Finding his true calling

KARL PEARSON
Star Beacon

June 03, 2008 05:25 am

— DORSET TOWNSHIP — For parts of five decades, Ed Pickard toiled in various athletic fields around the area, either as a boys basketball or golf coach or a softball coach at Jefferson High School.
But the 66-year-old Pickard has never been happier than the work he has taken on full-time over the past three years, working in a field that is even more challenging,. Over those five decades, he had heard a still, small voice in his ear calling him to the full-time ministry, but he finally yielded to God’s call, or the tugging at his heartstrings, in the spring of 2005 when he answered the call of the Dorset Baptist Church for the second time in his life. He has come to realize that was truly his calling all along.
Pickard is not a very demonstrative man, speaking in a quiet voice and rarely laughing, although he has a slight smile almost always tugging at his lips. But it is clear he is completely content trying to seek and save the lost in the tiny church in the small community surrounding Route 193 in central Ashtabula County.
When he and his wife of 44 years, Jerie Leigh, agreed to take over the pastorate, the church was barely hanging on, numbering roughly 10 members. But a new sense of vitality has poured back through the doors since the Pickards agreed to take on the task.
“We usually run between 30 and 40 people a Sunday now,” Pickard said with that slight smile. “These are very faithful people. Things are happening here among people who need Jesus.
“We baptized seven people out at Camp Koinonia (the American Baptist camp in Harpersfield Township that serves churches in Ashtabula, Lake, Geauga, Trumbull and Summit counties) last summer. We also completed a remodeling project that cost between $25,000 and $27,000 that has brought the whole building together as one unit.”
Not that Pickard is satisfied with stopping there. He knows there is much work to be done in the field in which in he now labors.
“There are 900 people living in Dorset Township and 700-800 are unchurched,” he said. “There’s still a lot of work to be done. We live in a mobile society where people want to be where things are happening, so it’s difficult, but we’ll keep on working.”
It may seem the truths Pickard tried to communicate to those he worked with from 1964-2003 at Jefferson High School and those he uses with his congregation now are at polar opposites, but he has found they are much the same. The athletes he coached at Jefferson or the students he taught in roles such as advisor for the J-Hi Life school newspaper, in the many English classes he instructed at Jefferson from 1965-1996 or the students and teachers he tried to assist in another seven years as the computer technology coordinator at the school before his complete retirement from the school needed the same elements his flock needs now.
“Being a coach was like being the pastor of a church,” he said. “In athletics, you’re trying to teach the boys or girls you are working with to be as good a player as they can possibly be and how to work together as a team. In the church, you’re trying to teach the people to try and grow as much spiritually as they possibly can, to try to be the best witness for Christ they can possibly be and how to work together as a congregation.”
He believes all Christians have their own unique ministry.
“I believe we’re all called to the ministry,” Pickard said. “The pastor isn’t the only one called. We’re all called to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength.”

Not the plan
It certainly wasn’t Pickard’s plan to become a minister when he began his college education after graduation from Ashtabula High School in 1960, even though he attended Eastern Baptist College (now Eastern University) in the Philadelphia area, a training ground for many ministers in the American Baptist Church. If anything, his goal was to become a teacher and get into coaching.
“I always wanted to be a teacher first,” he said. “I wish I knew why.”
Perhaps it was the influence of a couple teachers he encountered before he ever got to Ashtabula High School.
“I have very fond memories of my third-grade teacher, Miss Linnea Stone,” Pickard said. “Then, in seventh grade, I had Miss Eileen Watrous. I think they probably influenced me the most.”
One might have thought two legendary Ashtabula High School teachers and coaches, basketball coach Bob Ball and football coach George “Chic” Guarnieri, would have influenced him, too. He had both in class, benefiting from Ball’s excellent tutelage in English and Guarnieri’s well-documented instruction in history.
They did, in their own way. In fact, Guarnieri had some sound advice for Pickard just as he was about to set out on his teaching career at Jefferson.
“I bumped into Mr. Guarnieri after I graduated and he found out I was starting at Jefferson,” he said. “He told me, ‘Keep your mouth closed and your eyes open.’”
Ball’s influence was more profound in Pickard’s goal to become a coach.
“I really wanted to become a basketball coach,” he said. “I had played junior high basketball, but I never played in high school because I had a job working at Carlisle’s (Ashtabula department store). I was always impressed by Mr. Ball.”
It probably wasn’t really Pickard’s goal to become an English teacher, either.
“Math had been my best subject in high school,” he said.
But, Pickard’s goals were nearly scuttled before they ever really got going.
“I graduated in the top 10 percent of my class at Ashtabula, and there were 221 seniors, but I had never really developed good study habits. I actually played college basketball for the first half of my freshman year at Eastern, but I got on academic probation. I almost flunked out.”
With a good deal of assistance, Pickard honed his study skills and managed to work his way into good graces academically and earn his degree from Eastern in June, 1964. A week later, he and the former Jerie Leigh Whittaker, whom he had dated since they were in the ninth grade, were married June 13, 1964.
“I started dating Jerie Leigh (daughter of the late Dick and Jerie Whittaker) in 1956, the year I accepted Christ as my Savior,” he said.
Pickard would go on to earn his masters degree from Edinboro State Teachers College (now Edinboro University) in 1968, capped by a six-week class at Michigan State.
Throughout his life, Pickard has become ever more convinced that God has guided him every step of the way, placing people in his path who have made everything in the life of he and his family possible. That’s includes his teaching job at Jefferson.
“(Renowned Ashtabula County physician) Dr. (Harold) Franley was president of the Jefferson school board at the time and had a number of friends on the faculty at Eastern,” the son of the late Ed Sr. and Doris Pickard, said. “Jerie Leigh was working as a nurse’s aide at Ashtabula General and she happened to be working there when Dr. Franley was at the hospital delivering a baby. They had some time to talk, and she said we were going to be married soon and I was looking for a teaching job.
“Dr. Franley sent me an application and I filled it out. I came back on spring break and was interviewed and got the job. I have been fortunate to get a lot of things I never deserved, ”
Franley also helped the young couple get settled in their first home on South Chestnut Street in Jefferson Village.
“On top of everything, Dr. Franley helped us get our first apartment (near his office),” Pickard said. “We lived there until we had first child (son Mark, who was born on Nov. 16, 1967) and we moved into the house we’re in now (in Jefferson Township) for 40 years.”
The Pickards’ daughter, Lisa, was born Dec. 21, 1968 after they had moved into their new home.
Pickard has remained friends through the years with the Franley family, particularly Hal Franley, a dentist in Jefferson.
“Hal’s always been my dentist,” he said.

On the job
It didn’t take long for the Jefferson administration to tap into Pickard’s desire to get into coaching. His first coaching job was in his first passion, basketball.
“I started coaching basketball in 1965 when Bob Ashba was the head coach,” he said. “I did that through 1967.”
But the demands of being a young teacher, husband and father convinced him to scale back at bit, dropping the coaching assignment. At the same time, learning of his background from Eastern, the congregation of Dorset Baptist Church invited him to serve as interim pastor, then chose him as its full-time pastor in September, 1964, a post in which he remained until December, 1967, shortly after Mark was born.
Apparently, other people had a better idea of the direction Pickard’s life was to take. There’s also the notion he had to learn the ropes of being a minister since he was still in his early 20s.
“Professor (John) Thomas (who had been the pastor at First Baptist, Ashtabula from 1946-51), had gone off to Eastern to be the dean of men and a professor of education there, but I’d become friends with his son, Johnny, who was my age,” Pickard said. “I had spent a week at Eastern with them one summer and that had helped me make my college choice.
“When I was at Eastern, Professor Thomas told me I should go into the ministry. Then I got the call from the people in Dorset in the summer of 1964. They were good people. I know my sermons weren’t very good then. I’m not sure why they hired me.
“I honestly have to say, I believe God allows us to make choices,” Pickard said. “Maybe He was calling me into the ministry, but I just didn’t answer. At that time, though, I think I realized I couldn’t do all I was doing and do any of them well. I always felt it was difficult to be a good teacher and a good coach.”
Pickard scaled back, but still did interim pastoral work at First Baptist, Jefferson, First Baptist Church of Perry and Lakeside Baptist Church in Painesville Township, among others, over the next seven or eight years.
It’s quite apparent Pickard has a boundless supply of energy. He may have set basketball coaching aside, but he turned to a new coaching assignment — boys golf — which he turned to in an era when golf was still a spring sport. It was a great decision because it was at a time when the Falcons were one of the area’s best teams, keeping the job through 1977.
“We had some teams with excellent golfers back then,” he said. “We were in the NEC at that time, though, and were always getting beat by Harbor, which had golfers like Todd Crandall. We did win the NEC Tournament one year.
“We won more than 100 matches during my 11 years with the golf team. We went to the district three years and we won the (Grand River Conference) four years in a row when we switched to that conference. (The late) Larry Daniels was my assistant and helped develop some excellent teams.”
To top it off, Pickard took on the job of the J-Hi Life school newspaper in 1971 and coordinated it until his retirement from the classroom in 1996.
The switch of golf to the fall ended his career in that sport.
“While it was in the spring, I could do it,” Pickard said. “When they went to the fall (in 1977), I couldn’t.”

Scratching an itch
Pickard was out of coaching for four years, but was feeling the urge to get back into it the whole time. The answer to that urge came in 1981.
“I had always loved baseball and softball,” he said. “I had played softball in church league when it was really big around here. I also had worked with Lou Tenney, one of the best pitchers around here, when I worked for my father-in-law at Ashtabula Auto Parts. I learned a lot from him about pitching. Coaching fastpitch softball always appealed more to me than coaching baseball.”
Because he was on the teaching staff at Jefferson, Pickard was given the softball job, replacing Helen Ferraro, who was not a teacher.
Pickard was the beneficiary of a lot of the talent Ferraro and her capable assistant, the late Sylvia McCormack, developed in the high school program and in their work with Jefferson Area Girls Softball. The Falcons more than held their own in his 16-year career in first the GRC, then the NEC, at a time when many of the teams in both conferences were highly competitive.
Although he kept voluminous records of his time with the Falcons, Pickard doesn’t focus on wins and losses, although a survey of those records show his teams compiled a 276-119 (.699 winning percentage) during his career. That included three GRC titles, two NEC championships, four sectional championships and one district title. The Falcons also made it to the regional championship game in 1991, losing on a very controversial 4-3 decision to eventual state champion Akron Hoban, which was undefeated that year.
The thing that made the impression on Pickard was the people with whom he worked.
“All of life is about relationships,” he said. “It’s that way in teaching and athletics, and it definitely is in the church.
“I remember all the players, assistant coaches, umpires and even opposing players and coaches. One of the best relationships I had was with Joe Kalinsky, who worked so hard to keep our fields in such wonderful shape.
“I remember the people more than the games,” Pickard said. “I was fortunate to work with great people like Kathie Watts, who was an assistant coach, and Ron Garvey, who was a volunteer coach.”
At the same time, Pickard always coached his teams to play their best.
“We always played and I always coached to win,” he said. “It really turned into fun the last six or seven years. We went to places like the Akron Tournament and Eden, N.Y., which was a lot of fun.”
But the emphasis was always on one thing — fun.
“We won a lot of games, but I used to tell the girls that’s not why they’re there,” Pickard said. “I used to tell them, ‘If you’re here and your parents are pressuring you to be here, tell me and I’ll find a way to cut you. If it’s not fun, you shouldn’t have to be here.’”
Pickard never tried to make verbal statements about his faith to his players or those with whom he worked. Instead, he emphasized being exemplary in his conduct.
“I believe you don’t have to be a full-time Christian worker to be a full-time Christian at work,” he said. “As a coach, I never tried to overtly coach Christianity to any of the boys or girls I coached. Sometimes, I’ve wondered about never teaching it overtly.
“Over the years, I had to deal with difficult parents. I even had to deal with difficult Christian parents. I also had a lot of parents who told me they were glad to have a Christian teacher in the public schools.”
By the time 1996 rolled around, Pickard had pretty much had it as a classroom teacher.
“When I left the classroom, if I’d had to grade one more essay, I’d have gone crazy,” he said. “The kids were fine. I was just sick of grading papers. I didn’t feel God leading me to leave the classroom.”
But he found an outlet to remain in education, taking over the job as technical coordinator in charge of getting the high school on board with computer technology. That also allowed avenues to continue working with the softball program.
“I volunteered a couple years working with Amy Shelatz,” Pickard said. “I also worked with (current Jefferson coach) Paul (Bodnar) for a couple years. But it’s nice to be outside the sport now.”
“I had no problem retiring from the classroom and going on to the technical coordinator or going into permanent retirement after that. It’s been wherever God is leading me.”



Answering the call
By the summer of 2003, Pickard was beginning to listen more intently to God’s call. Having continued his work as a pulpit supply substitute and from his stints as interim pastor, his skills as a preacher had progressed significantly from his first stint at Dorset. And he was feeling God’s nudging.
“It must have been God speaking to me,” he said. “God was smart enough to get out of one area and into another. I don’t think I would have been ready back then. By the spring of 2005, I felt this was where God wanted me. I probably spend 10-20 hours a week on my sermons.”
Another great thing for the Pickards is that their family has remained close, with both children just a few minutes away. Mark and his wife, Kim, have presented them with two grandsons, Ben, 11, and Andy, 9. Lisa also lives in the community.
“It’s been wonderful to have all our family so close to us,” Pickard said.
Their family surprised Ed and Jerie Leigh in 2006 by marking the 50th anniversary of their first date in 1956 with a hayride and other festivities at Camp Koinonia.
Their work at Dorset Baptist continues to bear fruit.
“We have a good mix of people of all ages,” Pickard said. “We have Sunday School for everybody, including for fourth-sixth graders and a teen class and classes for older people.”
Pickard does not look or act anywhere near his age. He seems energized. He holds to several truths that have gained increasing resonance with him over the years.
“(Evangelist) Billy Graham was asked when he turned 80 what had surprised him the most about life,” Pickard said. “He said, ‘The brevity of it.’
“I also believe in the statement, ‘Too soon, too old, too late, too smart.’”
He also draws strength from a statement from C.S. Lewis, known to many as the author of “The Chronicles of Narnia.”
“I also try to live by the C.S. Lewis quote, ‘Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. Aim at earth and you get neither,’” Pickard said.
Above all, there are at least two Biblical tenets which he holds dear and guide his steps.
“I believe in what Psalm 90:12 says,” Pickard said. “It says, ‘Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.’
“Another verse that is a guiding force in my life is II Corinthians 5:15, ‘And he died for all, that those who live should live no longer for themselves, but for him who died for them and was raised again.’”
Dorset is where God has meant him to be all along, Pickard believes. He just resisted that call for so long. Now, the principles he put into teaching and coaching carry him forward in his own little corner of God’s kingdom.
“We may not be big in numbers, but if we’re not growing in numbers, we’re growing spiritually,” he said. “Studies show that 59 percent of churches in our country have from 0-99 members. This is where God wants Jerie Leigh and I to be.”

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