GUILDERLAND — For the past seven years, Russ Craig has been a busy man.

The newly-ordained associate pastor of Christ Lutheran Church juggles two congregations over 80 miles apart, a full-time state job, and his family.
"I’m not really that busy," said Craig, 52, who has been studying part-time to become a pastor since 1999. "I think God gave me the ability to balance these things."

In December, Craig was ordained and installed at Christ Lutheran, on Western Avenue. His was the first ordination in the church’s 75-year history.

In its anniversary year, the aging congregation, of about 60 to 70 members, is making a push to reach out to the surrounding community, Craig said. It’s a community that’s changed a lot in 75 years, as the city of Albany has crept past the Guilderland border.
"This used to be a suburban church," Craig said. "This was the suburbs. Neighborhoods change."

Craig, now of Voorheesville, grew up in Rotterdam and graduated from Mohonasen High School in 1971. After college and a few years’ working for the state, Craig began studying for the Roman Catholic priesthood at St. Bernard’s Seminary in Rochester in 1977.

During the summer of 1978, Craig was assigned by his seminary to St. Thomas’s Church in Delmar. To make money, he went back to work with the state. There, he met his future wife, Carole.
"I found her. We fell in love and that was it," for seminary, Craig said.
Craig had no regrets about Catholic seminary. "It was one of those watershed life experiences," he said.

Still, he never expected to return to the ministry.

Finding a home

In 1985, the Craigs, with two children, moved to Delmar and began attending Bethlehem Lutheran Church, part of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, a denomination in which neither of the Craigs had grown up.
"We just found a home at BLC," Craig said. The large congregation in Bethlehem has many young families.

At Bethlehem, Craig gradually became more and more involved in ministry, first teaching Sunday school and Bible studies, and then spearheading the church’s Stephen Ministry lay care program. In 1997, he was commissioned as a deacon, Bethlehem’s first. In his duties as a deacon, he often helped out at churches that lacked a pastor, including Christ Lutheran Church and SonRise Lutheran Church, in Pottersville in the Adirondacks.
His training for the Stephen Ministry and to become a deacon "was just a lot of fun," Craig said. "Even before I finished it, it really wet my whistle and I wanted to learn more."
So, in 1999, Craig enrolled in a relatively new program offered by the synod, Distance Education Leading to Ordination (DELTO). For nearly seven years, Craig and his fellow students, whom he described as "experienced" men, met every other month at Concordia College in Westchester County. In between meetings, they completed courses on their own, guided by mentors.

In Craig’s case, his first mentor was Pastor Warren Winterhoff, now retired, of Bethlehem.
"He’ll always be ‘Pastor’ to me," Craig said.

The DELTO classes are exactly the same as those taken by full-time seminary students, Craig said.
"New ways"

Meanwhile, Craig continued his work as a policy data analyst with the New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance, and his involvement with Christ Lutheran and SonRise Lutheran increased. He became an expert at time management, he said.

With encouragement from his wife, Craig stuck to the rigorous program.
"She’s an important part," he said. "I would never have gotten through this without her."

Currently, Craig does most of his ministering at SonRise. Christ Lutheran is loaning him out to the small congregation until a new pastor arrives fresh from seminary this summer. Craig doesn’t mind making the 87-mile drive north every Sunday.
"I learned a lot that I can bring here," he said. "It’s been a really good experience for me and I hope to bring it to Christ Lutheran."

Christ Lutheran has a full-time pastor now, Kenneth Curry, who served as Craig’s mentor in the final years of his classes. When Craig finishes at SonRise, he will join Curry in helping the church to connect to the community.

He’s already gotten started with visits to church members and a campus ministry program at the nearby university.
"We’re going to be looking at new ways, other ways of bringing out the Gospel," Craig said.

It’s the people that Craig likes the most about being a pastor.
"I love getting to meet people. I love sharing God’s word with them," he said.

All his life experiences have brought him to Christ Lutheran, said Craig, who plans to retire from his state job at 55.
"I find myself tied to this place," he said. "I feel that maybe this is where God intended me to help."