By Martie Thompson
editor@floridanewsline.com
Pastor Perri Martin grew up in Jacksonville and attended local schools (Twin Lakes Academy Middle School and Mandarin High School) before graduating from Asbury Theological Seminary in Kentucky — but she said never in her wildest dreams did she think she would come back to the area to River of Life UMC, where she now serves as pastor. Although she was familiar with River of Life, since her parents and grandmother lived in Julington Creek Plantation, she said she attended Crossroad UMC when she was growing up. Her husband, Gil, now serves as youth director at Crossroad in addition to helping to lead services at River of Life two times per month. The couple has four children under the age of seven, and Martin said it was important to them to not worship at separate churches each Sunday.
Q: What was the first thing you did when you found out you’d been appointed to River of Life?
A: After I graduated from seminary, I was appointed to a church in Englewood, in southwest Florida. I served there as associate pastor of family ministries for four years. When I learned in 2019 that I’d been appointed back to northeast Florida, to River of Life, I was amazed. The first thing Gil and I did was drive up here for a day to tour preschools!
Q: What is your vision for River of Life?
A: The church’s vision is to be a source of living water of God’s grace flowing into our community. My prayer has been to send us people who need grace in their lives. We have many activities and ministries for all ages. One of our coolest ones is “Mid-Chill” for middle schoolers. This is held on Wednesday afternoons, which are early release days for St. Johns County public schools, from noon until 2:30 p.m. Middle school students can ride their bikes from Fruit Cove Middle School to the church, where our college interns oversee activities and devotions. We also recently started a Fresh Expression called “Preschool Playground Playdates,” where one time per month, preschool families from our church invite their friends with preschoolers to meet and play at a local playground or park.
I also love that our church is so giving. We recently hosted “Trick or Treat for Nonperishables” and collected more than 6,000 pounds of food for St. Francis House as well as for some families at our two local schools that were identified as needing some help.
Q: What do you like to do in your spare time?
A: I like being with people and building relationships. I started taking karate in September with my five-year-old. I was on the golf team at Mandarin High School and now we are introducing our family to golf. On Saturdays my parents let our kids spend the night and then bring them to church with them on Sunday morning. Gil and I play a round of golf and then go out for dinner afterwards.
Q: What is a little known fact about you?
A: Some people might not know that I got my second tattoo in the oldest tattoo parlor in the world: Razzouk Tattoo in Jerusalem. They have been tattooing as a family since the 1300s.
Q: What is your favorite Christmas tradition?
A: We have a lot of traditions involving my family growing up and my grandmother. But for my immediate family I think my favorite is ringing the bell at Publix for Christmas for the Salvation Army with my kids. We have done this now for a few years and we bring the whole show — instruments and off-key voices (except my Gil) singing our favorite Christmas carols. My older kids each also picked a child from under the Julington Creek Elementary tree to provide Christmas for.
Photo courtesy Perri Martin
Perri and Gil Martin
