Dear SFPC Siblings,

There is a two-word question I keep bumping into. Two little words, and somehow, they have a way of blowing the doors wide open every single time.

What if?

What if we kept becoming a community where people who are still figuring out their faith, or figuring it out all over again, could actually exhale here? What if talking about God, and doubt, and the weird holy wonder of it all, became as ordinary among us as talking about our kids or last night’s game? What if our giving was less about obligation and more about hope?

I will be totally honest with you; those are not hypotheticals for me. They are pretty close to why I’m still in ministry. And they are the heartbeat of the What If? stewardship series we’re stepping into together these next four weeks.

Here is what I want you to know. The Race to 160, our shared vision as we move toward Salem First Presbyterian Church’s 160th anniversary on May 15, 2029, is not a number on a report. It is not a budget target. It is a direction.

And that direction has a shape to it. Session has named three intentions for this stretch of the journey, and they belong together. The first is that SFPC continues to become a safe landing for spiritual seekers, a community where people who are questioning, rebuilding, or just starting to poke around at faith do not have to perform certainty to belong here. The second is that we continue to become a church where people talk about God, naturally, honestly, without that stiff and slightly apologetic posture churches have trained people to adopt. The third, which our staff is carrying, is to double the number of folx ages 25 to 50 who are actively engaged in the life of this community by 2029. Not because that demographic is more valuable than anyone else, but because they are the generation most likely to have been hurt by church somewhere along the way, and the generation whose kids are growing up right now deciding whether faith is worth anything. The May 15, 2029, anniversary is not an arbitrary finish line. It is the horizon we have chosen because 160 years of SFPC deserves a church that is not just surviving into its next chapter but genuinely alive in it. That is the promise we are making to each other, season by season to keep becoming a church worth being part of.

And this is where stewardship comes in, the gatherings, the ministries, the staff, the welcome, the building with the lights on, none of it just happens. When you give to Salem First Presbyterian Church, you are not just keeping an institution afloat. You are investing in a community that is, quietly and steadily, being shaped into something more open, more honest, and more alive.

I think we have been doing some remarkable things. Our Faith on Tap gatherings and our social media presence have brought in people who have not set foot in a church in years, and what they find here is a community that does not require them to have the answers. Our IMPACT ministries have planted us right in the middle of real need in our city. Our work with families is putting down roots that I think will matter for decades. None of that is accidental. That is the community you have been building, one ordinary, faithful decision at a time.

Over the next four weeks, we’re going to sit with What if? Together, in worship, in conversation, and in letters from our Stewardship Team, and I hope, in your own prayer. This is Stewardship Season, and when you are ready, I want to invite you to make a pledge, not with only your finances, but also your service, your prayer, and your talents, that reflects both your gratitude for what Salem First Presbyterian Church has meant to you and your hope for what it is still becoming.

I am genuinely grateful to be on this journey with you. All of it. The questions, the doubts, the moments of grace, and the occasional miracle of what this community does when we decide to show up together. It is because of my gratitude and commitment to this place, these people, and to the work of the Holy Spirit that my wife, Heidi, and I have decided to increase our pledge by 5% this year.

May it be so.

Rev. Dr. Greg Bolt, Pastor
greg@salemfpc.org