Pastor Pick to retire from Trinity Lutheran after 20 years

After 40 years of being a pastor, 20 of those with Trinity Lutheran Church, Pastor Wayne Pick has decided to retire.

After graduating from Concordia Lutheran College in Austin, Texas in 1973 with an A.A. Degree, he attended Concordia Senior College in Ft. Wayne, Indiana where he graduated with a B.S. Degree in 1975.

He then served as Vicar at St. Paul Lutheran Church in Williamsburg, Iowa from 1977 to 1978. In 1979 he completed a M. Div. Degree at Concordia Thological Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri. While a student at the seminary, he served Concordia Lutheran Church in Cottage Hills, Illinois as his field work congregation.

Pick was ordained in Trinity Lutheran Church in Waco, Texas on June 10, 1979.

When he was awaiting his placement with a church, Pick specified that he wanted an English-speaking congregation in a small town down south.

“I thought 100,000 people was a small town when I was growing up,” Pick said.

His first parish was St. John Lutheran Church in Wilcox, Nebraska, which Pick said had around 320 people. He served there from 1979 to 1983. 

While in the area, Pick married Deborah May Uden on Dec. 18, 1982. He was also a member of the Wilcox Lions Club, served on the Wilcox Planning Committee and was a volunteer firefighter and EMT.

From 1982 to 1983, he also served as Vacancy Pastor at Grace Lutheran Church in Franklin, Neb.

Pick’s second call was to St. Paul Lutheran Church in The Grove, Texas from 1983-1992. While there, he served as LYF Zone Counselor and LWML Zone Counselor. Pick was active in the Rotary Club of Temple, Texas and was a firefighter and EMT on The Grove Volunteer Fire Department.

While living in The Grove, Pick and his wife brought their two children into the world: John, who is now 36 and Sarah, now 34.

Deborah was not a fan of The Grove, and Pick described the area as being hot and having a lot of shale, cactus, rattlesnakes, copperheads, water moccasins, tarantulas, fire ants and more.

“You name it, every critter was there,” he said.

He recalled Deborah had told him, “You brought me to a godforsaken country.”

Pick said the Lord saw they had completed their journey in the area and they moved to El Dorado, Arkansas in 1992, where he served with Our Savior Lutheran Church until 2001.

He was the LWML Zone Counselor and Stuttgart Circuit Pastors’ Counselor. Pick also served in Vacancy Pastor positions at St. Paul Lutheran Church in Ruston, Louisiana from 1995 to 2001, and Faith Lutheran Church in Magnolia, Arkansas from 1999-2001.

Pick was active in the H.O.S.T.S. Mentor Math Program at Barton Middle School in El Dorado, was a Chaplain’s Assistant at the University Medical Center of South Arkansas and he was a member of the El Dorado Lions Club and S.I.G.H.T.

Trinity Lutheran Church

On Sept. 1, 2001, Wayne answered his fourth call, this time to Trinity Lutheran Church in Ogallala, Nebraska.

Unfortunately, one of the first major events he encountered in this position was the events of September 11, 2001. He said the congregation had wondered if the church was going to do anything regarding the tragedy.

Pick, along with Father Joe Steele and Pastor Robert Pierce, agreed to meet at the high school football field to hold a community service with scripture and prayer.

After that, Pick was able to settle in to the local community, which he has found he enjoys for a number of reasons.

Pick said he would describe the area as “romantic,” in a way, as it still contains bits of the Old West.

“You can go to Windlass Hill and see wagon ruts, and you have Chimney Rock and a few other landmarks,” he said, also noting that while there is still crime, it is “not in the abundance that a big city has.”

Grant, he feels, is a good place to raise children and live out one’s life.

Another benefit to moving to Nebraska, Pick said, was being closer to Deborah’s family. She had grown up in Hastings, so living in Nebraska made it easier for her to visit family.

Pick, Deborah and their two children all live together, with Deborah employed at Paks Developmental Care in Ogallala where she is the bookkeeper, John is employed at Safeway in Ogallala, and Sarah works at Hastings Memorial Library in Grant.

While living here, Pick has volunteered as a firefighter and EMT, though he could not continue his service with the fire department after knee surgery. He has also been a member, and even one time was the president, of the local rotary, and he has served as a City Councilman for the City of Grant.

After 20 years at Trinity, Pick’s last service will be Sunday, Dec. 26, but he will still be Trinity Lutheran’s pastor until midnight of the new year.

“It’s kind of interesting how my first major church service was Christmas when I started, and now Christmas will be the end of it,” he noted. “It’s going to end as it started. It’s full circle.”

The thing Pick said he would miss most about his position with the church is the congregation at Trinity Lutheran.

He described the church’s members as mission-minded and very supportive of one another. Pick also noted that the church has talent, whether it’s those who play the piano or organ during hymns, or the voices of members of the congregation that he can hear from the front of the room.

Pick also noted how when there is a situation such as a hospital call or a death, members of the congregation will jump in wondering what they can do to help out by serving a meal or volunteering in some way.

“I just can’t express the amount of mission-mindedness here,” he said. “Some families help support individually, some help in the offerings we have. It’s a combination of not being self-centered and being out here in the country.”

The church and the community itself, Pick added, is in general just a great place to be.

One thing Pick said he will not miss, however, is writing sermons. But he will always miss the people.

“The people make the church, and the people make the pastor,” he said.

Once retired, Pick said he would stay in the area and will likely be looking into a part time job or volunteer work in whatever form he can manage, though he can’t lift much because of his knees.

He said he has a good camera, so he might get into a photography hobby.

Pick hopes to return to the church as a visitor or to hear another person preach and teach once a new pastor has been installed.

Though he will miss being in the pulpit preaching and teaching Bible study, there is so much he still wants to do, “but I just don’t know where the good Lord is going to plug me in.”

After Jan. 1, the church will go into a vacancy, which Pick described as a sort of mourning the church does after a pastor departs. A new pastor will be decided upon at a later time, once someone is called to the position. Until then, Pastor Jon Dickmander of Brule will be the Vacancy Pastor at Trinity Lutheran.