
childhood leukemia, and while going through treatment was introduced to a place
called Camp Goodtimes West, where she continues to volunteer. This is a
pediatric oncology resident camp for children aged 7-17 who are affected by
cancer. When Gretchen and I met, I began to serve this community as a
volunteer. When the Director position opened up last year, I prayerfully
considered it. Now I find myself serving as the Director of Camp
Goodtimes West, an amazing "congregation" of families whose lives
have been shifted and altered by this disease. I work with a wonderful
corp of volunteers to assure the safety and enjoyment of each and every camper for
our three weeks of camp each year. It is a community that goes through
highs and lows, deaths and weddings and births - tangible joy as well as the
depths of grief. Rallying this group through these moments is hard work,
and quite simply a great, great privilege.
At this point, I look back and I sense that God has been moving me toward this
role for a long, long time. My time at Fuller continues to shape me as a
servant leader, and as someone who gets to preach the gospel always, but in
this particular calling, finds that direct words are unnecessary. The
clear goal of moving this big-hearted and purposeful group toward making a
direct and positive difference in the lives of hurting families represents a magnificent
movement of the Holy Spirit.