“Orange You Ordained?”

Knock knock.
Who’s there?
Orange.
Orange who?
Orange you ordained?

A dear friend was ordained into ministry on Sunday, August 2. Jennie and I watched the livestream of his ordination service at Heart of the Rockies Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Fort Collins, CO. HRCC is the congregation we were privileged to serve in an interim capacity from November 2024 to June 2025. We forged many friendships in Christ that will abide with us far longer than the eight months we were there. Nathan’s is one of them.

Nathan sought me out early in my ministry there and invited me for coffee “to get to know each other.” Suffice it to say we did that and more over the next months. As we expanded our coffee time to breakfasts and lunches, a trust and respect developed that in turn fostered an openness to transparency and vulnerability. In sum, we shared our stories and our souls, including our journeys of faith.

I’ll not tell Nathan’s story other than to say that our paths to ordination were very different – as different as our sexual orientation. I needn’t tell you that the Church’s (and churches’) receptivity to men like Nathan sensing God’s call on their lives is very different than what men like me experience.

I was received with open arms by the Tennessee Region of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in 1982 when I sensed a call to ministry and approached the Commission on Ministry to begin the three-year process that led to my ordination in 1985. Nathan, however, traversed a route to Sunday’s ordination that began decades ago. Sensing God’s call, he began ministry on the staff of the Assemblies of God tradition of his upbringing. But that was during the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” era. They didn’t ask and he didn’t tell. Which worked fine until, his soul convicted by God after a long period of anguished prayer to come out and tell the truth about who he was, he told…and was told to leave. Excommunicated. Nathan told me the harrowing, heartbreaking details. (Note: I am not violating a confidentiality by sharing this. Nathan tells his story openly and with an extraordinary humility and grace that is one of the fruits of his maturing in faith and a witness to his fitness for ordination.)

One of the blessings of Nathan and my friendship was doing ministry together at HRCC. In partnership with the Rev. Wendy Davidson, HRCC’s stellar Associate Pastor (I needn’t tell you women have their own stories to tell of their treks to ordination), we three planned and led worship together. I bounced sermon thoughts off Nathan and he did the same with me. Particularly enjoyable was co-teaching an adult Christian Education class about sharing our journeys of faith sincerely, honestly, and openly. Mind you, we weren’t talking about standing on street corners and shouting “Are you saved?” at passersby, cramming our beliefs down others’ throats, or foisting John 3:16 signs at the television camera at sporting events. Our desire was simply to provide a safe space in which others could tell and hear each others’ stories like Nathan and I had.

The first Sunday of our class, Nathan and I concocted a plan to break the ice and quell whatever anxiety attendees brought with them over the advertised prospect of “sharing their faith.” On a Sunday several weeks earlier as Nathan, Wendy, and I took our seats side-by-side on the front row, Nathan sported a bright orange shirt that, upon my seeing it, led to my opening my eyes wide in what must have appeared to be a comic book caricature of WHOA! accompanied by an exaggerated gasp, wide grin, and an arm around his shoulder. After a shared laugh, I composed myself for the Call to Worship.

A week later, Nathan sidled up next to me, placed a wrapped present at my side, winked, pivoted, and returned to his seat in the back of the sanctuary. During the prelude, I unwrapped the gift, opened the box, and saw my very own bright orange shirt glowing at me. I wasn’t fully composed when I stood up to begin the service and made sure not to make sustained eye contact with his grinning visage when I led the Call to Worship.

Had I been at Nathan’s ordination on Sunday along with everyone else, I know what I would have said and worn.

I would have said, “Nathan, my dear brother in Christ and now colleague in gospel ministry, I commend to you the question from the Presbyterian tradition that is asked of their candidates for ordination. I have always resonated with it and strived to fulfill each of its four-fold components in the forty-one years of my ordained ministry. I could write an essay on each one of them and their importance to a vital ministry. So, I ask you: Will you pray for and seek to serve the people with energy, intelligence, imagination, and love?”

That’s what I would have said at Nathan’s ordination.

As for what I would have worn, I think you and he can guess.