ABCNJ Staff Transition

After two years of serving as a full-time Associate Regional Pastor for The American Baptist Churches of New Jersey, the Rev. Dr. Carol L. Patterson has accepted a call to serve as the Associate Pastor of Faith Formation and Discipleship at her home church, First Baptist Church of Lincoln Gardens, where Dr. Dante Quick serves as Senior Pastor.

Dr. Patterson began her journey with ABCNJ in October 2019. While serving as an Associate Regional Pastor, she has shared her teaching gifts by providing the 2020 Lenten Devotional, presenting the webinar, “No Schism in the Body,” at our 2020 Annual Session, serving as a 2021 Summer Camp teacher, and offering various online workshops to our ABCNJ churches. She has also served our ABCNJ churches during their pastoral search process. 

Carol has served well in sharing the mission of ABCNJ. One of the ways Carol carried out the mission of ABCNJ was by sharing her passion for partnering with pastors and people to equip faithful, healthy, and loving congregations for the work of helping their communities reflect the kin-dom of God by respecting and advocating for their neighbors in need. Carol has been an integral part of the ABCNJ ministry team, and her contributions, commitment, and dedication will be greatly missed.

Rev. Miriam Méndez, ABCNJ Executive Minister and Senior Regional Pastor, states, “We are grateful for the ministry gifts Carol has brought to the region in her short tenure with us. Carol, we bless you and ‘thank God every time we remember you... we pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.’ (Philippians 1:3-6) We also bless the First Baptist Church of Lincoln Gardens, one of our ABCNJ churches, in this new partnership.”

Carol’s official last day as staff of ABCNJ will be April 21, 2022.