CHESTER AND HUBBELL, Neb. — Shortly after Pastor Brad Boyer and his wife welcome a new baby into their rural Nebraska family, Chaplain Brad Boyer of the Nebraska National Guard will leave his family to spend a year in Afghanistan.
Chaplain (1st Lt.) Boyer pastors two Missouri Synod Lutheran churches in tiny Nebraska towns on the civilian side of his life: Zion in Hubbell and St. John in Chester. Recently the congregation leaders in both churches were award the Nebraska Committee for Employer Support of the Guard and Reserve Patriot Award for their support and understanding of the military side of their pastor’s life.
Chaplain Boyer expressed his appreciation by nominating Zion chairman James Laverentz and St. John president Jay Jensen. Nebraska ESGR volunteer Area Chairman Alan Baldwin from Seward presented the plaques.
“I felt they deserved the award because they’ve very unselfishly shared me with a lot of people they do not know. Civilian pastors who are also Guardsmen or Reservists are especially valuable because we’re something like the equivalent of the CEO of the company (church),” he said.
The Chester and Hubbell congregations were without their “CEO” pastor about a quarter of 2009 (13 full weeks) while he completed military training.
“Churches are also not under the jurisdiction of ESGR,” Boyer pointed out in his award. “Unlike all other employers, they are under no obligation to guarantee employment to their clergy when they return from deployment.”
Boyer’s unit, the 402nd Military Police Battalion out of Omaha, is slated to deploy to Afghanistan from November 2010 until November 2011.
“Yes, that includes me,” he said. “Our specialty is internment and resettlement (I/R).” He said I/R units “are basically detention professionals. We make sure that detainees are kept safe, treated with dignity and respect, until their detention is over.
Boyer, a civilian pastor since 2003, a chaplain since January 2009 and a member of the 402nd since March 2009, has been married 19 years to his wife, Chie neé Kohara. They are parents to daughter Serendipity Grace, 3.
And there’s big news on the horizon. Another baby is “due just before I deploy.”
Boyer explained that he and others who minister in the military are universally referred to as ‘chaplain,’ regardless of rank. “We need to be equally accessible to everyone,” he said, from the lowest ranking private to the top general. “We’re also the only people in the military who can approach anybody up and down the ranks one-on-one without having to go through the chain of command.”
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Chaplain Boyer, James Laverentz, chairman of Zion Lutheran Church in Hubbell, and ESGR volunteer Alan Baldwin from Seward.
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Chaplain Boyer, Phillip Poppe, an elder at St. John Lutheran Church in Chester standing in for church president Jay Jensen who couldn’t be there, and ESGR volunteer Alan Baldwin from Seward.
ESGR volunteers provide free education, consultation and if necessary mediation for employers of Guard and Reserve personnel. Please contact Executive Director William Nelson at 402-309-7105 or email william.nelson1@us.army.mil for more information on ESGR Employer Outreach Programs and volunteer opportunities.