Experiencing a New Side of Church Communications

These past few months I have served as the Digital Media Intern here at Good Shepherd. While my story at Good Shepherd started long before I began my internship, I have been able to experience this church and the way it runs in an entirely new light. Every event, every idea, and every detail that pertains to the way this place operates is met with an overwhelming amount of forethought, and each decision is carefully deliberated for the benefit of the church’s mission. 

With any new experience in life, we worry we don’t know enough or aren’t well equipped with the necessary tools to succeed, and with this being my first internship, those thoughts ran through my head. While learning something to be graded on is very familiar to me, applying that knowledge to further the mission or vision of a church is a completely different type of added pressure that has far more meaning than a score on a test or a letter stamped on a piece of paper.    

When I first announced I would be interning here at Good Shepherd, Sarah Iverson and Joanne Zastrow, both told me that the start of this internship would mark the day that Eric Holmer would ruin all my future bosses and supervisors for me because of his patience and his deep desire to see those around him succeed. Though only time will tell. I want to thank Eric Holmer for not only this opportunity but also for the way he has led me and the time he has taken to help me further my own knowledge and skillset. I have learned so much about the business side of social media, how to build a website, and how to capture events through different media avenues.   

I have been able to further relationships with staff members and talk to so many amazing people whose passion for service and the Lord has inspired my own faith. The power of being able to share other people’s stories for the good of the church has been such a blessing, and the feeling of doing it for a place that means so much to my family has only added an element of purpose to the work I’m doing.  

Overall, I have been able to witness the ways the people who belong to this church nurture and support each other and their community. And I have been extremely blessed to be a part of a group of people who have such a fire lit under them to continue serving the Lord and ministering to the community around them. 

As I head back to Iowa City to start my sophomore year at the University of Iowa, I am excited to continue studying journalism, but I will miss all the amazing people that I had the chance to interact with throughout my summer interning at Good Shepherd. Thanks for a memorable summer!