Solo Pastor: Installed – Crawfordsville – Indiana

Date Posted: March 9, 2026

Organization: Wabash Avenue Presbyterian Church

Job Type: full time

Position Type: Installed Pastor

Presbytery: Wabash Valley Presbytery

Salary: $60,000.00

Organization Website: https://wabashavenuechurch.org

Congregation Size: 101-250

Community Type: Small Town

Position Details:

The WAPC Pastor will perform the following duties: Organize and lead worship services, collaborating with committees as appropriate; lead adult Christian Education class; officiate weddings and funerals; visit members who are homebound or in residential care and administer Sacrament; attend church outreach/social events; preside over Session meetings; supervise staff and serve on Personnel Committee; coordinate with Christian Education Committee to rebuild youth Christian education and events; respond to congregant emergencies; meet with leadership of Crawfordsville downtown churches and participate in occasional joint services; recruit and mentor Lake Fellow in Parish Ministry in partnership with Second Presbyterian in Indianapolis; collaborate with Communications Specialist on regular messages to congregation as well as upgrade to web page and social media presence; oversee strategic planning and implementation; with financial support from Session, engage in continuing education.

The WAPC Pastor, coordinating with the Worship Committee and Choir Director, will organize and lead Sunday morning worship services as well as seasonal services and any additional vigils or services that circumstances (e.g. times of crisis) may warrant. The Pastor will also coordinate with the Christian Education Committee on a program of Sunday morning Bible study, trusting to find the congregation both inquisitive and ready to do homework.

WAPC values its relationships with nonprofit agencies, and the WAPC Pastor will lead the congregation in articulating a vision for those relationships that involves the time and treasure of the church. This vision may also include the use of a sizable, centrally located church building that we wish to remain useful to the community.

WAPC enjoys relationships with a group of “downtown churches” – St. John’s Episcopal, First Christian Church, and Christ Lutheran Church – with whom WAPC has enjoyed occasional common worship and educational/service programming. The WAPC Pastor will preserve those relationships and lead the church in exploring additional avenues for coordinated service, worship, and fellowship.

We hope that the WAPC Pastor will lead the church into additional acts of service that arise not out of the yearly budget or calendar, but rather out of emerging circumstances that call for action. The WAPC response to the arrival of Afghan refugees at Camp Atterbury, part of a wider coordinated action, is a model for this type of work.

Based on what we know about our church and where we would like to be in the future, we value an individual who demonstrates exemplary communication skills, is grounded in their faith and the Reformed tradition, and is adept at leading the church in relevant change. A candidate should be a good listener, well-informed of the current social climate, well-organized, and adaptable. We would welcome a person of vision to support and walk alongside those members who introduce creative and innovative ideas to foster and sustain the vitality of the church. We hope to find a person with an engaging personality who embraces challenges and is capable of creative responses to those challenges. Ability to connect with young couples and attract young families to the church is critically important, along with a genuine drive to re-energize our once vibrant Christian Education program. Facility with modern technology is desirable. Musical talent is most welcome but not critical. Whether our new pastor is a musician or not, appreciation of the importance of quality music as part of our ministry is a highly desirable quality. An ability to connect with people, giving them a sense of welcome and personal empowerment while fostering deep connections to their personal faith and spiritual journey represents a more important quality than rigorous interpretation of theology. In sum, the gifts we seek in our new pastor are energy, empathy, creativity, and ability to rise to a challenge.

Our vision is to welcome and provide sanctuary to all who seek God’s love, encourage their spiritual growth, and equip them for acts of Christian witness and service in the community. WAPC has a strong tradition of providing space, funds, and other material support toward local mission. For example, even in lean times WAPC has maintained its financial support of local organizations such as the Youth Service Bureau, FISH (a food pantry and clothing closet), and Habitat for Humanity. WAPC provides meeting space for Alcoholics Anonymous, rents space affordably to a local counseling service, and owns two houses that rent at below-market rates to low-income families. The church helped coordinate the provision of relief supplies to Afghan refugees at Camp Atterbury. We aligned with five other churches to form the Crawfordsville Afghan Refugee Coalition which, working through Exodus Refugee International, formed a relationship with a refugee family that the church continues to support.

In recent times WAPC has leaned especially into the core Christian message that God’s love is for all, including and especially those who have been marginalized and rejected. That message has manifested, for example, in a more obvious and public posture of welcome to the LGBTQ+ community.

WAPC has regularly developed three-year vision plans with substantial participation of the congregation. With the recent retirement of our Pastor of 25 years, we see the church as ripe for its next vision study.

Address: 307 S Washington St, Crawfordsville, Indiana 47933-2849, US