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Services Planned Tuesday for Fred Lawson
CROMWELL, CT (August 28, 2003) - Memorial services are scheduled for 1:30 p.m.
on Tuesday at Hilltop Covenant Church in Cromwell for retired Covenant
pastor Fred Lawson, who died August 26. He was 78.
East Coast Conference superintendent Robert Dvorak will officiate at
Tuesday's memorial service. Following the service, there will be a
reception at the nearby Covenant Village of Cromwell, where Lawson had
lived in recent years with his wife, Gladys.
He was born November 16, 1924 in Boston, where he grew up in the
Covenant Congregational Church. He attended North Park Junior College
and finished pre-seminary education in 1945, then earned seminary
certification from North Park Theological Seminary in 1949. He was
ordained as a Covenant pastor in 1953. Last spring, Dvorak led a
celebration for Lawson's 50 years of ordination at the Covenant Village
of Cromwell.
Lawson married Gladys Pedersen on June 14, 1947 - he was serving as
interim pastor of the Evangelical Covenant Church of Wausa, Nebraska,
during that time. Following seminary, Lawson served at Bensonvale
Covenant Church in Omaha, Nebraska, from 1949-52. He then ministered to
Covenant congregations in Marquette (1952-59) and Oberlin, Kansas
(1959-64), before becoming executive director of Covenant Heights Bible
Camp in Estes Park, Colorado from 1964 to 1967.
In 1967, Lawson moved to Connecticut, briefly working at The Children's
Home of Cromwell before serving as pastor of the Evangelical Covenant
Church of Woodstock. Before retiring from full-time ministry, Lawson
served at Salem Covenant Church, Pennock, Minnesota, and Covenant
Congregational Church in Quincy, Massachusetts, just a short drive from
the church of his youth. He retired in 1989.
Friends and family noted Lawson's pastoral skills, saying that he was
beloved by people of all ages, particularly children. Lawson often
dressed up as Santa Claus and met kids at local venues during the
Christmas season. He even dressed up as Santa on a local Kansas
television show and read the Christmas story, said his son Bruce, who
serves the Covenant's Department of Christian Formation in camping and
planning ministries while assisting the Central Conference-sponsored
Harbor Point (camping) Ministries.
Along with his wife Gladys, Lawson is survived by sons Bruce (Carol) and
Michael (Joan) Lawson and daughter Nancy (Warren) Lawson Scholl. He is
also survived by seven grandchildren and one great-grandchild.
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