Second year M.Div. student Stephanie Backus wants people to know that God will never leave nor forsake us, even if we leave or forsake God. She knows this from experience. Her call to ministry has sometimes felt like playing the children’s game of “hot or cold” and searching in the dark for the unknown thing that was missing.
“My story is a story about how God doesn’t ever leave,” she says. “My earliest memory of being called to be a disciple was when I was four or five. I looked up in the choir loft and saw Jesus. I can still see him in that moment as vividly now as I could then.”
From this early moment of awakening, Stephanie says she was very active in the church where she grew up in Missouri, from singing in the choir as early as third grade and participating in a Chrysalis weekend at age 16. Chrysalis, a United Methodist ministry of spiritual formation for teenagers, became something she stayed involved with through the rest of high school, and through which she initially sensed her call to ministry.
Cold, Cold . . .
She began to pursue that call, but after a traumatic event in college began to run away from church and ministry to pursue a career in journalism. “I was so angry,” she says. “I couldn’t understand how God could let this happen to someone or would have this happen to someone being called into ministry. And I didn’t have anyone shepherding me and guiding me in my faith to help me process it, so I ran. I ran for a long time.”
Getting Warmer . . .
As Stephanie’s journalism career took off, and later when she and her family moved to Pittsburgh, she always sensed something was lacking. Thinking what she missed was community, Stephanie began attending Faith UMC in Fox Chapel. There, she became involved in children’s ministry, the vision team, and as a liturgist in worship. Reconnecting with God was great, but something was still missing. She was getting closer, but still grasping at air.
Hot! Hot!
Then, in May 2021, Stephanie finally grabbed hold of what she’d been searching for. As one of her pastors read from Isaiah 6 about the prophet being called to serve God, then shared his own story of being called to ordained ministry, Stephanie realized that God had never stopped calling her to ministry. She had just stopped noticing.
But others at the church had noticed. As soon as she revealed to people that she felt called to ordained ministry, affirmation of that call was universal and enthusiastic. So Stephanie enrolled at PTS in fall 2021, where she quickly became an excellent student and valued member of the Seminary’s worship team.
“At every step of the way, anything I put in the path, any boulder that I put there, God has removed. I thought, ‘I’m still going to work full time, and probably go to school part time.’ And here I am in my second year, full time at PTS and working full time. I thought, ‘Okay, I can’t do this if I don’t get any scholarship money.’ But that first year I got a scholarship from PTS, and this year I got a scholarship from the United Methodist General Board of Higher Education and Ministry on top of that. All of the artificial stones that I threw in front of me, God was like, ‘Do you really think that I can’t move that?’”
What’s Next?
Her employer and family have been gracious in allowing her the space to juggle school and work, and the class schedules have allowed it. Even with starting as a part-time student, Stephanie is on track to graduate in May 2024. Asked about her plans following graduation, Stephanie is confident that God is calling her into pulpit ministry. But she also loves academic research and has not ruled out continuing in a doctorate program in New Testament studies.
Wherever her call leads, she intends to make sure everyone feels welcomed and included by God. She says, “For many people, church trauma is their trauma. In my heart, I’ve always been a healer. I feel that and want to make it better. I can’t make people’s experiences go away, but what I can do is demonstrate Christ’s hospitality and make sure everyone who is there has a place at the table.”
More than anything, Stephanie wants to be the type of spiritual leader she never had. When others are experiencing trauma or its aftermath, she feels called to guide and shepherd them to the warmth and healing that only Christ can provide.