Rev. Steven Cholak
Pastor Steven Cholak grew up in Akron, Ohio as an only child. He attended Concordia University in River Forest, Illinois for college and was an athletic training student in the Exercise Science and Fitness management department. He majored in exercise science and minored in biblical languages (Hebrew and Greek). He attended Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana. He learned American Sign Language in the seminary’s Deaf ministry program and worked with Deaf churches in Fort Wayne and Denver, Colorado. Pastor Cholak did his vicarage at Memorial Lutheran Church and School in Houston, Texas. During that yearlong vicarage, Steven met his future wife, Stephanie Blake, a pre-kindergarten teacher at Memorial Lutheran and he asked her to marry him. He has served the church as pastor and classical educator in Nebraska, Indiana, Texas, Missouri, and New Mexico.
Scholasticus Opening Address and Chess
The Christian is called to live in the relationships, situations, vocations, and times. Christians must deny themselves and pick up their cross and follow Christ in all things. The crosses we bear are designed and given to us by God. We do the carrying. The struggle is ours. God calls us into these vocations. God takes the solitary and places them in families, churches, and societies. God binds us to other men and women and bids us love them. Christian culture is passed down from one generation to another. Christian culture transforms the world. God sustains and nourishes. He forgives and he encourages. He feeds and binds up. He bids you live in his grace all your days.