My First Year of Officership: Lieutenant Krishna McFarlane

The commissioning and ordination of new lieutenants is one of the most exciting events on the Salvation Army calendar. But what happens after our new officers march out of the sanctuary and into their first appointments?

Lieutenant Krishna McFarlane was commissioned in 2023, and is now the corps officer at Living Hope Community Church in Winnipeg. In this episode, she talks about her first year of officership—how she and her son have navigated the transition; how the church has welcomed her and grown, more than tripling attendance since her appointment; and what she would say to other Salvationists who might be considering officership.

Transcript

Kristin Ostensen

The commissioning and ordination of new lieutenants is one of the most exciting events on the Salvation Army calendar. But what happens after our new officers march out of the sanctuary and into their first appointments? Lieutenant Krishna McFarlane was commissioned in 2023, and is now the corps officer at Living Hope Community Church in Winnipeg. And she’s here to talk about her first year as a Salvation Army officer. Is officership what she was expecting? How has her son adjusted to being an “OK”? And how is God guiding her through it all? Stay tuned for an inspiring conversation as Krishna shares about her calling and ministry—and offers some wise words to other Salvationists who may be considering officership.

Hi Krishna, and welcome to the Salvationist podcast.

Krishna McFarlane

Hi Kristin. I'm so glad to be here. 

Kristin Ostensen  

Yeah, thank you. Thanks for taking the time. So, to start off, can you tell me a little bit about yourself and your journey to officership?

Krishna McFarlane

Sure. So, I grew up not in Canada, actually. Was born in Jamaica, and I grew up Salvation Army. So I was a junior soldier, I played timbrels, I played in the band. So, an island girl, and then I moved to Canada because of what I would consider a series of unfortunate events, or fortunate for me. But you know, life happened, and I moved to Canada in 2015, and I came as a student, not necessarily with the intention to become a Salvation Army officer, but newly divorced as well. And so, I think it took a while for my heart and my head, to realize that I would be doing parenting on my own, right? So, the stats—that made me recognize quickly that the odds are really stacked against me. I'm a single Black mom of a boy in Toronto, right? I had this really good job, which worked at the time. I did my 40 hours on the weekends, which means my days off were during the week, and that worked perfectly, because I didn't have to pay for childcare, right? But which means on the weekends, when I'm gone to work, Dorien is home alone, and he wanted to play basketball, and he wanted to do all these things, and I'm not there to protect him. I'm not there to watch over him. And where do a lot of the gangs form? On the basketball court. And I remember praying about it and asking God to give me an answer. And shortly after, I remember Salvation Army had this transformational weekend. I don't know if they still have had it since, but they had that. And in all honesty, it changed my life—not in this big, dramatic way, but it created the space for me to be able to have a heart to heart with God. So, I just talked to God and said, I really don't know what to do. And I felt stuck, and I remember crying, and I kind of just left it there. I left it at the transformational weekend, and about a month later, I got a call from my corps officers, and they said, There's a job opening. We don't think you're gonna take it, but we feel led by the Spirit to ask you if you are interested in taking this job as an administrative assistant. And it had two other components, so I would be also the director for the after-school program, and when that takes a break in the fall, I would then do the Christmas kettle co-ordinating. And without even knowing how much the job would pay, I said yes, because I felt like it was an answer to the prayer that I prayed a month ago. And I remember them saying to me, but you don't know how much we're going to pay you. And I remember saying to them, God will provide. I just know it's the answer to the prayer that I've prayed. I knew within my spirit, and I said yes to that, not thinking about officership, just saying yes to, I know, because I said I'll be the director for the after-school program. And they said to me, And Dorien can come, which means I don't have to worry about childcare. He can play with other kids, you know? It's at a church, so be exposed to good, positive things. And so I said yes to that. And for me, that was as far as I was willing to go, right? So it's like, Yes, I'll be working at the church. It's positive for me. It's positive for Dorien. I am happy and content with that. But when God gets a hold of you, right, you can't say no. And I think God's plan, which I could not have seen at the time, was for me to be an officer, but he knew if I said yes to one small thing and yes to another thing and yes to another thing—and saying yes when he intervened and made provision, made me able to, made a possibility for me to be able to say yes when officership presented itself. And how that presented itself was that was I started working in the summer of 2019 at Cedarbrae Community Church and within a few months of just being a positive influence in the children's life, interacting with people and giving them great customer service when they came to the church to donate anything, or to shop at the food bank, or any of those things, I was like, Why have I not been doing this all of my life? And I think that's when I first recognized that I could be an officer. The officers there were also good, because they recognized and they never said anything; they never planted that seed, that you should be an officer. But they would say, “Krishna, you speak really well.” And we would talk about Bible stuff, and they would say, “I think you should probably preach, write a sermon, see how you feel about a certain topic, and let's talk about it and if it sounds good, if we think it's what the people should hear, then we'll have you preach. How do you feel about that?” And I remember the first time preaching, oh my goodness, it was terrible. [laughs] But just the exposure to stuff like that, and then Covid happened, and just being on the front lines and seeing how I can be the hands and feet of God to people and give them hope, kind of, I decided then I said, “God, I'm going to go into officership.” And I said it to my corps officers, and they weren’t surprised. “Yeah, we know you would have gotten here eventually, because we saw it.”

Kristin Ostensen

Oh, that's wonderful. It's wonderful that they saw opportunities to give you opportunities to grow and to embrace that calling almost without even realizing it. That's really beautiful. And of course, you were commissioned last year in 2023. I've been to a lot of commissionings over the years—obviously not as a cadet—but I'm curious, what's it like being one of the cadets up there? What was your experience of commissioning and ordination last year?

Krishna McFarlane

Because it was also a congress, it was spectacular. And it was, I guess, heartwarming to have my mom there, to have my son see me—I know he often says it was so impactful for him to be able to see me walk across the stage and, you know, point to the heavens, that that be the glory, that I've made it to the end. I had people from my, my corps officers from Jamaica, they had come over to support. Yes, they did. And it was just, it was amazing, that they invested in a ticket to be able to come to support. And they even said to me, “We knew that you would have ended up here when you left for Canada, you would have been an officer.” I was like, “Really?” They said, “Yeah, we knew.” So, yeah, it was amazing to have the support, to know that I made it to the end of training too, because there's a lot of growth that is painful, that happens during training, right? So, to have made it, to have big hope, to have been refined, was just a blessing.

Kristin Ostensen

And you even got to carry the sessional flag.

Krishna McFarlane

Yes, I did. I carried the sessional flag. I remember when I was asked, and that was such a privilege. It reminded me of when I was a Girl Guide, and we used to be the flagbearers, too, at commissioning. That was when Girl Guides was really big, back in the day, when I was a teenager, and here we would, at every commissioning, carry the flag to bring in the cadets. And I remember when Major Andrew [Morgan, former training principal] asked me, and I said yes, and it's just so—I don't know—funny how the things that you think God won't use, he ends up using it, right? All that practice of carrying the flag that I thought was—and sometimes I complained, right? Why do we have to be the ones to carry the flag? But God used that in my later years to bring blessing to me, because my family was so proud, the fact that I was chosen, and I think I did a really good job, too, with representing my session. I love them, yeah, and that's what it's about, I suppose.

Kristin Ostensen

That's really lovely. I love that sort of full circle moment of being a girl guide and then a cadet. And of course, you were appointed to Living Hope Community Church in Winnipeg, and you trained in Winnipeg, so it's not an unfamiliar city to you. But how did you feel about the appointment as your first appointment?

Krishna McFarlane

In my heart, I wanted to stay in Winnipeg, and people find that weird. Well, I didn't have anywhere else to compare Winnipeg to other than Ontario, right? Yeah, and I kind of knew I didn't want to go back to Ontario because it's really busy, and I felt more at home and settled. And thinking about Dorien, too, he had moved a lot, right? The staff advisors at the college, I'm sure they had a laugh, because we had to close up, close out the college here for it to move to Ontario, right? And we were going to do a farewell circuit, and we had put all the names of the corps in the City of Winnipeg on the board, and we were all going to take a turn to preach, and I picked Living Hope, not knowing that I was going to be appointed. So, when I knew what they knew, the staff had known, right? Yeah, afterwards, but just coming to do the farewell, which was the first time I’d come, and at that time, when we did the farewell, I'd known by this, that I was appointed there. It was not a goodbye, it was a goodbye/hello, right? But being here for a year, I would say, and I often say, it was the best match for me. I love Living Hope, and my first impression of it is that it's a blank slate and the sky is the limit.

Kristin Ostensen

Wonderful. So when you think back on your first year and a bit of officership and on your training experience, what would you say were some of the most helpful things you learned and could apply in your officership?

Krishna McFarlane

Almost all that I've learned in training, I still use. The discipline of making sure that I don't overwork, because there's no one to tell you it's time to turn off, the off switch—"It's four o'clock, you need to go.” But they kind of had that rhythm, and they often talked about it in training, that corps life has a rhythm, and if you can figure out what the rhythm is, then you'll be able to safeguard yourselves from a lot of the pitfalls. And so, in my first year, I tried to find the rhythm, and a lot of it I had to create, which made it, I guess, a little bit easier, as opposed to jumping into something that already existed, because when I came here, a lot of the programs weren't up and running, and so I had to implement those, and I tried to create those so that I had a day for Sabbath, that I wasn't so preoccupied or occupied with work that I’m not able to be a good parent to Dorien, because he's still also a part of my congregation, and I I need to pay him attention, some attention to right? And that was one of the things that I learned at training college—not that you don't know as a parent, but sometimes you feel this tension or this pressure to choose between ministry and a child that's, let's say, you know, when you're like—and Dorien’s not a baby. He's a teenager who sometimes will say, “I don't need you right now,” right? And you have to know, OK, I need to tend to him and ministry will have to wait. One of the main things, too, out of all the things that I've learned and I've shared with other people, that I have taken from training college that—and I have to give credit to Corinne Cameron, and I'm tempted to say Major Corinne, she was my staff advisor, but also one of our professors—is the preaching plan. It's the best gift ever given to me, and I use it where I know exactly what I’ll preach each week. I use the narrative lectionary. That's a tool that's given to me that helps me to be able to manage my time well and plan ahead so that when surprises come—because they will—I am already, what I would say, 80 percent prepared, and there is room within my calendar to be able to tend to these surprises without having a crisis.

Kristin Ostensen

Wow, it sounds like you really learned a lot about kind of balancing things in training college, having that sort of evenness. And of course, you talked a bit about the work that you did at Cedarbrae and even all the way back to being a Girl Guide. But before you became an officer, how did the ministry experiences, whether it was sort of official as a staff or some of these more unofficial-type ministry experiences—but how did those experiences also help prepare you for officership?

Krishna McFarlane

I would say a lot of my experience even started before I came to Canada, right? I grew up Salvation Army, so even the rhythm of corps life, I had a sense of. I knew Christmas kettle was the biggest time that we fundraised because I did it back home. There are things about Canada that's different, but there are things about Canada that's also not that different, right? In terms of the calendar year sort of looks the same, right? There's this Christmas kettle period and that's busy, and it's always been busy since I've known it. So coming to Canada and training college, that was not a surprise for me. Though we didn't have after-school programs growing up, there were a lot of programs at church, and we lived at church almost, I would say, lived at church, because as soon as you come home from school, you change, you do your homework and you head to church for whatever they had: singing company, Girl Guides, band practice, you know, I mean, youth group. And so that part, I was exposed to it as a child, right? Home league. We also had a real closeness with our corps officers. So, because the church was, also their house was at the church, it's all in one compound, right? And so that nearness, I suppose, to your congregation is probably the difference that I see here, but I carry that with me into my own space. So, a lot of the things that I've learned growing up, I've taken it with me here, and then when I came here, I would say it complemented whatever I already had taken with me, right? So, of course, we didn't have food bank, but I was exposed to that here, having that experience. We didn't have the after-school program back in Jamaica, but we had one here, and so I was exposed to that. At Cedarbrae, they didn't have a band, but I grew up playing in the band, so I knew all the Salvation Army songs, the old, old songs to the newer ones, right. And administrative work—I guess I like admin work, so that wasn't hard. That was just a transfer of a skill from whatever I did before. But the preaching piece, yeah, I didn't preach in Jamaica, but we had five-minute talks, which was sort of like preaching, so constructing a short sermon, so to speak, I guess, were things that I had from where I was before coming here. That's what I took with me, and it just a good blend. And it's helped me in ministry.

Kristin Ostensen  

Yeah, and when you describe it like that, you can really see how God was preparing you, literally your entire life, through all these different ways. And that's kind of funny, because given all of that, would you say being an officer is what you were expecting, or did anything kind of surprise you?

Krishna McFarlane

Yes and no. [laughs] Yes, in the sense that you are someone that people look up to and expect a lot from, and so in that sense, I guess I was expecting that. I guess it's the tension between—what I didn't expect is when I—how do I say this?—when I looked at a pastor before I became one, I don't know if I saw them as a “normal person.” [laughs] Know what I mean?

Kristin Ostensen

Yeah, I know what you mean.

Krishna McFarlane

I'm a pastor—like, Ahh, is this for real? Me? Little old me? You know. And I guess it's coming to terms with the fact that, you know, I'm a normal person, but I'm also a pastor, and getting people because—though the office of a pastor is critical, and it's not more important than the other callings that God has called people to. And sometimes I feel that we have set ourselves upon this pedestal—and it's hard not to do that, actually, because people still have that mindset that the pastors are up here and they are somehow down here, and the wealth of knowledge about God comes from the pastor. I don't subscribe to that, and so I try to get my congregation to realize that we're in this together, that we're all called, and that we are truly—a term that I've learned in training college—a priesthood of believers, and we minister to each other. Yes, I preach, but the role of a pastor is—in Salvation Army, especially, I find it's so much more than preaching, right? It's really a lifestyle. 

Kristin Ostensen

Yeah, it's a very holistic ministry. And now that you've been an officer for a year and a bit, looking back, what would you say has been one of your most meaningful experiences? 

Krishna McFarlane

The people. I can't name just one experience, but I will share this with you. When I initially came, we had, let's see, a little over 25 people, and I had to—between me and Dorien and two older ladies, we had to pack out chairs every week, because where Living Hope is, it's a multipurpose room that we transform into a sanctuary on right Sundays, right? So, it's not set up and you just come into the space. It has to be set up every Sunday morning. And initially it was just on me and Dorian to do that, to do the setup. And would I say I complained? No, but I found it unfair to be the one to do that. I was like, Everyone—this should be a collective effort, because this is the Lord's house. And, you know, we should be building up the temple of the Lord, not only our spiritual temple, but the physical temple together, right? And I remember I was challenged. I said, “Krishna, you need to find a way to get your people to see that this is their church and they need to participate in building up the temple.” And I honestly, I don't know how it happened, but the church started growing—that much I know. The church started growing by just being out in community, by doing door to door and talking with the people in the in the park, and then people just started coming to church. And by then, coming to church, and I would just, I remember saying, “We need people. We need volunteers to come and help with setting up a church on a Sunday morning”—the breakdown wasn't a problem, it's the coming in early. And I've seen them grow from not coming to set up the church, to coming and setting it up every Sunday morning, to the point where, if I come before 9:30 where it is already set up, they get mad. They take pride now in setting up the church and saying, “Is it set up properly?” That is one of the things that stand out for me, is how in that short space of time, we've grown together, we've become a family. And I remember at our last Rally Day, which happened a few weeks ago, a congregation member said to me, “You have a really nice family.” So, I thought she was talking about Dorien, so I said, “Yeah, he's all right.” [laughs] And she said to me, “No, not Dorien. Look, you have a really great family.” And she was talking about the congregation, and it's so true. They have grown so much, and I think it's the growth over time, as I look back at things that seemed so hard, or obstacles that I thought, OK, we probably never overcome—we've overcome, all because we've prayed together, we laugh together, we eat together. We share our problems and we carry each other's burden together.

Kristin Ostensen  

What a beautiful picture of the church and building the church really kind of literally and spiritually. That's amazing. And we've talked a lot about Dorien, your son, and I'm wondering how has he experienced becoming an “OK,” an officer's kid?

Krishna McFarlane

Great. From day one, he has been very, very, very supportive of me doing ministry, and the support is just still there. And I think it's easier for him to be supportive, because he has his relationship with God himself. And so, sometimes, when I get discouraged, or sometimes I will say, “They better not move me from Living Hope,” he will say, “Mommy, remember what you signed up for,” right? “You signed up to wherever he leads you, you will go.” So the support is not always what I want to hear, but it's always the truth, right? He's a teenager, but thank God, he knows who God is, and I can't complain. He has a great family, exactly what I prayed for when I moved to Canada for him, is exactly what God has provided—great role models for him, and yes, so many people have spoken into his life, and he's done really well.

Kristin Ostensen 

That's wonderful to hear. And we talked a little bit about how God has been working in your church. And I'm wondering how has God been working in your own life, your own heart, this past year? 

Krishna McFarlane

So, I would say I'm hopeful. So, in my office now, I have—because sometimes it does take a lot of refocusing. You can become almost weary or dry because you're giving all the time. But what I have on my wall at the moment, this year, is a whiteboard, and on one side it says, “Please.” And some of it is the things, physical things that I'm asking God for, for the church, but some of it is stuff that are spiritual, stuff that I am hoping for myself, too, and for my church. And then on one side—yeah, there's “Please.” And the other side is “Thank You,” right? Learning to be grateful, even in the circumstances that aren't necessarily what I want them to be. And staying grounded, I would say, is what I'm looking at for this year, because what I have, the resources and the access to the resources I have here, I can take for granted if I'm not careful. And so, I always try to keep that at the forefront of my mind, because I also know what exists for other officers in other places—they don't have the same resources, and so I can complain if I'm not careful, right? And so, I just try to stay grounded now and focused and grateful, always, always grateful for the fact that I get to do this.

Kristin Ostensen

Yeah. I really like that whiteboard idea—I might steal that. That's a really good way of focusing your mind around being intentional and, you know, and even feeding into your prayer life as well. And as we're wrapping up now, I'm wondering, what would you say to other Salvationists who are considering officership, now that you've been in it for about a year or so?

Krishna McFarlane 

Remember that your first calling is from God, and you get to serve out that calling through The Salvation Army. You will hear a lot of voices, but before you come into ministry, make sure you know the voice of God, because that is who will lead you into the destiny that he has planned for you, right? “I know the plans I have for you; plans to prosper you, not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” And I say that to say, when I came to Living Hope, I could have seen it as a church that was dying because it was a clean slate. There weren't a lot of programs going on. They hadn't really bounced back as effectively from Covid as they would have liked. But I prayed. I prayed with the people who were there at the time, and God gave us a vision. And that's what I held on to: the call that God has right for me, which is also bigger than me, right? And like I said, we've moved from a little over 25 people to now 90 people on a Sunday in a little over a year. That's not by what we do as humans by any stretch of the imagination. It's what God does, and you have to listen to him and be obedient to that. And that's what I'd encourage. If God is saying to you, “Give up that job. What you get will be less than half of what you're working now.” Trust that if he has called you to do that, that he will provide whatever it is that you need. And so that's what I would say: Trust that God has the best of intentions for you. And if a person is out there who is feeling unsure, confused, they feel like God has called them, but in the midst of that, they're still confused—because that does happen. It's happened to me, even in ministry where, I know God has called me, and I'm faced with obstacles and I don't know which way to turn. Jeremiah 33:3 always comes back to me, which is, “Call upon me, and I will answer you and see if I will not show you great and marvelous things which you could not have imagined.” And so, in the midst of their, your confusion—whoever is listening—call upon the Lord. He will answer you, and he will show you great and marvelous things which you could not have imagined. And I'm sure I have a sea of witnesses that can say the same thing has happened in their life.

Kristin Ostensen

Well, thank you for those words of wisdom, those words of encouragement. It's been so great to chat with you and hear about your church and how God has been working in your life since you became an officer. And yeah, just want to thank you for this behind-the-scenes look at life as a lieutenant. It's been wonderful. Thank you.

Krishna McFarlane

Thank you so much for having me. That's great.

Kristin Ostensen

Thanks for joining us for another episode of the Salvationist podcast. This is our last episode of the year, but we’ll be back in January for an all-new season. In the meantime, catch up on past episodes at Salvationist.ca/podcast.