RUMFORD — Carol Stevens felt she had been called for years to do something in God’s service. She wasn’t sure what it would be, but after a series of mission projects and discussions with her local Methodist pastors, she changed one form of a healing vocation into another.

The former 30-year lab technician earned her master’s degree in divinity from Bangor Theological Seminary in 2005.

She began her ministry at Virgin Memorial Chapel, Rumford, the Bethel United Methodist Church and the Rumford Center Methodist Church on July 1.

She came to the River Valley area from her first ministerial assignment at the Boothbay Harbor Methodist Church.

“It is like coming home,” she said of her new assignment. “I loved it in Boothbay, but here I’m closer to some of my good friends.”

Stevens, 62, began feeling the call while she was an active member of the Wilton United Methodist Church in the 1990s.

“I had a burning desire to do some kind of mission work,” she said. “God had been calling for a long time, but I didn’t know what I was called to do.”

That desire, together with a mission project that had been supported by the Wilton church, and the encouragement of a former pastor at that church, led her to travel to Redbird Missions in Beverly, Ky. She worked on three separate projects in the late 1990s during her vacations from her regular job as a lab tech at Franklin Memorial Hospital in Farmington.

Although the experiences were very fulfilling, she decided she wanted to continue her mission work closer to home because her children were still growing up and she had the responsibility of caring for her ailing mother.

She continued her path toward the ministry by taking a course in chaplaincy, and learned that the pastorate was what she wanted. It would be the best place to use her skills, she thought.

“When I took the chaplaincy course, I felt it was a whole different aspect of healing. I like watching people grow in their faith. It’s different with each person. They discover gifts they have and use them,” she said.

She has taught lay leadership courses where she has seen people grow in both their ability to preach and to lead their respective churches.

Now, she is getting to know her three congregations. As a pastor of three churches, she must juggle numerous hours and duties.

She preaches at 11 a.m. each Sunday at Virgin Memorial Chapel, at 9 a.m. three Sundays a month at the Bethel church, and at 9 a.m. once a month at the Rumford Center church.

She hopes to join the Rumford Association for the Advancement of the Performing Arts, and is working to bring back some gardening space at the parsonage on Franklin Street in Rumford.

Stevens has three adult children and two grandchildren.

She may be reached at the Rumford parsonage at 364-8703.

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