DEBORAH CORRAO / L’Observateur / July 10, 1999

Larry Juergensen was a serious young student at Luther Seminary in St.

Paul, Minn., when he chanced upon the quote: “God made the world for thefun of it.”He admits he initially was confused about what it meant, then he realized God wants us to have fun in this world. Since then the slogan has becomethe catchword of his 30-year ministry.

Tomorrow Juergensen, 55, is preaching his last sermon at Lutheran Church of the Galilean in LaPlace where he has served his flock of 100 or so members for the past three years.

“I believe I brought joy and peace – two fruits of the spirit – to this congregation,” says Juergensen, pointing to side-by-side bulletin boards in the church lobby where his favorite phrase headlines a collage of upcoming church activities.

Under his pastorship, churchgoers have been treated to an Elvis impersonator, a Hawaiian luau and lots of fellowship that he says is intended to be just plain fun.

“When I first got here I discovered that no one in our congregation had been on a swamp tour even though they had all lived in the area,” he recalls. “I organized a tour with Cajun Pride Swamp Tours for the wholecongregation.”On the tour he asked the guide if he could feed an alligator with a piece of meat but pulled his hand away at the last second out of fear of the hungry reptile.

“Finally I asked the guide to hold my hand,” he says. “‘I’ll put my trust inyou,’ I told him. He held my hand and told me when to let go of the meat.”Juergensen wasn’t always so trusting. As a matter of fact, whileattending St. Olaf College as a bio-chemistry major, he began to haveserious doubts about the nature of God and even his very existence.

But, he says, several coincidences occurred during that period that not only turned his doubt into faith but redirected his career path.

He enrolled in college with the goal of attending medical school despite strong leanings toward the work of the church.

“I chose St. Olaf because it was known for preparing doctors as well asministers,” says the Minnesota native. “I just never felt reverent enoughor smart enough to be a pastor.”It was in his sophomore year that his doubts began to surface.

He shared those doubts with his mother on a trip home from school.

“I told her I didn’t know if I believed in God,” he says. “She answered, ‘Ithink you’ll make it through that phase.'”Still reeling from the sting of his mother’s description of his confusion as a phase, he got the opportunity to hear the German theologian Paul Tillich speak at St. Olaf.Juergensen had read much of Tillich’s work but found new inspiration in words the theologian spoke during the lecture that Juergensen had not come across in his reading.

Tillich said, “Living faith is overcoming doubt.”That’s when something clicked for the young student.

“Maybe I don’t only have faith,” he remembers telling himself after hearing the words, “maybe I have real living faith.”That faith was reinforced by an encounter with a senior student to whom he confessed his doubts about his spiritual life.

“He asked if I had prayed about it and if it would be OK if he prayed with me,” says Juergensen. “It was the first time someone had prayed out loudwith me and for me. It was a moving spiritual experience for me.”Those events led to a promise.

“I’m going to be a pastor as long as there’s a church who wants me to be its pastor,” he vowed.

A couple of years later, a degree in philosophy of religion in hand, he enrolled at Luther Seminary, where he graduated in 1969. While aseminarian he put his trust once again in the Lord and a visiting pastor resulting in another radical life change.

The pastor, from a large church in Minneapolis, was known as “Mr. Cupid”among seminary students for his penchant for matchmaking – fixing up those students with eligible young women from his parish. He was atLuther Seminary to lead a clinical pastoral education course.

“I promised him I would take his course if he would find my future wife,” says Juergensen. “He introduced me to Ilona, who was a nursing studentthen, and the rest is history.”The couple married the year after his graduation. Juergensen was ordainedin his hometown fulfilling the predictions of his second-grade Sunday School teacher, who reminded him at the ordination ceremonies that she had always thought he would become a minister.

Larry and Ilona Juergensen have three children from their marriage: Patrick, 25, who lives in Fargo, N.D.; Kaj, 24, a shift manager at KentuckyFried Chicken in LaPlace; and 17-year-old Karl, who will be a high school senior in the fall.

Karl is the only son who will accompany the Juergensens Tuesday when they depart LaPlace for Sun City, Ariz., where Juergensen has accepted acall from the 1,600-member congregation of the American Lutheran to be an associate pastor in charge of outreach.

Juergensen says even his new life in the Phoenix suburb came about as a result of a sequence of coincidences and miracles.

He put out feelers for a new pastorate when the LaPlace church was extended as a mission church for another three years. At the time, churchauthorities decided to fill the pastorship with someone who specialized in church redevelopment. Juergensen was offered the opportunity to train inthat capacity and stay on as pastor but felt it was not what God was leading him to do at that time.

After interviews and invitations from a church in Texas and one in Minnesota, he was on the verge of accepting the pastorship in Texas when he unexpectedly received a phone call from the head pastor at the American Lutheran Church. It seems Juergensen’s sister-in-law, a realtorin the Phoenix area, had run into the wife of the head pastor one Sunday afternoon while the latter was house-hunting. Juergensen’s sister-in-lawmentioned during the conversation that her brother-in-law was looking for a new pastorate.

After a short phone interview, faxed exchanges of Juergensen’s profile and the church’s job description, he flew to Phoenix for the interview that would quickly lead to a call.

The Juergensens have strong family ties to the Phoenix area. LarryJuergensen’s grandparents and parents, now deceased, retired in Arizona.

Two brothers and a sister live there along with nieces and nephews.

“Ilona and I actually began our married life out there,” he says. “That’swhere we enjoyed our honeymoon. We have pictures of the two of us ridinghorses out in the desert with the sunset in the background.”Juergensen says he plans to retire in Arizona when the time comes, but he is not quite ready to fade into the sunset.

Instead, he hopes to add a sense of joy and adventure to his new ministry in one of the fastest growing areas of the nation.

“Evangelism is a challenge,” he says. “The hardest part of my job isaccepting Jesus’ parable of the sower. You sow the same seeds but you getdifferent results. You hope everyone will respond to your message, butonly a certain percentage do.”Juergensen says his mentor reminds him of the parable when he gets depressed, saying that Jesus was aware when he told the parable that some will say “amen” and some will say “no thanks.”Juergensen has not yet begun packing his personal memorabilia in his LaPlace office. Besides the hundreds of books filling the floor-to-ceilingshelves along two walls of his office, he must also pack up a whimsical collection of stuffed animals and statuettes that occupy odd spots around the room.

Near his desk, atop a file cabinet, a stuffed lion and lamb lie together, signifying, Juergensen says, the prophet Isaiah’s vision of the peaceable kingdom.

Next door three stuffed gorillas, each holding a peeled banana, serve as souvenirs of a recent “let’s go bananas for the Lord” campaign.

And finally, there’s a sizeable collection of penguins.

The collection began with a gift from a former secretary because of his love of a tiny book called “The Penguin Principles.””Being a minister is like being a penguin,” Juergensen says, laughing. “It’sat times dignified and ridiculous. The task is glorious, but we ministersare sometimes laughable.”He plans to use a couple of the penguins as props during his farewell sermon Sunday.

“That day will be filled with mixed emotions of both great joy and much sadness,” he says. As I look forward to the future I’m overflowing withgreat joy! The church and its ministry to which God has called me looks so exciting.”On the other hand, Juergensen says, he will miss the members of the LaPlace church.

“These people are beautiful Christians who have fun serving the Lord,” he says. “The church is filled with people who love the Lord and their church. They give generously of their time, talents and financial resources.”After church Sunday his congregation will honor him and his family with a farewell potluck dinner and, as he reflects on the sun setting on his ministry at Lutheran Church of the Galilean, he expects much sadness as he says good-bye.

“God’s love is abounding here,” he says. “It is hard to say good-bye to avery dear part of our family, who are brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus.”

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