Tandragee man elected Moderator Designate for Presbyterian Church

TANDRAGEE-born and bred Reverend Trevor Gribben will be the new Moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland (PCI).

He is currently serving as the PCI’s Clerk of the General Assembly and its General Secretary.

On Tuesday evening, Mr Gribben received the most votes from the Church’s 19 regional presbyteries when they met independently, in various locations across Ireland, to conduct the Church’s annual election for its senior officer bearer and principal public representative.

Known as the Moderator-Designate, he will be formally elected and installed as Moderator by the General Assembly, when it meets in Belfast this June.

The Tandragee-born 63-year-old is the 13th minister to hold the office of Clerk of the General Assembly since the establishment of the Church in 1840, and will be the 7th Clerk to serve as the Church in its highest office, the last being Dr Sam Hutchinson who was elected in 1997.

Speaking following his election, Mr Gribben said, “Having served as an ordained minister within PCI for the last 37 or so years, it really is a great honour, and a very humbling experience, to be nominated as Moderator-Designate. Although it’s been my day-job over the years as Clerk to ring colleagues to inform them of their nomination as Moderator-Designate, it was a very different experience tonight to get that phone call myself from the Deputy Clerk!”

Mr Gribben continued, “I am, however, very much looking forward to this new opportunity to serve in a different way, but with a fair degree of trepidation. As Clerk of Assembly, I’ve worked very closely with all Moderators over the past while, but I suspect it will be very different stepping into that role myself.

“As I look forward to the year ahead it is with a strange mixture of emotions, including both a degree of both nervousness and excitement in almost equal measure. Nervousness, because it will be something new, which will involve setting aside much of what I currently do, yet exciting, because of the new opportunities for service and ministry that will open up.”

By convention, the election takes place on the first Tuesday of every February and alongside Mr Gribben, this year’s other nominee was his ministerial colleague, Rev Richard Kerr, minister of Templepatrick Presbyterian Church Each received the following votes:

Rev Trevor Gribben 16 votes: The Presbyteries of Armagh, Ballymena, North Belfast, East Belfast, Carrickfergus, Coleraine & Limavady, Derry & Donegal, Down, Dromore, Dublin & Munster, Iveagh, Monaghan, Newry, Omagh, Route, and Tyrone

Rev Richard Kerr 3 votes: The Presbyteries of Ards, South Belfast and Templepatrick.

The son of the late William and Elizabeth Gribben, with an older sister and older brother, the Moderator-Designate is also uncle to two adult nephews.

Growing up, the family worshipped in Tandragee Baptist Church.

Looking back, Mr Gribben said that he is thankful for faithful pastors and the Sunday School teachers there.

At the same time, throughout those early years, he went to the Boys’ Brigade in Tandragee Presbyterian Church, where he was also involved in other aspects of youth work, eventually moving to join the Church as a full member when he was 17.

Having attended the town’s primary school, as part of the Dickson Plan, he went to Tandragee Junior High School for three years, and then Portadown College for four years, before gaining a BSc in Applied Maths and Computer Science at Queen’s University, Belfast, in 1983.

Along the way, Mr Gribben worked for a short while as a systems analyst and programmer for a Courtaulds-owned company, Mayfair Manufacturing in Portadown. But, as he says himself, “over the course of a number of years, I had a growing inner sense of God’s call on my life to ministry. Through the testing of gifts, including some tentative preaching, and especially speaking in youthwork, I was also encouraged by Christians I respected, as I discerned what God was leading me towards.

“But perhaps the final piece in the jigsaw was hearing someone preaching on Romans 10 in church, the verses that says, ‘My heart’s desire for my own people is that they might be saved…How shall they hear without a preacher?’ I heard them again at Queen’s Christian Union, all in a short period of time. From that time on I sensed where God was leading me and began to push on some doors, which in the providence of God opened,” he said.

Having been accepted for the ordained ministry in the Presbyterian Church in Ireland, Mr Gribben went to the Church’s Union Theological College. Here he completed his formal studies in 1987, with an award of a Diploma in Theology prior to being ordained in 1988 as assistant minister of Duncairn and St Enoch’s Presbyterian Church in inner-city North Belfast. That assistantship, he says, was a formative time, as he sought to both pastor and reach out in some very challenging circumstances in some of the dark days of ‘The Troubles’.

Two years later, in 1990, he was called to Leckpatrick Presbyterian Church in County Tyrone as their minister. Serving there until 1996, Mr Gribben was called to Whiteabbey Presbyterian Church in County Antrim, where he remained for a further 12 years, prior to being appointed PCI’s Deputy Clerk in 2008.

“During my time in Leckpatrick in the north-west and Whiteabbey in Newtownabbey, I tried to focus on letting God’s Word speak for itself, seeking to apply its truths and principles to everyday life. I thoroughly enjoyed those years in congregational ministry, coming alongside people pastorally, being involved in discipleship and helping to give leadership and direction along with fellow elders and leaders. It was a privilege to see people coming to a living faith in Jesus Christ and to see many others grow in faith,” Mr Gribben said.

Speaking about what influenced his ministry over the years, the Moderator-Designate said that it was many brothers and sisters in Christ, “but perhaps more significantly many so-called ‘ordinary Christians’. It has been wonderful to see the difference the Lord Jesus makes in the lives of people who have trusted in Him – people who have a God-given peace and assurance, sometimes even in the most difficult of times and circumstances.”

“But first and foremost, it’s the Lord and His amazing grace that has been the greatest influence on me, enabling me to achieve anything that I have achieved. My adoption into His family has been the most significant thing in my life. The saving grace that I know through faith in the Lord Jesus, and His daily sustaining grace, are simply everything to me. Like all believers, I very much remain a ‘work in progress’, and I’m so thankful both for His mercy and forgiveness, and His power to change,” Mr Gribben explained.

It was only through a clear sense of call, after nearly 20 years in congregational ministry that he moved into a wider ministry role within PCI in 2008.

“Though serving today in a particular role as Clerk of Assembly and PCI’s General Secretary, I am still very much a minister and a preacher at heart, and I greatly enjoy preaching in different congregations across Ireland on many Sundays - and I still see that as very much part of my calling,” he said.

Reflecting on his current role, he continued, “I have had the privilege of serving PCI in a leadership role within our General Assembly and in doing so, alongside a large number of very dedicated and gifted people – both staff in Assembly Buildings and colleagues that make up our presbyteries, councils and committees - I’m also privileged to have been able to serve our Church in this type of leadership role for some 17 years, both as Deputy Clerk and over 10 years as Clerk.”

When he is not leading the staff team in Assembly Buildings, advising the General Assembly, or the Church’s various bodies, the lifelong Arsenal fan enjoys watching local Irish League football, becoming a Linfield season ticket holder in recent years. Cricket is an even greater passion for the Moderator-Designate in the summer, as he supports Waringstown Cricket Club, where he is very much a non-playing but very keen member. Also in the summer months, he helps people explore their faith on Christian centred holidays, often on the Greek island of Samos.

“I have been doing this for over 20 years now, and it is a sort of a busman’s holiday, as I am speaking and teaching for a week, but then staying on for some holiday time. Throughout the year, though, I also enjoy spending time with friends, some of whom have given me the privilege of sharing family life with them,” he said.

Looking ahead to serving as Moderator, Mr Gribben said, “These are challenging days for the Church, as we seek to live out our calling in an increasingly pluralist and sometimes even hostile world. But these are also great days of opportunity. The world might be changing, but the world still needs the Lord and the message of the Gospel hasn’t changed. The Good News of salvation and new life that is freely available by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone, is needed today as much as in days gone by.

“We have of course always to find new ways to live out and communicate that message in our fast-moving world, but it is the Lord Jesus Christ that we commend and the call to know Him and live for Him that is central to all that we do.”

Mr Gribben continued, “Up and down this island in local Presbyterian congregations, men and women, young and old, are serving their Lord and their communities. I’m really looking forward to being released from behind my desk and getting out more, seeing the Church and its work for the Lord on the ground.

“I also want to encourage our congregations, ministers, leaders and members. In my current role I’m aware of many of the new and exciting things that are happening, especially our church plans, and I want to see some of those first-hand. I also want to bring something of the hope and encouragement that is in the Gospel to those who are perhaps discouraged and even struggling.”

The Moderator-Designate, concluded by saying, “I’m also aware of the amazing work for the common good being carried on by many organisations and people in society both north and south of this island. That includes those in our public services, in voluntary and community organisations, in other churches, and in local, regional, and national government. As Moderator, on behalf of our Church, I will want to encourage all that’s good and thank those who are contributing positively to the well-being of others, as well as sharing with them something of our Church’s vision and values of what makes for a healthy society.”

Mr Gribben will continue as Clerk of the General Assembly and PCI’s General Secretary until he is officially nominated to this year’s General Assembly, when it gathers in Belfast in June. He succeeds the current Moderator, Rt Rev Dr Richard Murray, who will continue in office until then.