BACK in 1990, when Joani and I moved here to Gilroy to start the Foothills Church, we were pretty much all there was. Joani and I did everything in the church. I worked in the office during the week preparing the sermon, cleaning our meeting area, running off copies of my message on a borrowed copier and writing the monthly letter. Joani worked from home preparing for Kids Church. We were the worship team, youth pastors; she was children's pastor, and I did all the mailing and banking. It was hard work, but we were young and I was dumb so we didn't know how good life could be.
AFTER a couple of years of grinding, God had mercy on me, or mercy on the church, and so He sent us Sue Orlandi, a neighbor of ours who started coming to the Foothills. She asked if she could help with the church books and sort of be a like a treasurer. I said "like", yes, I likey. And so, Sue has worked at our church for the past 30 years. She does all our records, keeps everything accounted for, and has saved our bacon more times than I can count. Sue also does some maintenance at the church and handles most things with our facilities. Anyone who has done any repairs at The Foothills has met and coordinated with Sue.
LORI Balog and her family started attending our church for about 3 years before she joined our staff in 2007. In a somewhat miraculous way, God sent her to us as our administrator. Lori handles staff issues, volunteer needs, scheduling, and also serves as our Church Council secretary. She is involved in most every big decision at the Church.
PASTOR David was hired in June of 2016 as our worship leader. Man what a difficult position to hire at a church. But David, for the past six years, has been such a blessing to our church. And now, he, along with Shanna Korjenek have taken over as our youth pastors. David also works with the media side of things and is an excellent assistant pastor, preacher and teacher.
SPEAKING of Shanna, she and her husband Greg, along with their two kids, started attending The Foothills in 2011. In spring of 2018 we were looking to hire some help for Rachel Ratliff in the children's department and Shanna came to mind. Shanna has done such a terrific job serving as our Children's pastor these past years. As I said earlier, Shanna also helps to serve in the Youth Department.
MELISSA Simpson started working at the church in 2021, 13 years after she and her family started attending. Melissa pretty much assists everyone at the church, kind of like a Swiss Army Knife. Recently, her eldest son, Zack, has joined our staff as an intern. Haley Alger has also just recently joined our staff as an intern as well. Hayley and Zack do a little bit of everything here at The Foothills.
OUR most recent hire is a long time member of the Foothills. Kassi started attending with her parents as a teenager. Now you can see Kassi all over the church as our Social Media Director and helping with whatever else is needed.
WHO, might you ask, is our church janitor? All of us - we all pitch in to do whatever is needed to clean the Church and get her ready for the next service. As for myself, the Senior Pastor, my job is to just keep being awesome - a full time job!
THANK you Lord Jesus for our terrific staff and all they do to serve your Kingdom - the seen and unseen things!
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