For the next three months, operations of Fountain Hills Presbyterian Church will be anything but normal.

Rev. Bill Good, pastor and head of staff for the past seven years, will be on sabbatical leave from June 11 to Sept. 11.

In his absence, Rev. Ken Brown, associate pastor, will lead the combined 10 a.m. Sunday service and tend to the congregation’s needs during the summer. One guest pastor a month will be scheduled to relieve Brown of the Sunday sermon.

A sabbatical is designed to provide rest and respite for a pastor and a renewal of the individual’s spiritual life, said Good.

He believes a healthy sabbatical period results in deep renewal for both a church and its leader, and it re-energizes both to continue in a long-term pastorate.

“We will be apart. I will not be here,” explained Good in a May sermon to the congregation. “We will be alone, if you will, but we will always be together.

“I will only be gone physically…I will not be gone in spirit or emotionally.”

Good sees his sabbatical as a time for the congregation to rediscover its own capabilities and reexamine who is “really important around here…Jesus Christ.”

A pastor for 14 years, Good said the church is blessed with strong leaders to handle any issues.

Good plans to spend one or two weeks in a monastery to “reconnect with God.” Although not yet definite, he thinks his choice will be The Monastery of Christ in the Desert, a Benedictine monastic community near Abiquiu, N.M., about 75 miles north of Sante Fe.

While there, he will live in “rhythm of the monks” and devote “time in prayer for my life and the life of the church.”

“The spiritual life of a church is not any better than the spiritual life of its pastor,” he added.

In addition to recreating his spiritual life, Good knows his wife, Carolyn, has a “Honey do” list of projects for their home. They married last December but Carolyn recently moved here after selling her chiropractic business in New Jersey.

Relaxing and personal family time has also been reserved in the weeks ahead. A vacation to Aruba is planned with his wife, Carolyn’s mother and aunt, both in their 80s. A visit to Cleveland will reunite his seven-year-old daughter, Anabelle, and cousins. The Jersey shore also is on the itinerary. A stack of unread books also awaits him.