The gift of peace in times of crisis

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LOUISVILLE — A single phone call nearly 20 years ago turned Jenni Whitford’s whole world upside down.

Jenni and her young family had only just returned from vacation when her husband’s workplace called.

“I came home from a session meeting and got a call that my husband, Ken, had collapsed,” recalled Jenni, who was then serving as a three-quarter-time Christian educator in her home church, First Presbyterian in Jackson, Michigan.

When they arrived at the hospital, Jenni and her two children, ages 9 and 12, learned that 36-year-old Ken Ellis — a dedicated husband and father — had died of an aortic aneurysm.

And because it was her husband who had carried the family’s medical insurance, she learned that their coverage was paid only through the end of the month.

Her pastor was immediately by her side to offer both comfort and counsel.

“Since I was familiar with the PC(USA)’s four denominational offerings, I recommended to Jenni that the Christmas Joy Offering was there to help church workers in times of need,” said the Rev. Jim Hegedus, an honorably retired member of the Presbytery of Lake Michigan and Jenni’s former pastor at First Presbyterian. “Jenni was a church worker and most definitely in desperate and unexpected need. What a blessing the Christmas Joy Offering was for Jenni and her family at that sad and heartbreaking time!”

Facing such a huge financial challenge at a time of “chaos, upheaval and huge emotions,” Jenni — who currently serves as director for Congregational Faith Formation at First Presbyterian Church in Granville, Ohio — found just the support she needed through the Assistance Program of the Board of Pensions. The trusted PC(USA) agency, in partnership with the Presbytery of Lake Michigan, granted her immediate, emergency assistance to cover the family’s medical premiums for two years.

The generous support that she received was made possible, in part, by the PC(USA)’s annual Christmas Joy Offering, a cherished Presbyterian tradition since the 1930s, which distributes gifts equally to the Assistance Program and to Presbyterian-related schools and colleges equipping communities of color.

“It is a testament to the Christmas Joy Offering that, after nearly two decades, the memory of the help Ms. Whitford received compelled her to share her story,” said Ruth Adams, director of the Assistance Program. “It is a wonderful reflection of how the denomination is at its connectional best when it works together. That is the lasting impact that the Christmas Joy Offering has.”

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Called to be ‘God’s hands in the world’

Like Jenni, Isabella Pérez Sanchez’s life was forever changed by a medical crisis. Yet the 18-year-old high school senior has always believed in miracles.

How could she not?

Because Isabella, who was raised in a Christian household in Bogotá, Colombia, had always found that everything came so easily to her, she knew it must be a “God thing.”

But the one thing that, at first, didn’t seem so easy was the science prodigy’s lifelong dream of attending high school and college in the United States.

When the Presbyterian-related Colegio Americano de Bogotá, where she was a student at the time, told her about their partnership with the Presbyterian Pan American School (PPAS) in Kingsville, Texas, “Everything lined up really easily,” said Isabella. “And even though it was hard for me and my mom to let each other go, we both kept saying that this is God telling us, ‘This is my plan for you. It’s impossible that this isn’t the path you should take.’”

PPAS, which Isabella entered in the 10th grade, is an international, college-preparatory boarding school related to the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). Established in 1911, the school motivates and equips young people for lives of Christian leadership in the global community.

Once Isabella arrived on campus, the miracles in her life continued, especially the new worlds that opened to her by making new friends from diverse cultures.

But the biggest miracle by far occurred in 2019, when the aspiring doctor — who had felt called into the medical field since the age of 10 — encountered the greatest challenge of her young life.

Isabella said, “It was a Sunday morning in Colombia. I was coming out of church when I had the strongest pain I have ever felt in my whole life. They took me to the hospital immediately.”

Diagnosed with an arteriovenous malformation, a tangle of blood vessels that irregularly connects arteries and veins, disrupting blood flow and oxygen circulation, she underwent brain surgery and spent nearly two months in the ICU.

“That was when I realized I had a personal relationship with God,” said Isabella. “That was when I received my calling for life, which is to help others and to be God’s hands in the world.”

Today, more than five years after her huge medical scare, Isabella is completely healed.

“After my brain surgery, God gave me a second life opportunity and said I should use my hands to help other people,” she said. “I am completely thankful to everyone who has donated to the Christmas Joy Offering to keep our school running. I hope more people have the opportunity to grow as I have grown, not only in knowledge but also in faith.”

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A Presbyterian safety net in times of hardship

Although the Rev. Dr. Judi McMillan had also clearly heard God’s calling in her life, she found it wasn’t always easy to follow.

When the PC(USA) pastor relocated from Nebraska to Michigan 20 years ago to accept a call as an associate minister at a large, non-Presbyterian church, the relationship didn’t end as auspiciously as it had started.

A few years into her ministry there, it became clear to Judi that her position wasn’t working out, and she left the congregation.

“Although I had been in between calls before, this was a really hard time,” she recalled. “I had moved; I had just gone through a divorce, and my two grade-school-aged kids were with me. Pastors can leave churches that are not good fits, and sometimes a severance or their savings doesn’t stretch far enough. I found myself in the situation where I was the sole person providing for the kids with a mortgage.”

As Judi worked to find a path toward fiscal stability and renewed self-esteem, she followed her presbytery executive’s recommendation and enrolled in interim ministry training.

After reinventing herself by working at a flower shop, her life stress simply proved too much.

That is until her clergy colleague, the Rev. Dr. Kate Thoresen, advised her to call the Rev. Al Timm, who was then general presbyter for the Presbytery of Detroit. She encouraged McMillan to share her situation with him and said the Christmas Joy Offering could help.

“At a time when I was scared and unsure, the Christmas Joy Offering filled the gap of exactly one month — the last month I’d be without a call,” she said. “This was God’s doing. I was so very thankful for the work of Christmas Joy and for the concern of my colleague and the generosity of our denomination.”

After Judi had emerged from the worst of her financial stress, she received a call as interim pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Royal Oak (Michigan), where she found a financial adviser and began the process of securing her and her family’s future.

“You might say all of this was ‘preparing the way,’” she said. “It’s almost like each call is preparing you for the next one.”

Following several positions in interim ministry — in which she genuinely thrived — Judi eventually accepted a call as pastor of the Presbyterian Church of Bella Vista (Arkansas), where she has served since October 2021.

Judi, who has shared her testimony openly with her current congregation, said the Christmas Joy Offering was truly a surprise to her.

“I think it’s important to give to the Christmas Joy Offering because it continues to affirm pastoral leadership and leadership of those serving the Church,” she said. “It’s the Church saying to you, ‘We have your back!’”

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Studying history while making it happen

Sitting next to a picture on the wall at her office, LaTrell Clifford Wood accidentally discovered a significant piece of her family’s history.

“The picture had a name on it: Chief Justice McClellan, who presided over the Supreme Court of Alabama when the 1901 Constitution was written,” said LaTrell, an honors history major and the valedictorian of the Class of 2020 at Stillman College. Stillman is one of three Presbyterian-related Schools and Colleges Equipping Communities of Color of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), and its only Historically Black College (HBCU).

“That was the constitution that made a lot of broad statements about the forced illiteracy and alleged moral depravity of many Black people as ‘justification’ for them not being permitted to vote,” she said before adding, “It was actually McClellan’s family who owned my great-great-grandfather’s mother. These weren’t stories that I knew growing up.”

But now she does.

It is clear that history — and restorative justice — very much matter to LaTrell, the youngest daughter and granddaughter of a teacher and three generations of civil rights activists with roots in both west and east Alabama.

“My older sister, DaKishia, always says if there’s room for epigenetic trauma, there’s room for epigenetic wisdom,” said LaTrell. “For a long time, I felt very disconnected because I didn’t know people’s stories.”

Yet even before she knew these stories, LaTrell was drawn to history and its practical application as an aspiring scholar, leader and social justice advocate.

“When I came to Stillman, I started out as a business and fine arts major, but after taking a couple of history classes, I thought to myself I will never have an opportunity to learn history like this,” she said.

Founded in 1876, Stillman College was initially established as a training school for African American ministers, like the Rev. William H. Sheppard, who exposed the genocide of the people of the Kasai region of the Belgian Congo by King Leopold II. In fact, in the 1960s, there was a student movement to rename the college “Sheppard College” in his honor.

Today, the HBCU sits on what was once the Cochran plantation, where, in following “The Stillman Way,” it “provides an environment that delivers the pursuit of intellectual excellence, the development of personal honor and a commitment to the common good.”

Not long after graduating, LaTrell found her way to Washington, D.C., with the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, where she served Alabama’s 7th Congressional District as a congressional intern. Then, in 2023, she accepted a position as a hunger policy advocate for Alabama Arise, a statewide, member-led organization advancing public policies to improve the lives of Alabamians who are marginalized by poverty.

“From the moment she set foot on campus, LaTrell was a beacon of passion and ideology,” said Tasha Washington, Stillman’s dean of Retention and Student Success and LaTrell’s former supervisor. “LaTrell was inherently drawn to serving the underserved and forging pathways to higher education for those who thought it out of reach.”

Because of what her mentors at Stillman have meant to her both before and since graduating, LaTrell is committed to securing the college’s future.

“Since Stillman is a private institution and we don’t get state funding, we rely in large part on philanthropy,” she said. “I see the Christmas Joy Offering as a way to support restorative justice.”

Give to the Christmas Joy Offering to help Presbyterian-related schools and colleges equipping communities of color provide life-changing experiences and to help the Assistance Program of the Board of Pensions support our leaders: past, present and future.