CUMMINGTON — The Rev. Stephen Philbrick’s congregation knows him as a man of stories. But the story they came to hear at a recent Sunday service was that of Philbrick himself.

The hilltown shepherd, poet, former clerk at the creamery and pastor of 30 years at the West Cummington Congregational Church was serenaded on Jan. 26 with reflections, testimonials and memories to mark the anniversary. Church members remembered his leadership in the aftermath of a 2010 church fire, and lauded him as a pastor even to the non-religious, with one even giving him the title of “quintessential yes man.”

Following the day’s fanfare, which included a morning service and reception at the church’s hall with more than 50 community members who came from across the Pioneer Valley, Philbrick would go on to joke, “That guy they were talking about — I’d love to meet him.”

Philbrick was born and raised in Providence, Rhode Island. He graduated from Brown University in 1972 and later earned a degree in animal husbandry from the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

He is the author of four books, now going on five, and comes from a family of word craftsmen as the son of poet Horace Philbrick, the father of author Frank Philbrick and the cousin of author Nathaniel Philbrick.

His two living brothers were in attendance, and his youngest brother Harry Philbrick gave the congregation a view of the pastor going back further than 30 years.

“As Steve has been struggling with various medical issues, the fact that his heart was beating too much and working too hard makes sense,” Harry said.

He continued, “We were an extremely close family, but we lost our parents way too early. My dad passed away when Steve was 21 or so, and our mom I believe in his 30s. And that experience of nursing them through their illness and losing them really proves the old adage that what doesn’t break your heart makes it stronger.”

Philbrick came to Cummington 45 years ago and worked as a shepherd, tending to 100 Hampshire sheep for a 15-year stretch before the community would look to him to lead their church.

Building community

“My dear Connie married a farmer with a flock of sheep, and the next thing she knew, she was married to a pastor with a flock of people,” said Nan Clark on Sunday as part of the morning’s service.

At 95, Clark is the oldest member of the church, and had been part of the search committee that landed on Philbrick as the church’s minister in 1994. That year the community of eight couldn’t afford a pastor, and turned toward community members to lead services — Philbrick among them.

Eventually the search committee agreed to the selection of Philbrick at the recommendation of the church’s music minister, Penny Schultz. Philbrick, whose first inclination was to say no, said, “I realized that these decisions were being made at a higher and deeper level.”

As Clark recalled, “You had one condition: that you were in the same suit as the rest of us and you were not going to stand at the pulpit and tell us how to live.

“That was his condition and we agreed to that,” she said, and affirmed the choice made 30 years ago. “You’re the ideal person for this job it turns out. Not just the preaching, but also the counseling.”

Clark reminisced, “You were first our pastor, and we probably didn’t have much money to give you, so you were working at the creamery for a number of years early on, and in that job, you got to know so many people in the hilltowns, and you had a feeling for how these people lived, what was important to them, and it began to come into your sermons and your counseling — the feelings you had for the people in this whole community.”

Polly Ryan, who in her own testimonial said she attributes Philbrick with demolishing her shyness, said in a short poem she made for the occasion: “You brought us to ourselves in disguise of who we are.”

Jennifer Fish, a congregation member for 27 years, shared how Philbrick altered her conception of religion, as many in the congregation also shared they casually don the religious community as “a church for those who don’t like church.”

“I want to say that I swore off religion in my teenage years. I was used to religion as something that came from thousands of years ago and told you how to be, and I didn’t want to be part of that. And so I hesitantly came and heard Steve speak, and it touched my heart. I realized that the model I had wasn’t the model [religion] had to be.”

Laila Salins in her testimony shared her so-called “ode to the yes man,” based on a Philbrick insight: “When in doubt, say yes.”

Salins said that, “one tends to think of such a person as being weak, of having no backbone. But Stephen Philbrick is a yes man of a distinctly different type.”

She went on to say that, “My working theory is that, with an almost reckless sense of optimism, you believe in our basic goodness and humanity, and trust that we will do our best when given the opportunity.”

Building a church

Philbrick’s post as pastor has not only entailed growing the community, but also raising a literal structure after their church burned in 2010. Philbrick was lauded as a cornerstone through that process, with the church eventually opening on Nov. 4, 2012.

The new building was a remake of the original, and embodies the whitewashed interior and exterior New England churches are noted for. More than $800,000 was raised toward the structure under Philbrick’s leadership.

“A few little vignettes I remember from that time were painting parties to get that sanctuary painted,” said Schultz, reminiscing how Philbrick brought the community together to paint and enjoy refreshments when the church couldn’t afford painters.

And Schultz, who has spent three decades as the church’s pianist, said, “I want to also now say from a music perspective, we have a minister who is so crazy about music that his enthusiasm has attracted so many musicians to want to play.”

Harry let the congregation into the “inside jokes” of the church’s podium, noting that Philbrick’s brother Tim, who specialized in furniture before he died a couple years ago, had constructed the adornments of the church’s new sanctuary.

“Every time Steve preaches to you and talks to you at the church, he lays his Bible and his notes on the pulpit. … Tim, when he made the piece, included two ridiculous and stupid jokes that nobody would get except Steve, me and Ben,” he said.

Carved in the drawer reads “free Boris.” Harry explained Boris was “our mythical older brother who was captured in the basement.” The other engraving reads “This is a treat,” memorializing a comment made by his brother Ben when their mom had served a holiday dinner.

It’s here that Philbrick shares his stories.

“An old minister had told me when I started — you can have a great insight on Sunday morning. You can put the words together just right — people will forget it before they get home. But if you tell a story, people will remember the stories,” Philbrick said.

“I feel like we’ve been married 30 years” said the pastor and poet about his congregation, adding that “it’s been about ‘us’ all the way. They’ve been my teachers.”

Samuel Gelinas can be reached at sgelinas@gazettenet.com.