For Pastor Phyllis Haynes, becoming a Lutheran pastor at the age of 41 was a series of firsts.

First, she needed to get over the idea that she was too shy to stand in front of people and preach. Then, when she enrolled in the Chicago-based Lutheran School of Theology seminary in 1991, she had to leave Brooklyn, NY, where she had lived her whole life. And as an intern minister—or baby minister as she calls it— on the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, it was the first time that she needed to drive.

With her placement at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Narrowsburg, NY in 1995, she accepted her first—and only—call to ministry.

The road to ministry was not preordained. 

Graduating from Hunter College in 1973, Phyllis earned a degree in education. She served as a teacher in the Bronx. She started to get a master’s—twice—in hearing and language-impaired education.

And then there was the AIDS crisis, which took precedence over everything.

“I knew about the crisis, and I had friends who volunteered with the Gay Men’s Health Clinic, so I asked, ‘Do you think I can volunteer?’  Her friend ran museum and brunch trips, and Phyllis started volunteering. 

A significant turning point came when she and other Lutherans started a meal program. “We were incensed, furious actually, that we knew people who were being kicked out of their churches or turned away from the communion table. And we said, ‘We can’t bring them communion, but we can eat with them.’”

After three years and launching five more meal sites, she was hired as a full-time site manager.

Becoming a pastor

Phyllis says that her journey from there to seminary came from chance meetings. 

“You meet people early,” she said. “I met some of the women in the early 1970s who were some of the earliest women who were going to seminary to become ordained.” While that intrigued her, she protested that she was too shy. “I can’t do that,” she told herself.

Years later, she realized that she could talk to and connect with strangers. “I was doing it with the museum trips,” she said. “And then when we had the meal program, there were clients who would talk to me rather than the social workers. They told me I ought to become a pastor.”

Again, she protested and said, “I’m too shy.” Her clients, she said, laughed in her face and said, “You’re not shy.”

“Eventually,” she said, “I started listening to people.” 

She became intrigued with the concept of a call and confided in a pastor friend. “How do you know you have a call?” 

With that, Phyllis told her friend about a dream.

“I’m driving down a road,” she began.

“But Phyllis, her friend interrupted, “you don’t drive.”

“I know that,” she said as she continued her story. “I am driving down a road, and there are a lot of detours.” 

“What kind of detours?” her friend asked. 

“The work I do at the church, the Gay Men’s Health Clinic, the meals,” she replied.

“What’s at the end of the road?” her friend asked.

“Me in a clerical collar,” she replied.

“That’s a call, Phyllis,” her friend replied simply.

With that, Phyllis contacted the bishop of her synod office, found out what she had to do, and applied to only one of the eight Lutheran seminaries in the country —the Lutheran School of Theology. She was accepted. She arrived in Chicago in August 1991.

And that’s when she had another experience of a deepening call. Living away from family, she became lonely. She said that she had decided to leave and was “having a little head chat with God.” She told God that she was going home. She didn’t know how she was going to get there, as she didn’t drive, and friends had driven her there. 

The conversation took place in the chapel. And at that moment in the service, the hymn that was played was “Here I am, Lord.”

The refrain is, “Here I am, Lord, it is I, Lord. I have heard you calling in the night. I will go, Lord, if you lead me. I will hold your people in my heart.” 

Phyllis made the connection. Heard, as some would say, “the Word of God.”

“So I said, ‘OK, you win. I’ll stay. At least until I flunk the languages.’  I always have to have the last word,” she added.

But Phyllis didn’t flunk the languages. In fact, she aced them. 

She did her internship in Ishpeming, MI. She learned to drive, passed the test on the first try, thought that was a good omen, and bought her first car.

After finishing her one-year internship, she returned for her final year of seminary and interviewed in Narrowsburg in October 1995.

Several new firsts

After 30 years, Phyllis retired from St. Paul’s Lutheran Church on January 31. 

Following surgery, chemotherapy and upcoming radiation treatments for uterine cancer, Phyllis is looking forward to retirement. “As an ordained minister, I can provide preaching services and will be available for weddings and funerals for non-churched people.” Until she finds new housing, she will remain in the parsonage, and the congregation is beginning the process to call a new pastor. As is customary in ministry, a retiring minister must distance themselves from the congregation so that both parties can move on, which Phyllis is adamant about. 

Her faith continues to guide her. “To be Christian,” she says, “you’re going to follow Jesus, love God, and love your neighbor. People forget how accepting Jesus was of all sorts of people. Not just people like him.”

She takes the attitude with her cancer that her faith will make her well and that what will be will be.

“God is with me,” she asserts. “God has sent a lot of people to help, especially amazing doctors, friends in my pathway, and people at the church.” 

She says that when she gets to heaven, she expects God to remind her of the many ways she was disappointing, but that she will be loved despite her flaws. “I always tell the congregation that we are going to be really surprised by who is in heaven. Because God chooses. We don’t choose. We are all God’s children.”

In the meantime, she’s enjoying being bald, speaking her mind, and looking forward to going to the eye doctor. “He hasn’t seen me like this; it ought to be fun.”

It’s another first.

For more photos and a short history of St. Paul’s Lutheran Church  click here.