Shalom Anglican

 My heart is full! Sometimes there are seasons in life that bring a lot of rejoicing and this last month has been one of those. First, on Pentecost Sunday we had a baptism with two elementary aged girls as well as a baby of a family who is newer to our church and in our catechism class. It was a beautiful service with lots of guests and lots of joy!  Second, our youngest son Asher got married on May 30th to Angel and I had the privilege of marrying them. It was an incredible day filled with so much joy in having all our family in town including my mom! Beth and I are now officially empty nester's which has it's own set of emotions with it that I'm sure I'll be working through over the next year... lol!  Overall it's been a rich month of life and ministry. Beth and I are so grateful! Updates: Our catechism class is almost finished. Pray for everyone as they consider their next steps in commitment to Jesus and to Shalom Anglican. We've had a few new visitors latel...

"Abide," That was the word the Lord gave me as I laid in a hospital bed three years ago after a bad cycling accident that left me with a broken vertebrae preparing for surgery. It comes from John 15 specifically verse 5 which says,  An artist in our church recently  designed this print and made copies for everyone at Shalom!   I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. This accident also happened right around the time I was scheduled to preach my last sermon as the Lead Pastor of Seaside Church and so I chose to preach on John 15. Well, a few weeks ago this reading came around again in our three year lectionary cycle. I found myself feeling the weight again of the accident and all the losses I've experienced since then. It was a heavy week. At the same time the Lord reminded me that this is still true! Apart from Jesus I can do nothing and his invitation is to continue to ab...

 He is Risen! He is Risen Indeed!  I got to baptize my grandson John! Happy Eastertide to you as we enter into this high season of celebrating the resurrection of our Lord. Because Jesus rose from the dead everything will ultimately be okay! He rose to never die again and the tomb remains empty. Hallelujah! We had an incredible Holy Week and Easter Sunday this year. The highlight was celebrating a baptism together for two babies, a teenager, and a young adult at our Saturday evening Easter Vigil! We had over 80 folks at our Vigil and over 70 on Easter Sunday join us in worship. It was truly a glorious weekend! Updates: Happy Birthday Shalom! On Tuesday April 14 Shalom turned two years old! We gathered for an evening to celebrate, share what it's meant to us to be a part of this church, as well as share some vision for the future. It was a wonderful evening! We had several folks attend all of our Holy Week Services (Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Vigil) for the first ...

Simple Pastoral Ministry Our Family! Something that I'm reminded of on an almost weekly basis is how much people appreciate simple pastoral ministry! In our day, people can get online and find polished platforms, excellent teaching, and never ending Bible resources for free. But what they can't get is a pastor who will sit with them and listen to what's going on in their life. What they can't get is a pastor who will remember their name, pray for their needs, and offer spiritual direction for their souls.  I recently received a message from someone who had been to our church a few times but then ended up attending another church on and off.  "I just wanted to tell you what a joy it was to be back in Shalom's service again today. This morning you welcomed me with a hug and remembered my name. That meant so much to me. I've decided I want to make Shalom my home church and want to learn more about how I might get involved." Another person I met with recen...

 Friends of Shalom, Freshly Painted Sanctuary As I was re-reading my journal over the last month, I came across this sentence, "Things are going well, but there's a lot to do!"  I think that describes this season we are in. As we're moving from what's felt like an experiment that may or may not work to a church community getting planted I'm seeing the needs for more organization and development.  Included in the work is also good old fashioned pastoral ministry. There are many opportunities for me to meet with folks one on one as they are growing in their faith or navigating difficult circumstances. I've had several of these kinds of meetings lately. Updates: Everyone has been enjoying our newly painted sanctuary. We were able to partner with the school that owns the church on this project to get this done!  This Friday I'm meeting with 3 other couples and we are preparing to launch "Table Groups" in March. These are basically monthly dinner...

 Momentum... Meet our new grandson John Michael Clark! Momentum is a funny thing in church planting. It's when things feel good. There are new faces and new things happening. There seems to be an excitement around the community. I think over the last month we've experienced some momentum. It's interesting that this has happened now because for most of the last month we had to meet in the basement of the church while the sanctuary was being repainted. This created some inconvenience and "funkiness" to our Sunday and Christmas services. But at the same time... it also created some momentum.  In all this I'm reminded of something St. Paul said, " So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth," (1 Corinthians 3:7). Whatever has been happening, I'm thankful for what God is doing and how he is causing our little church plant to grow. Updates: A huge praise was that our daughter Elena Clark gave birth to John ...

Friends of Shalom,  As we come to the end of 2025, I am truly amazed and so grateful for all that our Lord has done and continues to do in our church. The best way to describe this year for me would be “holistic growth.” We’ve seen this in terms of new folks checking out Shalom (many new to faith), we’ve grown deeper in Christ as a church, and we’ve grown as a community in our relationships with one another.  Merry Christmas! Here are some highlights from 2025. Three adult baptisms. We regularly have people new to Christianity or who haven't been to church in years join us on Sunday. Two catechism classes with a total of twelve adults. Inside giving growth by almost $2,000 a month. Our average Sunday Attendance has grown from 30 to 45.  We collectively gave $1,500 for our lenten offering to Scarlet Road (a local non-profit that works with survivors of sexual exploitation). And we volunteered to help with several projects as well. Two weddings and Two engagements! W...

Young Adults The church we rent was recently painted. We're so grateful to be able to partner with All Saints Academy!  One of the exciting things about church planting is that as we open our doors for Sunday Eucharist and scatter gospel seeds in our community we don't always know which ones will grow up. We don't always know who God will allow us to reach. In many ways this reminds me of my wife's garden. Last spring she planted a bunch of different veggies some took and some didn't. It was a surprise to see as we moved through the growing season. One of the surprises in planting Shalom has been the number of young adults we have seen find a home at Shalom. I wasn't expecting that and it has been a true joy! We've already had two weddings with a third one this summer. We've had three babies born and one more coming in a month. We also have several single young adults in their 20's and 30's who are a part of our church. Please continue to pray fo...

 Our First Confirmation! On September 28th we celebrated our first confirmation at Shalom Anglican! We had seventeen folks confirmed by our Bishop, Jake Worley, and celebrated afterwards with a potluck. It was a beautiful liturgy and I think we all sensed the presence of the Spirit and left deeply encouraged!  Confirmation is an ancient liturgical rite where those who have been baptized and catechized publicly affirm their faith through confessing before the church their baptismal vows. Then a bishop of the church confirms and commissions each person through the laying on of hands to be strengthened by the Spirit for ministry in and out of the church. As you can imagine it took a little while to confirm seventeen folks in one service but it was sweet to watch as the church prayed for each confirmand during the Bishop's prayers. This is a HUGE step for us as a new church. When I see this picture I think of how Paul speaks of the church like a body in 1 Corinthians 12. Each...

 The simple but radical work goes on... End of summer camping at Cape Dissapointment As I sit down to write, my heart is heavy by the news of Charlie Kirk's assassination, another school shooting (only a few weeks after the last one), remembering 9/11, the continued death toll and suffering of civilian Palestinians in Gaza, and other headlines. Of course we know these are more than headlines, they are real people who are image bearers and victims of violence. In the face of moments like this I often wonder what I should be doing as a local pastor. Do I get on the socials and attempt to give a word of comfort or challenge like other pastors I see? Should I change my plan for Sunday and try to address all that's going on in people's hearts? What do I do? When we began sensing a call to church planting again the Lord gave us the name Shalom Anglican. Shalom means peace, flourishing, and a holistic sense of well-being. It has to do with seeing people enter into a peace with G...

 Grieving but grateful...  Robert Michael Steinbach Sr. 9/7/1946 - 7/28/2025 This is has been my response to people as they've asked me how I'm doing.  On July 28th my Dad's spirit left his failing body into the presence of the Trinity. My heart is heavy because of the finality of death. I can no longer see him or talk to him. Now I wait to go to him.  But I'm also grateful for his life. He had an amazing testimony which I shared about briefly at his memorial service . He was a gift to all who knew him. He was my Dad and I loved him dearly.  Needless to say July was a blur. I made two trips back to Maryland. The first was to see him and support my mom in his final days. The second was a week long trip after he passed for his memorial and committal service. I'm settling back into work and processing my grief as well as looking forward to the end of summer and some fall planning. Updates: While I was gone our church stepped up and handled the Sunday service. I'm g...

A Personal Update This last month was very full for our family. It began with our youngest son Asher proposing to his girlfriend! We couldn't be more happy for Asher and Angel and their upcoming wedding next summer. This means that a year from now Beth and I will officially be "empty nesters." I'm still not sure how I feel about that and will definitely need some therapy to process it all 😅. In mid-June we took a trip back to Maryland with our oldest daughter, son in law, and granddaughter.  We spent a few days enjoying Baltimore. This included time with Beth's family, an Oriole's game, the best crab cakes on the planet, and a few "snowballs." Then we spent time with my parents and my sister who live in Annapolis. My dad is going through some health challenges and it was a blessing to be with him and bring his great granddaughter around to lift his spirits.  Shortly after we got back we began planning and putting the final preparations together for ...

My wife and I have been building a garden… well, mostly my wife ;)  I underestimated how much work it would be.  We had to get stones out of the soil, lay down Beth's Garden mulch, then build a fence to keep the deer out. After that there was ordering dirt, wheelbarrowing the dirt, building planters, filling the boxes, and finally planting. This got me thinking about the work of ministry and specifically the balance between working hard, but then trusting God with the growth. In our garden we are working hard, but after we do our work we can’t make the plants grow. That’s outside of our realm. This partnership we have with God that began in Eden is a hard one. It seems like we’d rather just work hard and make it all up to us… or throw our hands up and just “let go and let God” to do it all.  But neither is how it all works. We do work hard. We do build. At the same time, only God brings the growth!  We see this in a wonderful text in Paul’s first letter to Corinth. T...

 Alleluia! Christ is risen! The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!  Palm Sunday begins outside with the liturgy of the Palms . This is our Eastertide acclamation and how we begin each service through Pentecost (June 8th). It's meant to orient us to the reality of our resurrected Lord who is reigning now. Easter isn't simply one special Sunday, but a whole season of being drenched in the joy and glory of Jesus' victory over his own death and now ours as well! If you find yourself drifting from the power of the resurrection that we celebrated on Easter, here is a link to my message on Easter Sunday to stir up hope once again! I have to say, this last month was simply AMAZING! God has been so good to us. Here are some highlights. Updates: We held our first Triduum (Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Vigil) and it was a rich time of worship that culminated in a Taco Potluck on Saturday night with most of our church joining in! Through these three services as well as Easter Sund...

 When God just does stuff... I've been a church planter and around church planting for over twenty years. I've had countless conversations with church planters desiring to start a new church and wondering if they should. Whenever I have these discussions I always look for two things. First, whether or not the planter has a specific vision (perhaps I'll say more about that in another post). Second, I look for what God is doing. In other words, what are some things that are happening that only God could do? What things are happening that the church planters plans, intellect, gifts have nothing to do with? See, one thing I've learned is that if God is at work in the beginnings of a new church he just does stuff! He does stuff that no one can take credit for but Him. He shows us that this is is his church and he's at work. This last month I've been reminded that God just does stuff. Almost every week this month I have showed up on Sunday a little tired and distract...

 Friends of Shalom, Have you ever had a moment where you feel and see the kindness of God in a profound way? Most of life is a grind. But sometimes in small and big ways we get to experience God's kindness in a way we aren't soon to forget.  This last July, Beth and I celebrated our 25th anniversary! Around this time some friends of ours who Placencia, Belize! own a home in Belize offered it to us as a free place to stay and we decided to take them up on the offer. They encouraged us to wait until March 2025 and so we began planning. A few weeks ago we flew out to Placencia, Belize for a 10 day trip! We had never done anything like this before nor for this length of time. Everyday we would share memories from 25 years together. Taking time away to reflect as well as enjoy the sunshine, beaches, food, and rich culture of Belize was a true gift!  These past few weeks I've seen and felt the kindness of God in a profound way. Updates: We got to visit a small Anglican Church.....