FAYETTEVILLE – From the moment he bowed his head on a college campus and fully committed himself to God, the Rev. Dennis Beaver has never looked back.
“I told him, ‘If you let me know you are real, I would give my life to you because I would owe my life to you.’ And this is from someone who never, ever could have imagined himself as a pastor,’” noted Beaver, of Fayetteville, who recently retired after serving 16 years as senior pastor at Evangelical Lutheran Church in Waynesboro and 40 years in the ministry.
During his senior year at Bloomsburg University, Beaver said he decided not to pursue a career in business, his major. “Two weeks later, while I was studying, my roommate came in and said ‘Why don’t you be a pastor?’ I looked at him and said ‘Why did you say that?’ He said ‘I have no idea.’
“When I look back at what happened, I realize God started putting the pieces together a long time before that,” offered Beaver, who grew up Lutheran in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania. He is the son of Walter Beaver of Lewisburg and the late Jean Beaver.
“I always questioned whether God existed. We went to church every week, but I found the music and church service incredibly boring. If somebody didn’t get my attention … I wanted to be fishing or playing sports, just be outside … I definitely would have been diagnosed with ADHD (Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder).
“Between my junior and senior year of college, I started to feel that God was going to use me somehow in my life even though I didn’t believe. I thought, ‘If there is a God and he calls me because I’m in business, I could use my position in a company to get people help – whatever they needed.’”
Beaver said he was very shy and knew he had to learn to come out of his shell to be a good business leader. “I minored in psychology, realizing those classes would help me to better understand people.”
All those experiences led to that pivotal moment at Bloomsburg, Beaver believes.
“If you truly come to believe that God is who he says he is and that he has shown his love for us in Jesus as our savior, how could you respond except to give your life back to him,” Beaver said.
Beaver said his wife, Linda, who he met at Bloomsburg, “has been with me every step of the way. She is ‘the wind beneath my wings.’ We attended mass together. She was Roman Catholic. I questioned Linda about why she had faith, and she really didn’t answer me, just to say, she always did.
“When I told her God was calling me to be a pastor, she didn’t flinch. I thought she would drop over laughing or dead or say, ‘Did you lose your mind?’ No one who knew me ever thought I would be a pastor. But she said she was not surprised and that ever since she was a little girl, she believed God was going to use her in some way, not as a nun but as a pastor’s wife.”
Beaver, who has a master of divinity degree from Gettysburg Seminary, began attending classes there after graduating from Bloomsburg in 1982. “I committed my life to God and said you’ve done what I asked, now mold me, bend me, shape me to be the best pastor I could ever be.” Seminary is two years of classwork, a one-year internship and then one more year for more classwork, he added. The second year of his classwork led him to Washington, D.C., where, after growing up in a small town, he wanted to immerse himself in the city culture.
He and Linda married in 1984 following her graduation with a degree in medical technology.
Beaver’s internship was at St. Michael Lutheran Church in Canton, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit. After graduating from seminary in 1986, he got his first call, St. James Lutheran Church in Columbia, Pennsylvania, where he served three years. The couple welcomed son, Joshua, in 1987 and daughter, Bethany, in 1989. They also have two grandchildren.
“Then St. Michael called and wanted me to come back as pastor of integration. They were getting 100 new members a year, but 100 were slipping out the back door. My job was to help retain people,” Beaver said.
After two years in Canton, the Beavers moved to Mifflinburg, where he served as pastor of First Evangelical Lutheran Church for 18 years. “We averaged close to 300 in worship. We were extremely active, and I had to oversee everything to some degree. We had a lot of tragedies in the church and the community that I ministered to.”
The year Bethany graduated from high school and headed to West Chester University, the couple were more open to a new call, according to Beaver. “Before we filed the mobility papers, Linda and I began praying, If you want us to go somewhere else …
“I’m passionate about small groups and teaching and was willing to go to a smaller church. Then I got the call about whether I’d be interested in taking the call as lead pastor at ELC. The town was in transition and the church was having problems, but we felt at peace that God wanted us to come here and we did.”
There was a lot of hurt in the church, Beaver added, “so we worked on healing. When churches start to struggle and lose members, there tends to be almost a sense of negative culture. It was important to have a culture change, to be in a loving relationship with God and each other that is vibrant and alive. That change comes from making sure people understand who God is and wants with us and finding joy in that relationship and sharing that with others.
“In my mind God breathed life into this church and made it vibrant again. It wasn’t just because we came here. God’s holy spirit was truly moving in this church.”
Beaver said he chose to retire while he still has a passion for ministry, and the couple hope to volunteer at churches teaching and working with small groups. “We also want to volunteer more in the community, especially hands-on.
“In two of the churches I’ve served, God brought us to help change the culture. It’s truly been amazing to witness what God is able to do when people open their hearts to him, in church and in their lives. When that happens, to have witnessed that, it’s almost beyond belief … so beautiful.”
