Richard Lucco will be honored next month with the 2021 North Park Theological Seminary Award for Distinguished Service.
He will be presented with the award during a virtual seminary chapel service at 11 a.m. (central) on Thursday, April 15. The service will be cast live on YouTube and Facebook. Lucco will deliver a homily titled, “Carried by Hope.”
Lucco graduated from the seminary in 1979. He pastored congregations in Kewanee and Elgin, Illinois, as well as Salem, Oregon, before he became superintendent of the Great Lakes Conference in 2002. In 2011, president Gary Walter appointed him as the first executive director for ministry development at Covenant Offices.
He retired in 2018 and returned to the ministry he loves most—serving as a pastor. He currently is the part-time associate pastor at Northwest Covenant Church in Mt. Prospect, Illinois.
In an article he wrote for the Companion last year, Lucco said, “As a pastor, I am free to listen to God and to people. I am free to present God to people and present people to God. I am free to pray. I am free to help folks find themselves in the biblical narrative and remind them of the grace of Jesus Christ. Grace that mends in the broken places. Grace that heals in the hurting places. Grace that forgives in the sinful places.”
Lucco has said his sense of being carried by hope has deepened since being diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2015.
Words of congratulations can be shared here.
