The great thing about the PacRIM internship is that it is a low-pressure way to discern whether you’re called to be part of a church planting team in the Pacific Northwest. The program is open to more than only future pastors, too. Another significant value is relationships. PacRIM introduces interns to church leaders across the region. Most churches do not want to hire someone who is an unknown entity.
I discovered PacRIM during my first year at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (TEDS) back in 2019. Before beginning seminary, I asked the Lord to provide opportunities to serve in a ministry which met two personal desires.
First, I knew that I wanted to do some sort of ministry with the “unchurched” and “dechurched,” while also being part of normal church work. Moreover, I also desired to be part of a denomination which closely resembled my own theological and cultural convictions.
God led me to the PacRIM internship in the Summer of 2021.
Each church planting intern is assigned a “host church” in the Pacific Northwest. I was assigned to Christ Church Bellingham, a church planted about twelve years prior. It was very beneficial to be part of an established church that is still on mission. I was given tasks and responsibilities that helped me grow in my gifts. And I wasn’t treated like a band aid for some ministry in desperate need of volunteers! I preached several times at Christ Church as well as at other churches in the area, and was given thoughtful feedback and encouragement. Interns that aren’t headed to pulpit ministry, like musicians and counselors, also get the chance to teach and lead in substantive ways.
My internship included the chance to connect with people in Bellingham both inside and outside of the Church. I knew that I only had about twelve weeks to begin to understand what the culture is like, so I joined a local jiu jitsu gym. That leads to one of my first takeaways: most people are perfectly happy for you to be religious, but they sure don’t want to talk about it.
The lessons reaffirmed the importance of long-term friendships with both Christians and non-Christians. Most will not want to talk about religion, but on multiple occasions, friends of mine in Bellingham reached out and expressed a desire to have religious or theological conversations.
PacRIM interns met weekly for lectures on various topics related to church planting. I found these to be helpful in how they complemented the courses I was taking at TEDS. The lectures were often much more practical than typical seminary classes, addressing matters such as prayer or the structure of a church plant.
In addition to this, having several other church planting interns meant that there was a great degree of camaraderie amongst the interns. It was encouraging to me, as an outsider to the Pacific Northwest, to see future pastors who desired to do ministry in that particular region of the country. Moreover, seeing the camaraderie amongst many of the pastors in the presbytery left me feeling encouraged, knowing that should I choose to do ministry in the Northwest, I would not be doing it alone.
If one is even slightly open to the possibility of considering church planting and has an affinity for Reformed Theology, the PacRIM internship is an excellent way to explore that possibility. It allows for one to grow in their ministry gifts, consider what it might look like to plant in the Northwest, and experience a beautiful region of the country.
